Happy Birthday, America! Let’s Blow Stuff Up!

My closest friends and family can tell you that I’ve been known to send birthday wishes and presents months after the actual event, so really, my entry concerning the Fourth of July is much timelier than might otherwise have been expected.

Last week, Beau and I escaped the stifling heat of our third floor oven for the Cape, which is cooler and offers many enticing forms of entertainment such as floating on a raft, drinking on the cheap, and molesting puppies. Yes, you heard me right. His aunt and uncle from down south brought their immensely cute golden retriever, Nelly, who quickly learned that I could be counted on for ear massages and slipping steak tips under the dinner table. We bonded up until the point we went for what was advertised as a “quick tinkle walk” and she crapped. Twice. Within a block. On someone’s front lawn. We’re currently seeking counseling.

Most of the week there (I asked for time off around 3:30 on Tuesday and then didn’t show up for the rest of the week – whatev, I already quit) was spent doing Capey things like buying $1 records at the flea market and barbequing meat. We saved the really good stuff for the Fourth.

Along with a dog, Beau’s extended family also brought fireworks. After an afternoon of drinking in celebration of our country, we decided it would be an excellent idea to set them off in broad daylight on the front lawn. Once we’d properly drawn all the neighbors from their houses with the racket, Beau’s mother got mischievous. This is the woman who once used the word “dildo” during a Scrabble game on Thanksgiving. Just give Mama Beau three fingers of whiskey and she turns into a frat boy. For example…

Across the street from the Beaus’ summer house is a rental property owned – and poorly maintained – by an extremely wealthy, eccentric couple who are “in oil.” Outside the vacant house this weekend was a leather arm chair from the mid-1950s and two brass lamps circa the Roosevelt administration. Propped on the chair was an old pizza box with the word “FREE” scrawled across it. Nearby, their junk car sat with a heavily duck taped sunroof and an antenna bent to a 90-degree angle. Mama Beau assessed the situation and determined the only appropriate course of action would be to place the arm chair on top of the vehicle. For this purpose, Beau and I were recruited.

Barefoot and under the watchful eyes of 10 to 15 neighbors, we repositioned the offending piece of furniture at its new altitude and scuttled back to the safety of the front lawn where we continued to set off fireworks and be judged by the folks next door. There are a series of pictures that I can offer as proof but SOMEBODY left the camera on the Cape so I won’t be able to until next week.

And so it is that we celebrated the birth of this great nation by doing those things that a proper American should do: drink excessively, play with explosives and invade neighboring pieces of property.