2021 Life Logs, Day 185: July 4th
2021 Life Logs, Day 185: July 4th
Date: Sunday, July 4, 2021
Weather: Overcast with Periods of Light Rain, Cool; High 65, Low 55 degrees
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
Here on Cape Cod we celebrated the 4th of July with a 4th overcast day with periods of light rain. The sun actually tried to peak through a couple of times today, but it was not successful. This weather has managed to get me into a blah mood where I really just don’t want to do anything. So, Shadow and I spent the day alone doing nothing until about 4 pm. I finally decided to take Shadow for his morning mile walk and by the time we got back home, I was feeling much more energetic. 
I had planned to use the strawberries and blueberries left over from making fruit salad for Friday’s luncheon to make two red, white, and blue fruit flans as 4th of July gifts—one for Heather and family and one for Shirley and Doris next door. So, with my renewed energy after the walk, I did get them made but it was too late to deliver them. They will now get a July 5th patriotic food gift.
There were no 4th fireworks in Falmouth again this year, so I searched on the television for some sort of 4th of July celebration. I saw that there was a program called A Capitol Fourth on public television. So, after watching a recorded Meet the Press, I tuned into the public television program. It was a music concert of different artists around the country interspersed with lots of video of a very red, white, and blue enthusiastic audience on the mall in Washington, DC. They looked so happy and so normal and that set off emotions in me that I didn’t know were there. Just seeing normal, happy people in our nation’s capital brought back all the dark memories of January 6th and that made me both sad and angry. I have always loved Washington, DC–the mall, the Capitol building, the Washington Monument, the Smithsonian, the Lincoln Memorial, the White House. And not until tonight did I realize just how horrific January 6 really was and how it has affected me. I am not ready to ‘kiss and make up’ and act like nothing happened. Sacred grounds were denigrated and because the leadership of the Republican Party has not willingly wanted to cooperate in getting to the bottom of what really happened, I no longer feel like I live “in the land of the free and the home of the brave.” I feel more like I live in a land with a whole lot of cowards who put political gain ahead of democracy. Because of this, this 4th of July was tough for me. I did enjoy the fireworks during the last half hour of the PBS program. And just as the program ended, I saw the sky light up out of my living room window. I opened the door so I could the fireworks lighting up the Eel River. They, too, were beautiful and lifted me out of my dark mood. Happy 4th of July.
What do you do on the third straight rainy day of a holiday weekend? One option is to ignore the rain and play mini golf. Heather and family have been camping in the rain since Thursday and they refused to let it dampen their spirits. On their way home today, Heather sent a text saying they were going to the Sandwich Mini Golf Course and then to Sweet Caroline’s for ice cream. Would I like to come? YES!!! The Sandwich course has 36-holes and we played the whole thing with very little rain. The boys like this course because a stream runs through it which gives them the opportunity to retrieve the balls that inevitably go astray and land in the water. Also, the Cape Cod Dinner Train that runs between Hyannis and Bourne goes right by course and it is always fun to listen to the train whistle and watch it pass by. We had only misty rain once in a while. Lucky for us, the pouring rain came down once we were had our ice cream and were on our way home. A good time was had by all and the Goldstones are one mini golf course and one Cape Cod ice cream shop closer to their goal of visiting all of them this summer.
Heather, Jed, and boys left this afternoon for two nights of camping at Nickerson State Park in Brewster up near the Cape Cod Bay. The park has lots of ponds for swimming, a bike path, and hiking trails, but the weather forecast is for rain for the whole time they will be there.
The Goldpebbles and I packed a lot into this last day of June. I thought we were going to the beach, but just as I was leaving home, I got a text from Heather saying the boys had set up a misting hose and had turned their backyard trampoline into a waterpark adventure and they were not going to be ready to head to the beach quite yet. So, we adjusted plans and I watched as they had a great time keeping cool. Their goal was for each of them to be able to do two bounces on their bums and then land on their feet, one Goldpebble after another. They practiced and practiced and achieved their goal which resulted in squeals of joy. They then headed to the deck to make roll their own roll up for lunch and then we were off for a couple of hours at Menauhant Beach. As has become their beach routine, Sam plays hard in the water and then takes breaks to sit on the shore staring at his phone. Typical teenage behavior. Jonah and Ollie play hard in the water and then expend more energy digging in the wet sand and making fortresses of one sort of another.
At 5 pm, I handed the boys off to Heather who came to join in on the beach fun and I headed to a gathering of my wine group. We met all winter on Zoom, so it was a true treat to meet in person. Our theme was New Zealand wines and I took a bottle of Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc along with copies of a photo taken when Mark and I visited that vineyard . . . the most beautiful we visited. The photo shows the beautiful, cloudy, and layered mountains that are the backdrop of Cloudy Bay Vineyard. My memory of the evening is a little cloudy. I think I enjoyed a little too much wine!
