Happy July 4th!

I have a traditional musing for today, but I figured I’d give you an update first. The morning is lovely. The yard is bathed in sunlight. The breeze is light but cooling. Yesterday I planted a few flowers and some herbs in deck pots. I have more to plant. Last night Nala came in chewing a small plastic pot. This morning I found the basil from that pot on the driveway. I potted the poor victim. I need a few more flowers for the empty clay pots. I’ll shop tomorrow. We have a uke concert in Hyannis this afternoon. We’ll be playing Songs Across America with a rousing patriotic set at the end.

I just love birthdays and today is the grandest of them all. 

On July 3rd 1776, John Adams wrote a letter to his wife Abigail. In it, he predicted the celebrations for American Independence Day, including the parties:

“It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other.”

John Adams expected July 2nd to be Independence Day as that was the day the Second Continental Congress voted for independence, but the signing ceremony for the Declaration of Independence didn’t happen until two days later so because July 4th appears on the Declaration, it became the date we celebrate Independence.

I know some people complain that the meaning of the day is lost in the barbecues and the fireworks, but they have forgotten John Adams’ hope. We are honoring the day exactly as he wished. Flags are waving everywhere. Families get together to celebrate and to break bread, albeit hot dog rolls. Fireworks illuminate the sky. Baseball is played on small town fields and in huge stadiums. Drums beat the cadence in parades. We sing rousing songs celebrating America and our freedom. We also sing heartfelt songs about what America means to us. We are many sorts of people, we Americans. We don’t all look the same, practice the same religion, eat the same foods or dress in the same way, but we all celebrate today.

“You have to love a nation that celebrates its independence every July 4th, not with a parade of guns, tanks, and soldiers who file by the White House in a show of strength and muscle, but with family picnics where kids throw Frisbees, the potato salad gets iffy, and the flies die from happiness. You may think you have overeaten, but it is patriotism.” Happy Birthday, America, from all of us Americans.

It is a bright, sunny, cool morning, but the day will be hot. We’re talking Cape Cod hot. The high will be 78°. My friends in Texas would wear winter coats.

I have an empty dance card today so I’ll be staying home. My to-do list is short. I have to hunt down my other slipper. It disappeared. I also have to vacuum, no surprise there, but I have an idea which may save me. I’ll wear socks and dust the floor as I walk. This technique originated in Moscow where they made us put covers over all our shoes when we toured museums. Their floors were all shiny and dust free.

When I lived in Ghana, my mother sent me packages. Inside them were games, books and, best of all, food. I remember beef jerky, boxes of Chef Boyardee pizza mix, envelopes like beef stroganoff and soup and candy which wouldn’t melt on the trip. I rationed my treats. Six days a week I’d eat Ghanaian food. Sunday was American food day.

Toward the end of my PST, a Peace Corps acronym meaning pre-service training, we were in Korforidua when one of the staff invited me to go to Accra with her. She drove. We went to a small, classy bar near the casinos. I didn’t even know places like that existed. We sat at the bar and played liar’s dice with the bartender for drinks. We did a bit of dancing on the small dance floor. I never found those places again.

During Easter vacation in my second year I went to Accra. I met up with friends who were also staying in the hostel. One of them was leaving Ghana as his school was closed for the rest of the year because of a riot. We all decided to have a few farewell drinks with him. We went to a large old hotel. The bar had tall ceilings and plants in pots by the long windows. There were couches and chairs covered in flowery fabrics. Overhead were fans. I felt as if I had been transported back in time to a bar in a grand hotel like Raffles. I was no longer in the Ghana I knew so well. I expected well dressed British couples to come through the door for cocktail hour. It was that kind of place.