Independence Day
I love the 4th of July. It’s warm out, the food is generally being cooked by some burly man in an apron over an outdoor grill, and there are fireworks. I mean really, what’s better than fireworks and men cooking for you over an open flame? Fireworks make me think back to being a kid in Vermont. My parents would take us to what was probably a small park but to me it felt like a gigantic field that went on for days. I’m sure there were like maybe fifty people there but it felt like an ocean of people to me. I remember that feeling on a summer night when the air is finally cool and the sun is setting, your skin still slightly damp from the day’s heat. I always loved slipping into that jacket my mom always made sure I had and finally feeling warm; lying down on the blanket and smelling the cut grass. It always felt like such a treat to be out so late with the grown-ups as if something very mysterious were happening at that time of night. I’m sure mysterious things were happening – it was the 70’s in Vermont.
This year we’re celebrating the 4th at my parents’ house in the great state of Tennessee – I say “great” somewhat facetiously since they’re trying to ban the word “gay” there. Is it possible to ban a word? I’m sure we will be requested to engage in conversation about it while we’re there. Not with my parents but instead with some random, slightly intoxicated retiree that is still trying to figure out how we conceived our kids.