Multi-Colored Disasters

Newsletter 2018-07-09

Combustible Relationship

My kids have a complicated history with fireworks. Sometimes they scream in terror. Other times, they just whimper quietly in terror. I don't know why they’re so scared of loud noises. They cause most of them. At any given time, the average decibel level in our house is the equivalent of a heavy metal concert playing during a tornado. There’s a reason the plaster on my ceiling keeps falling down. But for whatever reason, when the loud sounds come from a combustible canister in the sky, it’s suddenly too much for my kids to handle. I don’t mind that they’re scared. I wish they’d be terrified in a way that didn’t destroy my ear drums.

The size of the fireworks is more or less irrelevant. My kids were scared to death a few years ago when a family member bought some Roman candles and bottle rockets and set them off on a farm. Although that time, my kids were right to be afraid. One of my extended relatives took a pack of bottle rockets he thought was a dud and threw…