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We had a large crowd at the beach for the Fourth of July. My oldest daughter, Ashley, her husband Scott, and their kids, Gates, Collins, and Smith and friends were at the house.

The Boston butt and ribs were cooked perfectly. The kids had hamburgers and hot dogs. Everyone had a big time. The central entertainment of the day – as it has been for Fourth of July’s of the past – were the fireworks. The larger kids all like the fireworks, but the younger grandkids really don’t like them yet.

We ask our guests not to bring fireworks, not because of the kids, but because of my yellow Labrador, Yadi. He doesn’t like odd noises and is completely terrified of fireworks, gun shots or other loud and unexpected noises. He was bred to be a duck dog, but is just an indoor, couch dog that has never been hunting. The grandkids iPads scare him, and fireworks send him over the edge into complete panic. He tries to escape the noise by digging though the beds, which has led to torn sheets and mattress pads. 

Even though we don’t shoot fireworks, many in the area do. By mid-afternoon, fireworks were going off all around us. At nine o’clock, the FloraBama and a couple other places around Orange Beach put on extravagant fireworks shows. These shows are so much more than what we used to see when I was a kid. Everyone enjoyed them, except the two youngest grandkids and Yadi the Lab. They went inside and Yadi had to go into his crate, where he tried to dig out.

This wasn’t Yadi’s worst July 4^th, nor his worst fireworks experience. Three years ago, Gates was playing baseball in Orange Beach and we were all at the beach. We left Yadi and Ashley’s dog, Busy, in the house. In their haste to get to the ballpark the back door didn’t get locked well.

Fireworks were going off all around the area, which scared the dogs. We returned from the ballpark about 10 p.m. to find the backdoor open and Yadi and Busy gone. Busy wasn’t as elusive as Yadi and was captured by security guards by the time we returned home. Yadi found a porch almost a mile from the house to get on once the fireworks stopped. It was around 2 a.m. before I whistled him up as I walked the streets looking for him. Of course, he was calm and acted like, “What took you so long?”

Yadi’s mom and all the grandkids weren’t as calm. They were all crying and hugging Yadi as if he had been gone for days. Needless to say, the doors are now checked well when he is left in the house.

Those memories got me thinking about my earliest experiences with fireworks. We moved when I was five to a different house across town in a neighborhood with families with many kids. My best friend was Mike Pittman, who was almost exactly my age and lived across the street from me. Mike had two older brothers who were three years and nine years older than us.

When Mike and I were seven, his oldest brother, Hilton Jr., introduced us to fireworks, including cherry bombs and chasers. I still remember Hilton Jr. rubbing a chaser across Mike’s back so “it would get his scent” and chase him. Although Mike would later be a star defensive tackle at Ole Miss, at seven he was just a shaky little kid. The bigger kids lit the chaser and, of course, it chased Mike for about ten yards before he turned and it didn’t. However, that ten yards was enough for me. I ran home, and Mike ran inside crying. Hilton Jr. was grounded for a week.

The next summer, Mr. and Mrs. Pittman went out of town for a weekend leaving Mike in his brothers’ charge. The Pittman’s were serious bird hunters. They always had large containers of gun powder and shot to re-load shells. Hilton Jr. had several friends over. They constructed a large bomb in a gun powder container and installed some shell primers. They packed it all in, and one of the guys built a trigger device that would set the bomb off when it was plugged into an electrical outlet. Everyone hid, and the bigger guys had Mike plug in the extension cord to the bomb. The resulting explosion was much larger than expected and rocked windows throughout the neighborhood. I ran home and met Mom coming out of the house, and Mike ran in his house crying. The police came, and Hilton Jr. was grounded when his parents returned home.

When I was older, we would save money to buy basic fireworks – mainly firecrackers. We could get a good size pack of Black Cat firecrackers for a nickel. Every neighborhood had a kid who was a real jerk. Ours was Greg Moore, who was a year older than us. He was always trying to bully us and, when we had fireworks, would throw firecrackers at us. When I was about twelve, Greg tried to put a large firecracker down the back of my shirt. Feeling him, I turned and pushed him away, and the firecracker went off in his hand, burning him badly. Even though he was thirteen, he ran home crying. We all celebrated his injuries, and I was not grounded.

I have more fireworks memories and the Fourth of July always brings back those fond memories of younger days. Yadi has no fond memories of fireworks.

I hope you enjoyed more of my memories and have a good month.