Holiday weekend, a mother’s pride

Last Thursday, the morning of the 4th, I had an email from a neighbor saying her adult children were coming to visit and bringing fireworks to set off for the holiday. I could go on about that, but the most important result of a night of sitting outside with horses and donkeys while warfare was simulated next door was a reminder of how amazing my own two young adult children are.

My son and daughter-in-law arrived from New York for the holiday weekend, bearing no fireworks, but a bag of extremely good coffee beans. Along with my daughter, they brought keen minds excited to talk about real issues in the world, loving souls happy to snuggle dogs and cats and comfort as needed while the warfare simulation was happening, and values that guide them to consider the environment, wildlife, all animals, and other people when celebrating and simply living on this planet.

I’ll never have to worry about any of them bringing fireworks home to frighten animals, trigger combat veterans, or pollute the air and neighborhood with toxic smoke.

I consider myself lucky and I hope I’ve modeled that consideration to them and in that way played a role in helping them develop into the people they are. And they will model the same to their own children, moving us collectively toward a country where July 4th means something other than exploding sound and flashing light and toxicity.

We celebrated with good food - made veggie burgers, homemade fries (thanks to my son for that!), and drank good wine on the 5th. On the 6th we had our favorite fresh summer pasta (sauce made with local tomatoes, garlic, and basil, plus olive oil, a little salt and pepper, and a round of Brie) with handmade linguine thanks again to my son. I made my mom’s old-fashioned lemon pie filling but served it with local blueberries and a few raspberries instead of in a crust. It was wonderful. Even more wonderful than the food was the conversation we had while preparing it. What a gift it is to sit with my entire brood together!

Thanks to Mother Earth for the rainfall that evening and to the cicadas for providing a giant white noise machine. And the trees for processing that horrid toxic smoke. By the time I went inside for the night, I could see the stars again, and hear the soft snorts of a calmer herd.