Just returned from Braums where I went to get Burgers and
Ice cream for Joe and I. That will be
my 4th of July celebration…not having to cook, curled up on the
couch after a good burger with a bowl of ice cream and Joe watching a
movie. Fireworks are great but the older
I get I seem to have gone into the mindset of my dad who would always say “you’ve
seen one firework show, you’ve seen ‘em all” when we would talk excitedly about
going to see the fireworks on the 4th of July at some city park or
other venue.
Anyway, back to Braums.
As I pulled up there were a couple of little boys pulled up on bikes
that looked like they were held together by duct tape. The Braums I went to is only a few miles from
the RV park and in a poor, though safe neighborhood. One was about 6, the other maybe 10. Freckle faced and red headed, they looked
like a couple of little Tom Sawyers. I
went into the store and ordered the burgers.
As I waited I went over and looked at the ice cream to decide what kind
to buy. So many flavors! I remember
when I was a kid we would usually get one ½ gallon of Neopolitan about
once a month when my dad got paid. I
always wanted something different. But
with 5 kids Neopolitan was the logical choice since some of us liked vanilla
and some of us liked chocolate and we could only afford one half gallon. Every once in a while, my dad and I would go
for a drive leaving everyone else at home and we would go to this ice cream
place called Ashburns Ice Cream. My dad called it Assburns and I would giggle
at his joke. There I would get to choose
whatever flavor I wanted. I was careful
in my choice because it was such a treat and a secret treat at that and I didn’t
want to mess up and get something that I didn’t like. I think I only failed once in my choice and
that was when I ordered Pistachio thinking it sounded exotic. Most of the time, I settled on banana
nut. To this day when I taste banana nut
ice cream I think of my dad and Assburns ice cream and I smile.
Having chosen my ice cream flavors for the night, Toffee
bark for Joe and Strawberry Chocolate chip for me, I went to the counter to
pay. The little boys were in front of
me. As I stood behind them the older of
the two ordered 2 candy bar sundaes and a water and when the younger brother
said, no I want a coke, not water, he was told to be quiet by the big brother…we
only have $5.00. The clerk rang up their
ice cream and the total came to $5.86.
The older one turned to the little one and said, “you got any money in
your pocket?” “I think so”, he replied
and turned his pocket inside out. Out
rolled a couple of marbles, a bottle cap and a few pennies and a nickel or
two. I half expected to see frogs and
worms too! As he went off to chase down
the rolling marbles, I said to the counter lady, “I’ll pay for it…and add 2
small cokes”. The older boy whipped
around and looked at me in total disbelief. “
Thanks lady!” he said and his
smile could’ve lit up a room. Happy 4th
boys! I said. I have 2 boys too but they
are all grown up now. As the little one
came back to the counter, the older one said to him “this lady paid for our ice
cream AND A COKE! “ Then he tried to
hand me the $5.00 bill in his hand. “You
keep it” I said. This is my treat. The little
boy started jumping up and down he was so excited. We can buy some firecrackers
now Brody! he yelled out excitedly .
Then without hesitation, the older man behind me who had witnessed the
whole thing took a ten out of his pocket and handed it to the boy. Happy 4th of July he said. Be sure to ask your mama before you buy
firecrackers though and be really careful.
The lady at the counter turned to give the candy bar sundae order to the
teenager at the ice cream case and I paid and headed out the door. As I turned to go, the little boy ran up and
hugged me and said “this is the best 4th of July!”
It’s funny isn’t it how the littlest thing can make the
biggest difference. Not just to those 2
little boys either. Everyone in that
store was smiling. And as I sat eating
my burger and anticipating my ice cream tonight I realized how very blessed I
have been in my own life. It wasn’t a
lot, just a few dollars. But to those
boys it was A LOT!
I remember many 4th of July celebrations as a
kid. There were always fireworks in our neighborhood. That was before pop bottle rockets were outlawed
and before you had to have permits to shoot fireworks in your own front yard
and when everywhere you looked there were kids with sparklers and punks in
shorts and sandals, or still in their swimsuits from playing in the
sprinkler. Adults in those green webbed
lawn chairs, some with a beer in their hand.
The smell of barbeque grills and hot dogs. Someone would be working on homemade ice
cream, the old fashioned way where you had to keep adding salt and ice and a
cup towel over the top to keep the cold in.
Cranking the handle was a big deal and I remember how it felt like a privilege
to be able to help with that. We usually
only had a few fireworks because money was tight but for that one night every
year, we felt like kings as we opened our family pack and sorted out the kiddie
fireworks and put the others in order of how we were going to shoot them off,
always saving the biggest for last.
One of my favorite 4th of July memories was on the back
patio of our house in Stillwater. I must’ve
been about 14 or 15th. The Anderson
boys, Artie and Billy, lived across the pasture from our backyard and we had
been having bottle rocket fights with them all day (in fun of course). At some point my dad had come outside to
watch us doing fireworks in the backyard. One of us lit one of those chaser
things and it went up in the air and then all around the patio as we jumped out
of its way and finally it went up and then down and in almost slow motion as I
remember it landed in my dad’s boot. Had
we had a video camera I think we would’ve won America’s Funniest Video that
year. My dad jumped up, shaking his leg
trying to get his boot off, cussing at the top of his lungs. My mom ran out and grabbed his boot and
pulled it off. And then we all started
to laugh. And laugh, and laugh some more.
When I was 3, though I don’t remember it, the story was told
to me that I had picked up a firecracker called a cherry bomb while out in the
backyard with my brothers. Apparently,
this worked by throwing it as hard as you could to the ground and then it would
pop. I thought it was a cherry jawbreaker.
I picked it up, put it in my mouth and bit down. My mom said the next thing she heard was Jimmy
screaming that I had blown my mouth up.
My mom scooped me up, took me inside and cleaned out my mouth which was
bleeding from the explosion. Then she
said she gave me a popsicle. Popsicles I
should say because she said for the next week the inside of my mouth had
blisters from the burns on my gums. I
didn’t lose any teeth. Might explain why
I don’t like cherry jawbreakers.
When my boys got to the age where they liked doing fireworks
I would sit back and watch them as their dad supervised. I remember feeling bad for them the summers
that I had them for the 4th after the divorce because their
fireworks purchase was pretty slim (I couldn’t see spending money to watch
things blow up). They would usually end
up at their dads at some point during the day even then because like most grown
me I know, he would get as excited as they would about fireworks and spend way
too much money at the stand down the road.
Other than one year when they blew up my mailbox (with their
Uncle Grant) standing by (he never heard the end of that) and the year that
Andy and several of his buddies pooled their money, bought a bunch of
firecrackers and rigged them together to be set off all at once at a lot down
the road (now a park) causing me to have a minor panic attack when I realized
what they were planning….no one was hurt….none of the 4th of July’s
were memorable, at least for any bad things.
As fireworks go, you’ve seen one, you’ve seen em all as my
dad says. Though I must admit the
fireworks display we saw in San Francisco one year at the pier, with all sorts
of weird people wandering around and the fireworks being shot off from Alcatraz
Island to the synchronized patriotic music holds first place in my memory.
My mom and dad were married on the 4th of July in
1952 and had she lived, this would be their 62nd anniversary. That in itself always made the 4th
of July special to me. I always thought
it was ironic that they got married on Independence day.
As it draws closer to dark now, I can almost hear the
excited voices of my little boys many years ago waiting for dark so they could
help their dad pop firecrackers. Tonight
I will think of two other little boys who are probably at home with $15.00
worth of firecrackers waiting for dark to shoot them off in west Tulsa. That makes me smile.
Happy 4th to al
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