Double L Photography: Once Upon A Time on the 4th Of July {Stories from a Holiday Weekend}

I'm standing on my parents' driveway talking to my nephew. His dark brown hair has been shaved in his traditional summer buzz cut. He's holding up a long piece of seaweed and telling me that his mother doesn't want him to have it, but that he wants it, but she doesn't want him to have it, but he wants it. "You should just do whatever you want, Tanaki," I tell him. He starts to laugh at me. It's a high-pitched, squeaky, muffled laugh that sounds like it's coming from inside a tin can. He's laughing so hard it almost sounds like there's two of him. And then I realize it's not him. It's my children down the hall. And I'm not on my parents' driveway. I'm in bed. It's 7:10 in the morning on the 4th of July.

Neither of my nephews have dark brown hair. And neither of them are Japanese.

It was a gorgeous day on the shore. Nothing like last year when we froze under gray skies and rain. This time it was all blue sky and sunshine. I packed a picnic lunch, gathered up some towels, grabbed my book and the kids, and we headed for the beach. While Prince Charming wandered the shore looking for treasures, the kids worked on digging a tunnel under the tree we had parked ourselves next to. Being the beach, there was, of course, a slight breeze. And when I say slight breeze, I mean gale force winds. So, every now and then, as they were digging, buckets of sand would hurricane their way onto my towel and into my fruit bowl.

"Hey! Be careful please. This is a no sand zone over here," I said.

My son stood up from behind the tree. "A no sand zone? The whole beach is a sand zone. If you don't want sand, don't come to the beach."

Punk.

As we usually do, the Prince and I spent a few hours during the evenings watching "our show". That's what we call the TV on DVD that we're completely addicted to. It's full of sex and drugs and four-letter words and the children are not permitted to enter the room while it's on. We had just finished an episode. The credits were rolling and there was a old tune from the 1940's playing in the background. It was jaunty and dreamy and romantic. I moved toward my love, dancing across the couch to him, shaking my shoulders, snapping my fingers, smiling that smile. He turned toward me.

"What are you doing? Are you going to start another episode or what?"

Punk.

This was kind of weird.

This was kind of uber-cool.

This was kind of reflective.

As the sun set on the holiday, we decided to see what all the hoopla was back out on the beach. (Of course, we knew what it was, I just like saying hoopla...and hullabaloo....). We put on our sweatshirts and made the trek over the dunes to the celebration on the sand. It was still pretty light out, and the sparks from the fireworks weren't making nearly the impact that the noise was. That golden hour was magical, though. As it always is.

P.S. We only lasted about 10 minutes on the sand. The wind was blowing pretty hard and the kids were kind of freaked by all the loud noise. So....Back to house.....

We set up our chairs on the deck, grabbed our sangria (because nothing says 4th of July like Mexican wine), snuggled under the stars and stripes quilt my mother gave us, and settled in for the show. It was magical and magnificent and exactly the reason we bought the beach house. The sparkle took up then entire beach front. The three miles into town were covered with revelers lighting off everything they had left over from the previous two nights of show. Big blasts. Huge bursts of color and fire and stars and light. One after the other after the other, each one creating its own poetry in the bright sunset on the horizon. It was just awesome. Awesome! We called to the kids.

"Come on, you guys! Come out here! You've gotta' see this!"