My mother and her husband wanted us to see a fireworks display. We’d only been married maybe a year, and it was our first Independence Day together in Kansas City. My wife is from Northern California and admitted that 4th of July seemed bigger and louder in the midwest, what with all of the legal explosives and whatnot.
There were more than 20 displays scheduled in the metro area - we went to the closest, which happened to be in the parking lot up by the HyperMart (a gigantic WalMart with a full grocery store attached) over by Benjamin Stables, which was, well, a horse stable. (I think they took the horses away for this week).
It was only eight minutes away by car, and there wasn’t a line or anything because there was plenty of parking, since the parking lot was also attached to the local mall on its other side.
Anyway, when we got there my Mom’s husband parked the car, but left it running so the air conditioning would still work. And there we sat.
Awkward Silence #1.
“Are we here?” my wife asked.
“Yep.” he told her.
Awkward Silences #2 and #3
“Are they going to turn the lights out?” she asked. It was true: the orange lights in the parking lot were fully ablaze, each aluminum stalk sprouting tiny twin suns.
“Nope.” he responded, a true “man of few words”.
Awkward Silence #4
“…ok” she responded, and opened the door to the car.
“What are you doing?” my mother asked.
“I’m getting out to look at the fireworks.”
“Why?” Mom asked. “You can see them right there!”
“Where?”
“Through the windshield. They’re going to be right there.”
We were both in the back seat; we sklunked down as far as we could to look ahead of us between the seats to see this blank space where she said the fireworks would be.
“Mom,” I interjected, “this is a little oppressive; it isn’t even as big as a tv set from back here. We’re getting out of the car to look at them in the sky, the way a human being might.”
My mother was befuddled. “We didn’t get dressed to get out of the car.”
I opened my door. “Then you stay here. We’ll be right outside. Y’know, with the sky.”
“And the fireworks.” my wife added.
We stepped out into a tailgate festival. There were lawn chairs and coolers and babies running around with bare feet and conflicting styles of music from car radios. No one else seemed to have gotten dressed for getting out of their car either, yet were in no way pressured by social guidelines and were having an excellent time.
The car next to us had fully set up a mock backyard in the empty parking space next to them, with a tiny barbecue (definitely against some municipal code) three deluxe folding lawn chairs with those plastic weave ribbon seats, a boom box radio and a cooler filled with both beer and juice boxes.
One of their daughters, maybe four years old, was dancing around in a tight circle, singing a song she had made up, which went
Happy Fourth of July!
Happy Fourth of July! July! July! July!
Happy Fourth of July!
And then the fireworks started, right where my mother said they would, loud as everything.
And eventually my mother and her husband did get out of the car.
The display was gigantic, so low in the sky that it seemed only 50 feet away (definitely against a municipal code). But what we remember best is that little girl, who must be 30 years old now; dancing and laughing and singing her song as her parents chaise-lounged in the twinkling glow of Freedom, ringing.
My daughter now knows that song. We sing it every year. It is the song of the Fourth of July, an established fact, a fixed point in our family timeline. The glee of that little kid has echoed decades forward, sustained us on rainy 4ths, emboldened disappointing picnics and fireworks displays. Sometimes we sing it other days too.
The summer of lockdown many of our Brooklyn neighbors apparently took day trips to either Connecticut or Pennsylvania to fill their cars with professional grade fireworks. On that Fourth that July, our fourth floor windows were blazing with charge after charge of the Really Large Explosives (again, municipal code) which decorated the air right outside. Like, directly outside.
It was the best fireworks display we had ever seen; as close as we could get to being inside a fireworks display. Along with “ooo!”s and “ah!”s there were a couple of “WHOA!”s, but that made it extra exciting. In the impromptu video we took of the event, you can hear us all singing “Happy Fourth of July, July, July, July!”.
It doesn’t take much to make a holiday special, just family and tradition.
And, ok, maybe a blatant disregard of municipal codes.
Happy 4th of July July July July