[TigersEye]

Thanks for a fantastic and informative reply. Coming from a milk-toast white, midwestern Protestant, Scots-blood family and raised in a Denver suburb, 'ethnicity' itself was an exotic concept until I floated off to Boulder to waste a year at college. Ethnic pride and Old Country history were non-entities to me. (Gotta thank Mel Gibson for Braveheart. It gave me a little scrap o' blood-pride to hang on to.)

I reckon we can both be thankful we're just Americans in the final analysis. The rest is just interesting history and circumstantial occurrences to me. Ain't never even seen Yurrup. Prolly ain't gunna.

Thanks again.

[HitmanLV]

I reckon we can both be thankful we're just Americans in the final analysis. The rest is just interesting history and circumstantial occurrences to me.

That's what it comes down to, I agree. I'm an American and don't really have much in common with folks in Italy. Beyond some cultural values (which are aligned with many American values I share, and in some cases values that 21st century Italians have let pass by), taste in foods, some music, etc., there isn't much that links me to the old country, really. That suits me just fine.

In fact, I always found folks who overplay their ethnic heritage a bit odd, and that emphasis misplaced. That's just me, though.

Thanks for the kind words and you're welcome!