Fireworks…Whateva

I had a very nice Fourth of July holiday.  I consider myself pretty patriotic year round but of course on the Fourth everyone is really patriotic.  I really am proud to be an American.  It sounds like a song or just something you say but I truly am.  I get tears in my eyes when I hear the first ten minutes of Jimi Hendrix’s guitar solo of the Star Spangled Banner.  After the first ten though he loses me.  (I know it isn’t ten minutes long but geez, it feels like it!) Or if I see soldiers in a parade, I just can’t help but get choked up. I love the fireworks and the barbeques and honoring the soldiers who fought for our country.  We live in an amazing country and I think that on the Fourth everyone takes the time to recognize how fortunate and proud we are to be Americans.  I just like that vibe.

One of the great things about the 4th is the fireworks. I didn’t go to an official fireworks display this year.  I didn’t have to, it was all around me to the point of it sounding like a war zone.  I guess I just don’t get the need to blow things up.  I love the big displays that the cities put on but really do not like the fireworks that people set off at their own houses.  It never fails to get me all nervous.  Because anyone can buy fireworks.  People that I wouldn’t trust to use my scissors can buy little explosives and set them off in neighborhoods where there are houses 15 feet from each other.  Don’t get me wrong, I believe that we have the right to buy fireworks and light them.  I just think there should be some common sense test you must pass before you can buy bottle rockets and roman candles and let them off in a neighborhood.  I also think that you should have to be in an open area to explode things.  I know, America, freedom.  I get it but seriously people, come on.

Luckily, I and the people I love made it through the war zone that was my aunt’s neighborhood last night but it was by sheer luck.  When we walked out to our car there was a burned bottle rocket laying next to my car.  That is part of the problem with bottle rockets in the city.  They go off and you don’t know where they will land.  I was pretty unhappy.  I love my car.  I do not love bottle rockets.  I just don’t get the fascination.  But I guess it isn’t up to me.   This is the 43rd fireworks I have lived through without a serious incident, so my track record is 100%.  I guess maybe it’s time for me to relax a little, enjoy the holiday more, quit worrying about what might happen if that bottle rocket lands on a roof.  Maybe next year I will be the one lighting off bottle rockets, making the neighbors nervous.  It would probably be fun to watch other people get that look on their faces, and wonder if I am smart enough to aim away from their house.  This is supposed to be my year of change.  So look out for me next year, I am going to start stocking up now.  If you can’t beat them, join them!