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Morning

“Let freedom ring. Let the white dove sing. Let the whole world know that today is a day of reckoning. Let the weak be strong. Let the right be wrong. Roll the stone away. Let the guilty pay. It’s Independence Day.”

I woke up with this Martina McBride song in my head. Today is the 4th of July, and I plan on having a blast. Today I am gonna play with my kids and my hubby and cast off my monster. For today.

Tomorrow I will resume the previously scheduled programming that today is going to interrupt.

Last night we took the kids to Depoe Bay to see their fireworks. Smart town, that Depoe Bay. Sandwiched between two bigger towns, they must have figured out a while ago how to get their share of the tourist dollars and decided to beat Lincoln City and Newport to the party a day earlier. We came late so we had to sit quite a way from the throng and the booms. But it was nice. As Jaymi explained to a complaining Brandi (who just wanted the boom and the lights to match up) “This is just an extra. Tomorrow’s fireworks will be all FINALE. And the Finale will be a Finale’s FINALE!” Out of the mouths of babes.

Tomorrow’s fireworks.

I had one small thought that I quickly put away. “Wonder what the fireworks will look like from Heaven?” Next year I will be watching the Fireworks from a beach chair on the white sand of the Gulf of Mexico. In TEXAS! Not the white clouds of Heaven. Heaven will have to wait, ’cause Momma’s not going anywhere yet.

But the small thought was there.

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Night

It is now 8:45p and we are sitting on the beach on Siletz Bay. Right smack dab across the water from where the fireworks will be shooting off. Finale’s Finale just as Jaymi said. Boom and Bah right together tonight baby! The kids are building sandcastles. There are rockets going off everywhere and bon fires burning all around. There is someone behind me somewhere strumming on a guitar. The sun is just above the horizon. My toes are getting cold, but the sand feels good. I feel good. It’s been a wonderful day. Early afternoon brought the best small-town parade ever. The kids had a blast scrambling for candy thrown from the nothing-spectacular floats. The crowd was friendly and the temperature just right. After 45 minutes of clowns and funny cars, we walked down to the beach to avoid the exiting traffic and played tag with the surf for an hour. Dan and I tried to explain what the Gulf beaches will be like, but white sand and warm water is beyond their imagination. Home for a quick lunch and then we went to Devil’s Lake for a swim. It was the first time we took them there. The water was chilly, but way warmer than the ocean. They all had a blast. I watched them from my chair while reading my book. I wanted to join them, but I couldn’t take a chance of lake water somehow finding it’s way into my wound. It’s healed over and seems to be closed tight, but it wasn’t worth the chance of some other yuck getting in there. After the swim, we made our way here to Siletz bay and had dinner at Mo’s -famous for it’s chowder. Then plopped our selves down on the beach to wait. Dan has gone to get us coffee. I couldn’t wait until I got home to tell you about it. (I am sitting here on the beach writing this on my phone’s notepad. Isn‘t technology grand?) The only thing that would make this better is if Kelli and Tim were here with us.

Happy Birthday, America! It’s Independence Day!