As a child in Arkansas, I remember getting excited when I saw the the long, wooden fireworks stands start popping up in June. They would be placed on undeveloped plots of land that hadn’t sold, or farmers would fence off and rent out a small part of their field for them to set up. We always stopped at the Rainbow Curve firework stand. No idea why my Mom and Daddy Gene chose that one. It was kind of on the way home? Anyhoo, the people who sold fireworks there were like Carnies. It was seasonal work. They were strangers. I never recognized or knew any of them. Usually good humored, but they seemed a little bit untrustworthy. Maybe this was because the fireworks they sold didn’t always work? This is when I learned the word “dud’. Later on in adulthood, I learned this word could be applied to people too.

At the same time in my life, I learned the word “punk”. Not in the Sex Pistols kinda way (I learned that later). A punk was a brown stick that looked like incense, but wasn’t. We were supposed to use it to safely lite the fireworks. ‘Mooooommmmmmm”, my punk is out….” I remember thinking that punks were a dud cause they didn’t do anything and would constantly burn out. Kinda true of the teenage wanna-be Punk I would turn out to be, but firework punks were a total let down. When they did successfully lite a fountain, the adults would always scream “RUN” at us kids. I think they enjoyed scaring us a little bit. They would tell us horror stories of children that had lost limbs because they held Roman Candles, or the same kids only had eye holes where eyes used to be due to badly aimed Bottle Rockets. It always seemed like a lie, until I met a survivor as an adult. Though he did look sexy in that eye-patch, I’m sure it wasn’t worth it.

July 4^th has always been a long day for me. Not quite the eternity that Thanksgiving is, with its never-ending football game and relatives who turned into couch zombies. At least the 4^th has a crackling crescendo and you know when its over. Drag shows used to be particularly good that night. Lady Liberty was always there and delivered a number that usually had star spangled bathing-beauty reveal.

Growing up, July 4^th always meant coolers, crowds and long lines of cars trying to get out of the parking lot. Later on in NYC I went to the FDR and jockeyed for position within that crowd. This is when I started to hate crowds. All the maneuvering to find a space to stand that wasn’t shoulder to shoulder. Then to finally find it and realize that I was standing in the middle of a highway and had to fight the crowd to get back out. I could’ve seen the same fireworks from the sidewalk, 40 blocks ago- what an idiot I was. Only since turning 50 have I been able to cast off the curse of FOMO.

Fireworks were best seen from a NYC rooftop. This was the golden ticket to be found. I found one once, and it couldn’t have been more perfect. A rare find of enough alcohol, not too many people, and funny conversations. Moments like that were what made living in New York magical. At the party, a sassy homosexual flirted with me and told me how he had converted a pickle barrel into a Jacuzzi. I couldn’t have been more impressed with his antics and story, but surprisingly didn’t sleep with him.

I live in Amsterdam now. They only do fireworks here on New Years Eve and the streets feel like a scene from The Purge. The city center crackles and pops like a war zone. Neighbors buy gigantic palettes of pyrotechnics and blow them up with complete disregard of cost or safety. Bicyclists laugh as they pedal drunkenly through the piles of shattered red cardboard. It feels primal and reawakens my sense of survival as I stand safely watching from the door.

I didn’t even realize it was the 4^th of July till a friend texted me yesterday. I do kind of miss it. I used to think that the US had invented the red, white and blue flag combination, that we were the only ones. Well, I did know about France, because of the Olympics, but that didn’t seem to count back then. Since living abroad I learned that many countries like The Netherlands, France, and of all places RUSSIA use those colors as well. There’s a big, beautiful world we’re sharing that we’re very lucky to have. Hopefully, someday we’ll all get along, and that would be a real cause for celebration.

Header Photo by Stephanie McCabe/ Unsplash