Living-Deliberately.com

Wherever you are, however you’re celebrating, I hope it’s a great one!

My favorite memories for 4th of July always include the beach and fireworks at dusk. I like the small ones at home better than the big displays that require sitting through a traffic jam. Best yet is being able to do the small ones at home AND see the big ones from afar, ahead of the traffic! This year was a mingling of the usual (Mom’s potato salad and sparklers) and the not (no beach trip or parade).

I think my favorite memory of the 4th ever was one year on the “farm” I grew up on in Michigan (no animals and the garden was one full of roses). That year my dad went a little crazy with the fireworks and it’s really the first year I remember them. I was amazed and a little frightened and awestruck; I must have been 7. My sister and I had a summer habit of getting baths and nightgowns on and then heading back outside to run barefoot in the chilled grass, challenging one another to see who could run the farthest out of the circle of light, hoping to make it to the locust tree on the edge of the grove we called “the park”. I don’t think either of us ever made it that far, always turning chicken about half way across the yard. When I think of it, I remember the heavy smell of roses hanging in the dark air, the coolness of the grass just on the verge of dew, and laughing with a sister I was usually bickering with under the brighter light of day. And maybe all of that didn’t happen on that same 4th….or maybe it did. Childhood sometimes coagulates that way in the adult mind and that’s okay. What I know is that memory is one my sister and I both count as one of our mutual favorites and I think of it every time I sit barefoot at dusk, watch fireflies, or light a sparkler with a child on the 4th.

So here’s a toast to the Fourth, Families, Food, and Fantastic Memories! Blessings to all~

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