on the fourth of july

   A long time ago, I had a neighbor who almost killed me with fireworks. She insisted the box said DIRECT TOWARD YOU. And so she lit it, the entire frickin' box, directing that huge (illegal  from Tennessee) box of fireworks at me and another friend, sitting on her driveway as we innocently enjoyed our nice 4th of July beverages.

The next thing I knew, screaming flames of fire were headed straight for us and I jumped up and ran like an Olympic sprinter from Kenya to get out of those screaming fireworks flames' way. They headed into my neighbor's garage, and kept landing there for one whole minute. After it ended, our neighborhood street looked just like Baghdad after a wave of shock and awe: smoke filled the streets, an eerie silence hung in the air, and the 80 year old lady across the street was fearfully peeking out of her door in her housecoat and curlers.

I could hear my husband calling: "Amy? Amy! Does anyone know where my wife is? Where is my wife! Amy? Amy!" (Inside, hiding behind the sofa.) It took us 5 minutes to find the dog, who'd hidden under a bush behind the house, and her "husband" (they weren't technically married) was calling her cuss word after cuss word for trying to burn down their house. He was wearing overalls (no shirt) and a fishing hat, right off the set of Deliverance, running around like a psychotic, waving a garden hose. Several months later at an HOA meeting, the whole HOA ganged up on him and went down a long list of things he was in violation of in the neighborhood adding, pointedly looking at him as they reached the end of their list and going, and I quote: "Oh. And NO fireworks."

The neighbors broke up a few years ago; he went mental and she (technically) married someone much more emotionally healthy who took away her access to huge boxes of fireworks. I have no idea what happened to the girl who was sitting next to me on the neighbor's driveway. I do know we stayed alive, though, and our 4th of July beverages were saved. And now? I have a really cute, "watch this, y'all!" 4th of July story to tell.

(I meant to post this yesterday, but we had some family issues, which I will write about tomorrow. In the meantime, I hope everyone had a happy 4th of July with nice beverages, and no one was almost killed by wayward boxes of fireworks.)