Fireworks

Photo by Eliza Grahnke

It is a beautiful summer morning where I am today -- in my backyard. And so softly quiet, so gently alive after last night's fireworks gone crazy. 

I love fireworks -- the pretty kind, in the sky, not the random booms in the street. My daughter and I went to watch last night at the park and the sound of the firing, the shooting upward, the exploding into colors and sparkles echoed the thrill of fireworks past: at the ball park, at the lake front, at the local high school stadium, one year from the Hilton and Towers in Washington, DC. When I was a preteen my family and I watched the annual Independence Day fireworks sitting on the curb at the end of our block, looking over the well of the Eisenhower Expressway and up into the sky above us and the village park on the other side. 

The noisy stuff last night was stuff on the ground. At the park it was the crowd. So many kids chasing around, yelling and screaming, in the near-dark. Adults closing in on the edges of the crowd. My daughter in her lawn chair next to me entertaining herself with YouTube on her phone while complaining about the wait. And after we arrived back home and parked the car in the garage, we stepped out into the almost continuous explosions, near and far, the roar of Fourth of July in the city. 

The upside of all this is the quiet this morning. Bees in the thyme and lavender, cardinals in the elm tree, even the soft hum of the AC unit kicking in by the corner of the house. We are peacefully on the other side. There will be firecracker noise again by late afternoon today. This year's celebration of our nation's birth reaches into the weekend -- four full days of yee-ha! summer! 

Four days, maybe, of a slightly tamped-down news cycle. Oh, wait, not -- a presidential interview to be televised tonight. Lots more to worry about. Does Biden stay in or step out? Which way do our fears run? 

Last night I went to bed early, pulled the covers over my head and read a story from a distant land and time. Today, in the quiet, I sent some prayers heavenward for the country we celebrated so noisily last night.