Perfect weather
The sun warms the flesh and the air is infused with a cleansing ocean coolness
The breeze is playful
Leaves are screaming with green brilliance
I meander through Ballard with no destination
A memory comes: Andy Conrad lighting a firecracker in his mouth like a cigarette
The wick, fast as lightning, leaves him a fraction of a second to throw or spit the gunpowder from his mouth
Too late and BLAM!
His lips bleed, his nose is black, the fingers he raised to pull the tiny bomb from his mouth are bright red
He dances the crazed dance of the unexpectedly injured
I am sprawled on the still warm concrete in spasms of laughter watching him
The 4th is filled with memories of pyromania and suburban combat
Bottle rockets, firecrackers, Roman candles and BB guns make for moderately dangerous fun...
There is nothing more pleasing to the pre-pubescent boy than blasting a friend with some kind of burning object...or at least grazing him...ah! the joy of causing minor damage to structures or flesh!
I pass exiled smokers sucking away at sticks of death outside Wingmasters Bar and Grill
Inside the World Cup draws perhaps a dozen shabby looking characters and a few athletes who moan at a very wide screen TV while downing beer and chicken fat in the low light and piss perfumed air...
The coffee shop is packed with various stock characters: pairs of women discussing choices...life choices...food choices...choosing which choices to talk about and deciding if they are really choosing or just settling for someone else's choices (thank you Oprahchrist)....and outsider pensive sorts (like me) gazing at traffic while chewing on pens or attempting to be very pale.....a beard reads the paper, fluffing it in annoyance at something...pierced, bra-less young women fetch baked goods and grind beans....
Everything else is closed
The heat is gobbling up the cool ocean air and I move towards home trying to think of some observation about the 4th of July......
Explosions are fun for everyone except combat veterans and dogs
I've always thought it strange that we celebrate our independence by traumatizing former soldiers
I picture nervous grey haired men locked in closets, clutching pistols, wondering if maybe we could replace bombs and rockets with a traditional sing-a-long or dance....
And i think of food
corn on the cob, burgers, potato and fruit salad, that damn green bean casserole everyone makes, pies and cakes and brownies and cookies and beer and bombs and lawn chairs and and and and bloody flesh burned to perfection for sunburnt, drunk and hungry patriots...........the fat, violent , intolerant masses slobbing in collective gluttony............ and the beautiful ones too
especially the beautiful ones...............
Then I come upon a boarded up building with pictures of Betty Page, Albert Einstein and the Sex Pistols placed in the grimy front window in a wonderful shrine of absurdity...............
