The Grad School Diaries: ID4 Revisited

If our first Independence Day in Lansing had been a departure from previous experience, our second was more distinctive still. Since graduate students (even the exceptionally good ones, which I am not) are not paid like movie stars, there was never any reasonable chance that we’d be going back to Orange County and celebrate the day with our usual band of pyromaniacs; our celebration was instead limited to what we could manage in our own back yard. In this case, literally…

In the event, our fireworks party included our daughter and son-in-law and a few of their friends in addition to the two of us. I had also invited two of my fellow graduate students, but one of them had gone back to Kansas to visit his family and the other flaked on me at the last moment (sending his regrets by email literally AFTER he was supposed to arrive), but the two of us and a half-dozen college-age adults, all of whom have managed to retain enough of their sense of wonder to still enjoy a fireworks show made for a lively enough little party as we settled in for a while to paint the sky…

Michigan is about middle of the road regarding fireworks; which is to say, it’s midway between California, where only a few cities permit them at all, and states like Georgia, Tennessee and Oklahoma, where you will encounter huge fireworks warehouse stores scattered every few miles at random along the highway. Professional-grade mortars and military flash-bangs and gunfight simulators are closely controlled here, but nothing else is, and even items like Roman candles and bottle rockets can be purchased – although you have to be discrete about letting the bigger ones off. Of course, I’ve always found buying the various cones and fountains (and trying to figure out which ones are a good deal and which ones are over-priced rubbish) to be half the fun – and in Michigan you don’t have to buy them from a temporary roadside stand and then furtively pile onto the freeway hoping to get away before the police stop you…

Not that far from our house in Lansing there’s a large retail outfit that calls itself a “Hardware Store” – and is, in a very general sense. They do sell tools, and plumbing supplies, and so on, but they also sell bulk candy and costumes for Halloween, Christmas trees at Christmas time, Easter candy and decorations for Easter, and so on. For Independence Day, the place is packed with every kind of firework you can imagine (except for the really dangerous kinds), from tiny fountains that last less than three seconds (and only go a few inches high) to giant boxes full of gunpowder and color elements that are, effectively, a ten-minute fireworks display in a package (just light a single fuse and then run like heck). I took the kids with me the day before, and we brought home a good assortment of different styles; earlier in the week I had acquired some sheets of scrap plywood to use as a launch pad, some barbeque lighters to set off fireworks, and a whole bunch of citronella candles to try and hold off the mosquitoes…

In the event, we actually wound up with more ordinance than we could set off before everybody got tired of the oppressive, muggy heat, the bug bites, and the smell of cordite. I suppose we can use them next summer, although I don’t really know what will happen by then. Will I be done with my exams and remaining classes, and on my way to a dissertation and an eventual degree? Will the kids still be here in Lansing, or will they have migrated in search of work in a state whose economy isn’t as fried as Michigan? Will there be a party in our backyard, or will it just be the two of us, staring off into that searing black night as we look for better days? Sometimes I wish I could look ahead to the end of the book – and most of the time I’m really glad I can’t…