Questioning Loyalty

Should I be loyal to the country where I was born?

where I’m a citizen?

where I just happened to rent a place for a few years?

How about the state where I was born?

where I grew up?

or, where I spent the most time waiting in traffic?

Should I be loyal to a county or city?

a neighborhood?

a street?

a single corner café that knows my order?

Should I be loyal to my family?

my immediate family only,

or all the way out to cousins I rarely see,

or a long-lost relative a website insists I share a fraction of DNA with?

Should I be loyal to my friends?

the ones who text me back,

or the ones who never do,

but who regularly like my Instagram posts?

Should I be loyal to the company I work for?

my work colleagues?

for how long? until one of us quits, or forever?

Should I be loyal to the sports teams in the city where I grew up?

the ones my parents liked?

the ones with a better mascot?

or perhaps the underdog team,

because it feels noble to suffer alongside them?

Should I be loyal to brands?

to shoes I wore as a teenager?

to toothpaste?

to a supermarket chain that reorganized its aisles just to spite me?

Should I be loyal to the religion I was born into,

or the one I stumbled into later,

or to the religion of my spouse’s family?

Should I be loyal to my language?

is it wrong to welcome new slang,

or noble to protect old words like museum artifacts?

should I honor the grammar my teachers swore was sacred,

or admit it was mostly a matter of fashion?

Should I be loyal to the people of my generation,

to classmates who graduated alongside me,

or those who share my zodiac sign?