aloha. this kid with sword was hopping rock to rock bawling, snot dangling, and mister calmly ignored him. 
two hours later.
the sounds we hear now as we do stuff at the dining room table and look out at a big black billow of smoke on the horizon, these sounds in another country would quite probably mean death and mayhem, well we have mayhem here too, and death by misadventure too on this war holiday. 
i remember when i was a surly clerk at the record store, an e.r. dude said independence day was literally like a war, bodies streaming in maimed and dead. and that's the way we celebrate and remind ourselves why america is great, because we're making it great by any means necessary, mostly war. war and america, america and war, terror and more, terror war, terror.  
aloha.