When the fireworks stands open in June, he starts getting a glaze in his eyes and a little extra jitter in his step whenever he think about them. He begs to go looking inside those big, magical tents and trailers by the side of the road, and literally jumps up and down when his daddy is ready to take him.
It was like waiting for Christmas around here this week as we counted down to D-Day. (Not that D-Day, the other one.) There were just as many cries of "please, can we just light one ground bloom flower" (or black snake, or smoke bomb) as there were requests to unwrap "just a small present" in mid-December.
While Mim was willing to approach the launching pad for a few items, like the smoke bomb pictured above, she spent most of the time huddled with me on the trampoline. (Art had pulled it up near the back deck.) We had blankets over our head to protect ourselves from the possible fall-out, and looked like we were trying out for a particularly avant-garde interpretation of the Nativity scene.
When we first began our evening of entertainment, the fireflies looked as if they might be trying to give us a run for our money, but it wasn't long before they had all fallen prey to inferiority complexes or very brief, confusing love affairs, because they eventually stopped lighting the edges of the creek and backyard.
Now we have stopped, and the kids are showering and brushing teeth in preparation for what will probably be a restless hour of trying to get to sleep. The neighbors, who have teenagers, are still going strong, and will probably continue for some time to come. As long as we don't have anything land on our roof, we should be done with our own excitement for the evening. Here's hoping.
Before he went to bed tonight, Zaya came to give me a kiss and said, "Mom, thanks for not going with Dad and I to get fireworks so we could buy lots of good stuff." I do what I can.
Happy 4th, everyone!
1 comment:
I think you captured Zaya's attitude in this picture.
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