Sometimes, when my neighbors are lighting off fireworks at all hours of the night, I like to close my eyes and pretend that those fireworks are bombs. Like real bombs. The sort that destroy and kill and level. The sort that sound like a battle between good and evil, even if the good is sorta evil sometimes and the evil is once in a while, I assume, good. When I do this I realize that the annoyance of the fireworks isn’t really that bad, because they’re just little bombs made in China and sold in Indiana and the only destruction they leave in their wake is in the birds they kill and the animals they disorient. How grateful I am that the bombs in my life are just make believe.
If Memorial Day Weekend is intended to be a somber reflection, then Independence Day Weekend should be something different. Certainly our independence would not exist if not for the sacrifices of those men and women whose bravery far outweighs my own, but this is a weekend to celebrate what we have because of what they’ve done. We do not live in the most perfect of unions, but it’s our union, and it’s pretty terrific.
At the lake this weekend, the scene will be boisterous. It always is. So today I wanted to provide you with your Independence Day Weekend Primer:
- Don’t ever say “Happy Fourth!”. It’s Independence Day. Nothing less. A reminder, we do not say Happy 25th on Christmas, if we’re the celebrating type. Don’t say Happy Fourth, because it sounds absurd and it’s insulting to the real holiday.
2. If you’re going to light fireworks, please don’t do it late into the night. I have to sleep because my diabetic, deaf, blind dog wakes up at 4:45 am I can’t be up late.
3. Get out on your pier or on a boat to watch the fireworks. They’ll be Thursday evening in Fontana, and you should be there. If you go on your boat, don’t drink please. Safety first on a lake, especially at night. Be smart.
4. Marvel at the incredible pace at which the Lake Geneva area recovered from last Sunday’s storm. Pretty amazing effort, I’d say. Outside of some lasting damage in Cedar Point Park and in small pockets around the lake, it’s almost difficult to tell there was a rather catastrophic storm just over one week ago. If you have a handful of branches down, resist the urge to burn them this weekend. No one really likes smoky summer days or nights. Save that for autumn.
5. If you’re going to be fishing off of your pier or a boat, and you have houseguests who would like to do the same, please remember it’s easiest on you and your friends if you use artificial lures only. Buy some small chartreuse feather jigs at a local store and use 6 pound test line. Any kid can be taught to jig off of a pier. Single hooks (cut two of the three hooks off of each treble hook if you insist on fishing with lures that have treble hooks attached), and the barbs should be crimped down (use a needle nose pliers or similar). You’ll enjoy fishing so much more this way, and you won’t be killing fish. Remember, if you rip a fish apart to get the hook out and it “swims away strong”, it’s still going to die. Then you’ll be a fish murderer akin to my Uncle Joe and Grandpa, and while I loved those guys you don’t exactly want to fish like them.
See you around the lake this weekend. As always, I’ll be here, working. Other agents might be out of town serving their other random markets, but if you need anything at the lake, I’m your guy.