Sunday, July 05, 2009

Fireworks

It's the Fourth of July and certainly a time of celebration. Let me begin with the fact that I LOVE living in the United States of America and am grateful for all that I have and for all that we can be. I live in a free country where anything is possible and a person is only limited by the size of their dreams. We are an intelligent, peace loving nation (unless, perhaps you are a Republican) who have embraced the dreams of our forefathers so long ago and want to see this country rise to be one of inspiration to the rest of the free world.
Which brings me to what I want to muse about today.
Fireworks.
I know, I know, by speaking negatively about them it is if I am attacking warm apple pie and ice cream. One of my personality quirks is that I want to know WHY we do what we do. I am the type of person that when I was selected to direct our church's Sunday School Christmas play, I researched and put together a play to help the congregation learn WHY we have a green tree, and WHY we put lights up, and so on and so on...
I don't MIND doing what everyone else is doing and have done forever, however it needs to make some sort of sense to me.
When I make a pros and cons list as to why we have fireworks, the cons far outweigh the pros. The pros: memories of family get togethers watching the fireworks. Let's see I am sure their must be more. Oh yeah, the job creation for the companies that make and sell the fireworks. Let's see, perhaps overtime pay for all the people who have to work to take care of the injuries related to the fireworks. I will try to think of some more, if there are any.
Now to the cons: Noisy/they scare our pets and other animals/they burn fingers,hands/they start fires/they litter our beautiful planet/they appear to represent ROCKETS AND WAR/they freak out veterans/they are expensive.
It would be nice if, as a spiritually evolving country, we could come up with an alternative way to celebrate our freedom. Perhaps hold gatherings where people give thanks for our plentiful water and beautiful parks instead of shooting up fireworks that literally terrorize animals, litter the planet and all for a moment of visual pleasure. Perhaps people could take a look around and notice the natural beauty that surrounds them. And if what they see lacks beauty then maybe a group effort to help to create something beautiful would be the ultimate thanks and celebration. Think about it, we are using visual reminders of WAR and DESTRUCTION to celebrate our Independence and birth of a country. I would like to think that we could do better.
Maybe a baby start would bet eliminating all private fireworks and just having large displays? If they are over water then only the fish will be terrorized and polluted.
It's a thought.