Fourth of July...

We spent the Fourth of July weekend at my parents house in Long Island. For me going to see my folks is both peaceful and terribly stressful. When I am there I don't feel like a capable 30 year old mother of 2; I feel like the 16 year old who got caught drinking in the neighbor boy's basement. I don't know how to talk to my parents as an adult, and I don't think they always know how to see me as an adult. But there is a peace that engulfs me as soon as I see the funny little curve that branches off the highway and leads to their house. I like the feel of sand in my shoes, and chlorine in my hair; I love being able to play in the backyard with the kids, and to see them on the beach where I grew up in the summers.

And there is a lovely tradition sprouting up in the Fourth Weekend, one which echoes the

holidays of my earlier years. It seems I married a man who loves the fireworks. A man who drove to New Hampshire to purchase fireworks. A man who indulged my love of sparklers by buying me 288 colored sparklers and an untold number of smaller ones.

A man who (I'd put money on this) will let me nail a spinning wheel to the porch post in our potential new house....

My dad used to light fireworks (that did not come from New Hampshire, but possibly fell off the back of the truck on the way to New Hampshire) in the streets of Brooklyn. The spinning wheel of colored flames was nailed to the crooked tree out in front of the house and my dad cigerette in hand would light it. My dad is a gruff grouch. He stand places with his hands on his hips scouring the scene like a cop looking at a crime scene (or a crook casing the joint). But get him around kids with sparklers and he lights up, he smiles and laughs and offers to light more for kids who probably are too young for them in the first place.

For some reason I don't remember lighting fireworks on the beach growing up which is odd since we went to the beach every year, maybe we did but the gritty urban fireworks is the picture of my dad in my head. It is the image of my dad that makes me the happiest.