Extremely loud and incredibly close

On the eve of July 4, Michael, Kevin, Daisy, and I sat on the second-floor deck of our new house and waited for the fireworks to start. We'd been told they would be visible and hoped we'd see at least the highest fireworks over the trees. During the evening, families and teens and retirees galore flocked to our little tip of the point and settled into folding chairs in anticipation. Numerous cookouts and parties made the whole neighborhood festive and all-American in that old-fashioned, stars-and-stripes-and-hamburgers-and-beer way. Lots of people had purchased their own small fireworks, and these began launching from nearby yards with little thrilling screams into the sky around us, fizzing and scattering sparks and sometimes giving off startlingly loud BANGs, followed by applause.

A bit after 9, with a whoosh the first fireworks from the city's display leapt into the air directly in front of us. When I say "in front," I mean "apparently as close as the screen in an IMAX theater." The launching area, to our joy, was on the beach at the end of our short dead-end street. The explosions were positively ear-splitting. We gasped and jostled one another excitedly.

The show went on for a good half-hour, one sky-filling array after another of sound and light. I realized at some point that I was smiling like a kid on Christmas morning, rapt and lost in wonder. Out on the bay beyond the fireworks launching area, several hundred boats clustered in a great arc to view the show. After the cataclysmic grand finale, everyone on land cheered and hooted; the boats' air horns blared wildly like a caffeinated flock of geese. Two yards away on our street, someone shouted up to us, "Welcome to the neighborhood!"

We still live in Providence and await a good offer on our house here. The new house is ripped apart inside, enduring our rehab ministrations. It will be a while before we can even contemplate moving in.

But up on that deck, listening to the parties and the songs and feeling the sea breeze and smelling the gunpowder smoke as it wafted past, I felt already at home. All I'll need, I'm thinking, is one of those big ol' boat horns to honk when the fireworks next come to a night sky directly overhead.