INDEPENDENCE DAY

We used to get our 'caps' ready for days before the 4th arrived.

I don't know if kids have them anymore. Caps.

They came in paper rolls and in one shot tear offs.

Gunpowder in small doses. You put them in your cap pistol or, in our case, got the entire roll, maybe 50 shots, and hit it with a big hammer to make the loudest possible noise.

I loved the smell.

We did not have firecrackers. There were just a few kids who did but they weren't in our gang. Mostly city slickers.

We also had sparklers. I know that they are still around.

Someone always got burned by touching the burnt out sparkler right after it had died out.

You could also have sword fights while the sparkle was going or while it was cooling down. A cold sparkler wasn't much of a challenge.

After that, there wasn't a whole lot to do.

There was no parade. That was Memorial Day when school was still on and they could dragoon kids to march.

There were feeble fireworks. Of course, we didn't know that they were feeble. They were the only fireworks we had,

They set them off at a nearby private golf club.

The whole town would drive to a spot where you could see them clearly. Not the ground show. It was too far away. Maybe a mile. Just the sky.

I can't say that all of this gives me a lump in my throat for the good old days.

It is pretty much a non-holiday for me but that is because every day is a holiday.

I will have to settle for some reading and thinking about our country and what it means to me.

Then, I hope, that will stir me to some action.