I just got back from the 9-day trip to Michigan . . . only 7 days really because I used up two of them getting from here to there and home again.
I was “Up North” at my oldest nephew’s house with his 3 siblings, a couple of partners/spouses, my oldest brother and one of my great nieces (they’re all great, but here I mean my niece’s daughter) who’s four going on a lot older. I don’t know how old exactly, but she came into this incarnation giving me directions about preparing something for her arrival while still in utero. She has an agenda and is following it. The rest of us are just supporting cast.
It was gorgeous.
And I had much sweet, close family time there after spending the Fourth down state at my cousin’s. He and his family do fireworks. I mean THEY DO FIREWORKS!!!! He’s retired from Ford and has his pyrotechnics license. West of Ann Arbor, it’s quite an event . . .
Lovely setting. That field is full of boxes that will explode when they receive their radio cues.
Lots of people come besides my family. I mean lots! As in the food line was constant for an hour and a half. I’m guessing they fed close to eight hundred or more people and many more descended in the evening for the loud event. They rent a tent and these big plastic “rooms” that kids jump around in. This is looking back at the crowd over my cousin’s first and second plantings of corn. He also grows a huge garden and sells produce at a stand on the road to help support his habit of blowing things up on the 4th of July. (Our Grandpa, besides having a regular job, was a vendor at the farmers market in Detroit in the early 1900s.) My cousin is a talented and versatile guy. And his mother, my 91-year-old-bright-and-cheerful-as-sunshine Auntie, is the only one left of her generation. She was there with bells on, our matriarch.
The fireworks didn’t start until about 10:06. We had to wait through the twilight . . . which was long and lovely.
And the next pictures . . . the ones of the fireworks . . . well, they do not do justice to the event. Because we sit as close as legally allowed, it thunders our bellies and the bright lights are directly overhead. If it were real “rockets” making a “red glare,” I would be terrified. As it is, I put in my earplugs and ooh and ahh at the beauty of these elegant light formations, all carefully choreographed to music.
Even with my earplugs in I hear it all.
Sparklies, 4th of July 2009
I spent last night near Detroit Metro airport with dear, long-term friends . . . you know the ones. They’ve traveled with you, worked with you, grieved divorces and deaths with you, fed you, been fed by you, given you gifts, accepted your gifts . . . and we’ve grayed together with good cheer, rich memories and love.
Man, what a great trip!
