It’s a big month in the Faber house as we celebrate the birthday of America and our middle daughter. The plus side of having a child with a birthday on July 4 is that we tell her all the fireworks and barbecues are in her honor. This white lie will either give her an incredibly inflated sense of self-worth or give her something to share with her therapist at some point.
When I conjure up images of what the typical Progressive Dairy reader looks like on July 4, I picture a massive mullet, an American flag Speedo and a boisterous voice reciting the national anthem while holding Roman candles in each hand. You are all legends in my mind. While our Faber Family Fourths are a lot more subdued, there was a time in your young author's life where July 4 was the highlight of the year.
How distinctly American of us to blow stuff up to honor the founding of our nation. While I assume no responsibility for these unique insights, as fireworks are incredibly dangerous, there was a time when yours truly knew how to modify some conventional fireworks into a much better version of themselves. This fascination of turning the seemingly mundane into the extraordinary seems to cross cultural and socio-economic boundaries. The pinnacle of childhood-modified fireworks was wrapping sparklers in electrical tape and creating a boom that would put you on an FBI watch list. This degeneracy ultimately leads to putting matches in tennis balls, Molotov cocktails and shooting Tannerite out in fields. As a former county EMT, I would encourage discretion if you are particularly fond of your digits.
This expression of rebellion through fireworks had a highlight in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic when Los Angeles County asked all of their residents to stay home and watch a fireworks show in their house on TV. The news crews shared footage in utter horror of the L.A. night sky being lit up like a Christmas tree in NYC. There is also something incredibly ironic in the fact that we blow up communist, sweatshop-manufactured fireworks in order to celebrate our independence. Made-in-America fireworks are typically only reserved for the likes of Raytheon and Lockheed Martin.
July 4 is also the official barometer to see how well this year's corn crop is looking. Our corn crop has always been knee-high by the fourth of July. Some years, however, we have had to send the 3-year-old out for a measurement.
This year, the Pacific Northwest had a particularly wet start to it. Wet enough that if Noah was building his ark, he would have found plenty of volunteers to assist in the build-out. Our July 4 knee-high measurement this year might be going to someone with a few less trips around the sun than normal.
As you and your family take some time out of your busy schedule to burn hot dogs and gunpowder, take time to reflect on this social experiment we call America. While there is much that is wrong with our country, it is still a country founded on Judeo-Christian principles with freedom, opportunity and independence coursing through her veins. She was, and still is, a place where those with ambition, desire and a work ethic could achieve anything. We owe what we have to those who have toiled, sacrificed and bled before us. Let us appreciate those before us, and work to make this nation one we improved on and left better for the generations that follow us.
