by Garrison Frost

This Fourth of July, you didn't go to the beach. You didn't put on a painted-on bathing suit, or see any people in painted-on bathing suits. In fact, you missed the whole beach thing altogether. You didn't participate in that overrated loser-fest that is the Hermosa Beach Ironman Competition, so you didn't run-paddle-drink and you didn't vomit on your feet and have to walk around like that all day long, and try to convince your girlfriend by giving her a long, romantic kiss that you weren't so hammered that you would walk around with vomit on your feet. And of course, you didn't encounter innumerable friends of the family, or even your parents, in this condition, or make your condition worse by accepting the many beers and other alcoholic beverages offered as the long, hard day wore on. So you weren't at the beach, didn't bother, didn't drive in circles for hours looking for parking, didn't walk miles trying to find a volleyball court, didn't try to swim or surf in that smelly red tide mush and didn't forget to put on any sunscreen at all because of the aforementioned drinking. No, you skipped the beach altogether, or better, went down on the July Second or Third or both and got your dose of beach without the crowds and the drinking and the vomit.

And you didn't go to a barbecue. Not on the Fourth at least, because after the hamburgers, hot dogs, tri-tip and other meat products of the three-day charcoal fest, your insides really just could not take it any more. So, on Monday, it was no to the carne asada, no to the Polish sausage, no to anything black around the edges, seared on the outside but pink on the inside, no to ketchup, mayonnaise and mustard.

And you didn't spend the Fourth blowing things up, either. No fireworks, firecrackers, sparklers, spinners, piccolos, roman candles or anything like that. Your hands don't smell of gunpowder now because you didn't contribute to the bursting, blasting bacchanalia that the Fourth has become. So when the cacophonous static of explosions let loose after sundown you were no part of it, leaving it to those who raided the cheap gas stations of Arizona and Tijuana for their M-80s, M-100s and all the other Ms that seem to sneak into the neighborhood every year, only to be lit by excited young hands.

And, thankfully, you didn't spend the Fourth lecturing everyone about the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and all that. There's nothing more annoying, after all, than attending one of the aforementioned barbecues and listening to some boozy behemoth holding forth on John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and George Washington and all the other men in white wigs who made this county – goddamn made sacrifices! – so that we could be the great country that we are today. No, you weren't going around asking people if they knew what the Fifth Amendment was, no you weren't showing off your knowledge of any other verse to God Bless America, and you weren't all blah-blah-blah about this or that civil liberty.

And you didn't drink and drive.

And you didn't watch television.

And you didn't go to a parade – although you might have if one had been handy.

(July 8, 2005)

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