4th of July

 

 

Our gang used to have a July 3^rd bbq/party/fireworks party for the past...25+ years? It was an excuse for us boys to be 12 again with adult sized fireworks, with the addition of alcohol. Never once did we blow our hands off, set fire to a neighbor’s house but we did upset and distress a few neighbors who did not share our idea of fun. We managed to stop the scrutiny of the Pawtucket PD due to one of us being related to the dispatcher there. Who, when called, immediately recognized the offending address and then...never relay the complaint to a patrol car.

These parties included too much food, too much beer and perhaps $4,000 worth of fireworks, all set up with either fast or slow burning fuses, depending how much noise we wanted to make. Like most drunken or near drunk adults, there was a fair amount of romantic play between the singles, the marrieds, the cheating marrieds…who were more than a few.

But…

As the years went by, we got much older. The last party I attended I had noticed that most of us originals, now inhabited the table where the oldies we knew from before naturally gravitated too. You know the table, everyone’s fat, bald or white haired or all three at once! I found myself there because I knew them and they were the only people I could relate to. I was kind of shocked we were all there now, when once before we’d be the ones dancing, drinking our guts out or nearly blowing our hands off with fireworks.

When younger, the party lasted till dawn. Those w/o the stamina would sleep in chaise lounge chairs, in their cars or various places around the property. Eventually, the first light would come and we’d all finally leave.

But that last time, as I sat there with the others watching the young ones on the dance floor, doing triple jello shots and handstand kegger tricks, I heard once couple my age say…

“Honey...look...it’s past 11”

Those two excused themselves and said their Good Byes to the rest of us.

Since they broke the seal...others within minutes started to excuse themselves with BS or actual reasons to leave. One friend my age, then said to me, “Ahhh...guess I’ll go home too.” He had spent a better part of our conversation detailing how his surgeon fused some of his vertebrae due to years long back pain.

I stayed...knowing I didn’t have to be anywhere the next day and could easily sneak drive home avoiding the cops should they be out there. I had in me a huge total of...3 beers in 3 hours. Hardly DWI levels, but as I got older, it took sooo little alcohol to put a buzz on.

I stayed an additional 20 minutes when I felt my eye lids getting heavy, it was 11:45pm.

I left.

The second reason these parties came to an end was due to the older teen kids my friends had and would show up to see the fireworks display we would put on. And while we were busy with that, the kids would fill up on Manhattan Iced Teas and Alabama Slammers. The adults/parents knew and hopefully thought, “Well….how drunk can you get in 30 mins?” This was allowed for...one year only.

Getting older makes you get far more fearful of what might happen because all your life you’ve seen things happen to those around you or even in your own life to know...wild shit does happen.

When it became very obvious that the State would prosecute the hell out of the hosts if one teen slid his car into a family SUV of six...and that kid got his booze from that party...the liability stopped the event for good. It was damn near impossible to require ID at the property line to see if you were old enough to drink and never mind the culpability host laws that apply to full grown adults who can legally drink. You get them drunk at your home, enjoy the lawsuit that may come should they too slam into a family of six.

The party ending was not a big deal really, all of that coincided with our becoming old fucks who can’t keep our eyes open past midnight anyway. 

 

Moon Traveler Bottle Rockets and Mugsy Or “The Mugsy Seeking Smart Missle”

Poor Mugsy. She was an elderly dog that lived across the street from me with the Poal family. Every morning if it was warm enough, they shoved Mugsy out the kitchen door where she just lay and sleep in the sun in the driveway and coughed like hell once in a while. The Poals had two other dogs that were more loved and treated better. The were two little needle toothed, yippy little shit Toy Poodles, named Zsa Zsa and Buttons.

My friends at the time then, were were under 8 years old, preferred Mugsy’s laid back, too damn tired to move anymore attitude vs. those two yapping, tiny Nazi dogs who would do nothing else but bark at us and try to nip our ankles when they were out. The only thing Mugsy ever did that astonished us young kids would be to heave up her Alpo dinner onto the sidewalk 10 minutes after eating it, then have a good 20 minute sit down to catch her breath. After that rest, she’d get up, re-eat the pile of dog barf she had deposited earlier.

“Auggggh! Grossss! She’s eating her own puke!!”

But my brother and his friends, who were around 12, had other ideas for Mugsy one day.

I, Jim, Pat and John came upon our older brothers one afternoon after we had heard the whooshing and loud bang of bottle rockets being set off. What we saw was that they had fashioned a kind of bazooka out of a pipe which could be loaded with bottle rockets and aimed at...Mugsy.

The boys couldn’t stop laughing their asses off each time they fired one across the street into the upper driveway of the Poal’s house. No one was home there except Mugsy that day. The two little Nazi criminal dogs were inside all day until Mrs Poal let them loose at 4PM to chase us kids up and down the street.

Phhhhsssssh….BANG! And the older boys roiled with laughter. Lucky for Mugsy, bottle rockets are not accurate in any sense and would go off on their own trails no matter how expertly you aimed them.

We little kids were surprised at this. We had never seen anyone shoot off fireworks at a dog before. Mugsy, to her credit, took it in stride, just sitting there and just looked to where the rockets veered and exploded 10 feet to either side of her. This went on for a good 30 minutes.

Finally, Mr Cardosi, a retried neighbor came out shouting, “You leave that poor OLD dog alone! How would YOU like it if I shoved a bottle rocket up YOUR ASS?!!!”

I never had heard nice ol’ Mr Cardosi threatening our older brothers with shoving anything up their asses before. You learn surprising things when you’re 7.

So being guilted into cutting it out, the older ones relented and sulked their way down the street, all butt hurt being denied their “fun.”

We younger ones never followed them, we just were sat by the curb, hanging out trying to come up with something fun to do when we hear too close to us...

“Phhhhssssssshhhh BANG!”

Our bastard older brothers are firing bottle rockets from down the street...this time at us. 

I include the following cartoon...all of this happened in one form or another in our neighborhood growing up.  

 

On the bottom right  you see the "Mouth Loading Lady Finger Grade...NON Repeater." stunt. There was a kid who came to our neighborhood at times, one we didn't really like, Scott. Scott was older, a bully and permanently  dressed in filthy clothing.  He said to us he could "spit out a lit salute that he held in his lips" before it exploded. If you know anything about salutes, their wick's burn time is either two seconds or IMMEDIATELY. So we watch Scott put one between his lips and light it. A tenth of a second later it went off and we saw Scott hopping around spitting out  salute confetti as hit had blown into his mouth. 

Dumb fuck...