For the first time in the five years we have lived in the Greatest City in the World, Tom and I braved the crowd and stood by the East River to watch the Macy's fireworks.
Not that we hadn't seen them before. In other years we used to climb to the roof of Menno House. After we moved away from that realm, we were a little anti-fireworks, so we went to an empty bar (I had a stiff margarita) and watched them on TV. What was funny about that is we were close enough to hear the boom and crackle of said fireworks. The next year we sat far away in Central Park on a very sticky night. Our friend, Lady L met us there, and she suddenly wanted to go see, so we hurried to the subway--only to sit and wait for the train for an extraoridinary amount of time. By the time we surfaced, we saw everyone leaving.
This year we stood on the FDR highway for about two hours with some other friends of ours: Master Zanderoc and Mistress Szenga. They'd decided that since they were probably moving back to that mythical land called California within the next year, it was time to see them up close. And we tagged along.
The fireworks were pretty good. Worth the foot-hurting wait, though I was a bit tired of them by the end. Come on, come on, I thought, get to the grand finale already. There were these cool ones that kind of floated and dove over the water. I don't understand fireworks already, but that seemed pretty amazing.
I am glad we went, though sometimes I feel the hokey ones I went to in the past were better in some way. Or at least the anticipation was greater. I guess that comes from being a kid. One of the first Fourths I remember was a visit with an uncle's fiancee's family. I basically remember her little brothers or cousins lighting these worm-like things that writhed and struggled on the patio. Another memorable Fourth was when some high school friends and I climbed into a giant pre-SUV and headed for the fireworks in Peabody. Somehow we got lost and wandered the back roads for a long long time. I remember seeing them from a distance. We never actually made it to Peabody. A final memory (at least for this blog) was one summer between my Sophomore/Junior year of college. A bunch of us climbed the Hill behind campus and watched the various firework shows in the Shenandoah Valley.