Happy Fourth of July

When a day comes along like Fourth of July, I never know what to do with it. Actually any holiday is always a question mark for me whether to comment on it or recognize that many who read blogs don't celebrate the same events. Well actually I don't celebrate many 'holidays' myself. Still everybody has a fourth of July whether it has special significance or not.

We do fly our American flag ahead of our American Fourth of July and usually a few days after it. We also fly it on other days that are symbolic and where a flag says yes, we agree this is a time to remember or be grateful. Our flag is getting faded and soon will start to fray. I am not eager to replace it as my mother gave it to me because she thought we should be flying flags and so we did and do.

When I was a child, Fourth of July was a big deal with fireworks. Most of the cousins would come out to our farm where we would light off the firecrackers, swirl around the sparklers, and for many years take something called a roman candle and let one cousin or another hold it as it went off. Then the adults read that was dangerous, children were losing fingers or hands doing it; so they set it on the ground the next year, the year when one blew up.

Now, with it being just Farm Boss and me, with cows that aren't fond of big bangs, we aren't doing anything for the Fourth. We actually will be recuperating from a week with our grandchildren here. It was a great week with good weather and a lot of activity. I was running my dishwasher every day while trying to think of what to cook that the kids would like.

Friday, the last full day of grandkid activity, they shot up the toy rockets which is what the above picture is of, kind of anyway as they move pretty fast and some of the photos are just smoke. The cows, of course, had an opinion on this as they came running each time to see what the heck was going on.

The smallest rocket didn't deploy its parachute properly which led to it burying itself in the ground. Farm boss convinced me that when it came down, the wind would take it a certain direction. The next time it came down on the opposite side of where we were all standing (forget wind when something is small and traveling fast with no parachute) and again went straight into the pasture. I have never been that sure the going down part is safe with those things and might take an umbrella next time to watch. The cows requested there be no next time.