It was a massive display.
The cardboard wheel on the ground was blowing off two hundred and fifty dollars worth of gunpowder and other cool stuff making big booming blossoms of color in the twilight on the beach at Saint Augustine the night of July 4th, 2007.
Bright blue stabs of light were cutting through the rockets red (and green and blue and yellow) glare. Blue stabs reflecting off the sunburned faces of the vacationing revelers as they cheered and screamed. Blue stabs from the Police SUV parked near the offending, illegal, and abandoned wheel of fire.
What would John Adams think of us? To celebrate the Fourth of July properly, most of us (and our children) break the law… with fireworks. The Adams quote I am referring to is from a letter to his wife, Abigale, about the document that was going to be declared the next day.
“[The Fourth]… will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations from one end of this Continent to the other from this time forward forever more.”
One important thing they left out of that document of John’s and the Constitution. They did not give Americans the right to bear fireworks.
As evening drew on, a walk down the beach resembled coming ashore at D-Day. People were setting off their rockets in their front yards and pointing them over the beach. Falling from the sky onto the beach were all the itty-bitty pieces of paper and wood and hot sparks and Oh HELL! DUCK!
There were also some massive explosions on the ground that could have only come from elicit dynamite. Federal Law outlawed Cherry Bombs, M-80’s, and Silver Salutes as having too much gunpowder in them. Gun enthusiasts with their own supplies of gunpowder have since started “rolling their own”. Instructions are on the Internet. No, I am not putting my liability insurance at risk by posting a link.
Some die-hard down the beach had gotten his hands on professional class B mortar shells and was busy blowing it all up as fast as he could. He was burning money — right at three thousand dollars by my estimate — and having the time of his life.
Like most laws banning something everyone is going to do anyway, Florida’s fireworks laws are a study in lunacy. You are allowed to sell any firework not declared illegal by the federal government even if it is banned in Florida. The person who purchases the fireworks agrees to only blow them up where they are actually legal.
Tell that to the cops on Saint Augustine Beach who beat a retreat down to the pier so as to be out of harms way. They could arrest all of us, but I doubt there would be room enough in the Castillo de San Macros to hold us all.
Instead of parking cops on the beach, they should have gone with an Ambulance, EMT’s, and a cooler full of spare fingers. You can be hurt with fireworks. Really. Eleven people died and 9600 were injured in 2006 according to some do-gooder organization. I’ll be damned if I give these people’s name or a link to their website, so you’ll just have to take these numbers on faith.
Danger is part of the charm. We Americans have scrubbed the continent clean of most hazards by killing anything living that threatened us and bulldozing what was left. This has left us bereft of the joys of random danger. Not to worry, being Americans, we can make our own randomness especially on a day to celebrate being rash and rebellious.
The newspapers in 2007 dutifully noted the number of fireworks injuries the next day by calling around to the local hospitals and the usual cast of characters commented on it one way or the other. What is always missing from these stories is the victims happily telling their friends how they “damn near burnt off my finger” on the Forth. That is the truth that the media can’t handle.
Today is June 1st, 2009. The Fourth is looming. Lay in your supply now, BUT don’t spend ALL your money just yet. Everything they don’t sell by July 4th will be On SALE July 5th!
Stock up now for New Years – you scofflaw.
edited June 2 because I misspelled fourth as forth. and a hat tip to my Modern Foreign Language expert Grady Lacy.
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{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
I must confess that I too have almost blown off one of my digits while shooting off those nasty bottle rockets. It was supposed to shoot up but it fell back into the bottle and I stuck my hand in there trying to get it out. I didn’t know I could bleed that much and not pass out.
I observe the five minute rule: If a firework misfires do not approach for five minutes. I doubled that the night the bottle rocket fell back into the box full of fireworks.
Yikes! What a mess, Marvel. I’ll just stick to going to the ballpark or some other event and letting them entertain me with kabooms!
I did that once years ago in Ocala, FL. Everyone was in the park watching the fireworks when suddenly one of them veered away and blew up at treetop level above the crowd. The loudest sphincter tightening on record!
I assume you really mean the “fourth” (spelled out form of 4th) and not “forth” as in “Let us go forth to love and serve the Lord!”
ok, you nailed me. The spell checker liked it!
Fireworks in the South are as American as hold my beer Bubba; watch this.
Amen
Fireworks are legal here in South Carolina. One year our small almost-town had an official fireworks display in a pasture across from the fire department. Good thing. They set the field on fire. Best. Fourth. Ever.
I love the 4th & the fireworks I always have but living in AZ. where fireworks are ILLEGAL due to the Desert conditions it’s very high risk to set them off privately but everyone does it including me but I only set off the small stuff.
I used to drive long haul & have gathered a stock of LARGE fireworks from states where they are legal that I have yet to find a safe place here in AZ. to set them off, maybe one day I’ll take them up to Utah’s Great Salt Lake, not much brush fire risk there.
Hey Merrill,
Your blog is fun! I have not seen you, I guess since your Sprint days.
I was thinking about fm96 the other day. I was listening to a local radio station, can’t remember which one, and I was critiquing in my mind how I would have said the local ad I was hearing.. it was terrible…………
I enjoyed writing the copy for Cornerstone Fashion and going to the station to record them.
I checked out the blog recommendation and I LOVE it. I will start reading it. Good to hear from you and think about wvvs,and the 80’s. Where those the GOOD ole’ days? In lots of ways yes!