Bad Links?
Other glitches?
Notify Webmaster

A safe July 4 fireworks extravaganza

By RICK RYCKELEY
Contributing Writer

The Boy and I went to Florida for our annual father-son vacation last week.  On the drive down, we talked about the deep sea fishing trip and Jet Skiing ahead of us.  We were finally spending some quality father-son time together - that is until we hit the great state of Alabama. Then all he could talk about was buying fireworks. I told him it wasn’t a good idea to be buying something that I was sure was illegal in Georgia. Besides, being a fireman I know that fireworks are really dangerous unless handled by a professional. And, in the wrong hands, they have been known even to wreck bicycles.

The Boy arched a fuzzy red eyebrow towards me and sighed, “Dad.  You’re not gonna tell me another one of your stories, are you?”

I answered, “As a matter of fact, son, I am.”

It was July 4, and we had just dug the first bedroom to Cliff Condos. Cliff Condos was the massive three-year dig into the dirt wall of the vacant lot two doors down from our house at 110 Flamingo Street. We were in the second of a three-year dig, and despite time lost for dirt clods fights and ever-present water balloon battles, we were still on schedule. With the Great Room already completed the previous summer, only two more bedrooms and a guest room left to go and Cliff Condos would be finished. By three o'clock, the Georgia sun and massive dig had taken its toll on us all and it was time for a break. We decided to ride our bikes to the DQ. Big mistake.

One moment, the six of us were riding our bikes down to the local Dairy Queen for a lemon-lime Mister Misty Brain-Freeze-Ice-Cream Float - when the next, we were being bombarded by explosions from above.

Goofy Steve crashed after the first explosion, running into the curb just after the Wayne Street overpass, blowing out his back tire and bending his chopper handlebars. Two explosions later, Older Brother Richard ran into Neighbor Thomas, both winding up in the same ditch as Goofy Steve.

Preston Weston riding his new high dollar three-speed bike was the next casualty. A bottle rocket followed him down the street and exploded as he ran into Old Man Hodge’s weeping willow tree. With three speeds, he thought he could out-ride the bottle rocket, but he was wrong. When Preston Weston saw his new three-speed bike with a bent front wheel, the tree wasn't the only thing weeping.

After the crash of Preston Weston’s new bike I heard the laughter that was all too familiar. To me, the sound was like fingernails raking across a blackboard, belonging to no other than Down-The-Street Bully Brad. Looking up, I saw him standing on the overpass, still throwing fire crackers and shooting bottle rockets down at us.  One exploded and Twin Brother Mark ran into me and we crashed - much to the delight of Bully Brad.

The second wave of the bombardment came as suddenly as the first, but this time in the form of smoke bombs! We picked up rocks to throw at him, but Bully Brad threw so many smoke bombs down from the Wayne Street overpass that we couldn’t see anything. All we heard was his hideous laughter and smoke bombs hissing, going off everywhere. Thomas and Richard grabbed a handful of rocks and ran to either side of the Wayne Street overpass to try and catch Bully Brad in a cross fire. But alas, all they found was a few unused smoke bombs and a couple of Roman candles - which they lit and threw down at us. That was the day we found that Goofy Steve could dodge fireworks just as well as he dodged dirt clods.

You’d think having spent so many summers riding around with Goofy Steve I’d learn a thing or two about dodging, but no matter how hard I tried I just couldn’t kept dodging The Boy’s rapid fire questions, “Dad, can’t we just buy some fireworks? Howsabout bottle rockets? Or firecrackers? Can we shoot them off at the beach? If we don’t use them all we can take them back home, right?” I wasn’t sure which kinds of fireworks were legal in Georgia, so I decided to call one of my friends in law enforcement.

I asked, “Are bottle rockets, firecrackers and sky rockets legal?”

My friend in law enforcement answered, “There are no fireworks that are legal in the state of Georgia.” That was good enough for me, but not good enough for The Boy. He wanted me to call back and ask if smoke bombs and sparklers are legal. Maybe we could stop and buy some of those? For the next two hours, “can we stop and buy fireworks” was all I heard. We finally made it out of Alabama and to the beach without, I’m happy to say, one single bottle rocket or smoke bomb. The Boy, he was not happy.

Our father-son Florida trip was a wash-out, the sea was too rough to go fishing, and the Jet Ski people just laughed at us when we asked to go out riding in the rain. On the return trip home, we went through Alabama once again. The Fireworks Capital of the South, The Boy now calls it. He made me stop at the Black Cat fireworks shop. After only five minutes he bounded over to me with an armful of assorted fireworks, asking me to called my friend in law enforcement once again asked him if they were legal in Georgia.

“What about lady fingers, star ships, or torpedoes?” I asked.

A thundering, “NO! FIREWORKS ARE NOT LEGAL IN THE STATE OF GEORGIA!” But to the joy of The Boy, he did inform me about a new law that has gone into effect this June. Some bone-headed politicians thought it was a good idea to legalize sparklers. They think they’re harmless. Guess those brilliant politicians never treated a child with third-degree burns by one of those “harmless” 1,200-degree sparklers, or transported any of  the 9,300 people who were injured from fireworks just last year alone.

My friend then suggested for a safe, July 4 celebration we should go to a fireworks display, like the one in Peachtree City. “You can get a great view of it near the Hwy. 54 overpass.”

The Hwy. 54 Street overpass? Humm - I think we’ll stay home and watch a display on television. Ya never know, Bully Brad might still be lurking around.