Some of the best moments of my Henderson childhood happened on the Fourth of July. Also some of the most dangerous, but when I was a kid that was considered sort of a bonus.

I never remember calling it Independence Day, which to me has always brought to mind washer and dryer sales. It was the Fourth of July.

I knew the Fourth of July had something to do with George Washington being the father of the country and liking sparklers. It wasn’t my favorite holiday, mostly because there was no potential for presents and you couldn’t get a day off from school. But it featured hot dogs, watermelon and a parental nod to play with fire. That put it in the top five on my calendar.

It felt like the longest day of the year because nothing great happened until after sunset. Childhood anxiety battled the stifling July heat to a standstill as the sun slowly made its way across the sky.

I passed the hours leading up to sparkler time by playing catch with anyone available, riding one of the homemade bicycles my dad had wrenched together, dog-paddling around in our Doughboy pool or drinking water out of the garden hose.

I don’t think I drank water out of a glass until I was in college. Why? The reason was simple. As children, we weren’t allowed in the house. The withering temperature notwithstanding, our access to the inside and its swamp-cooled environs was extremely limited in those days. The rule of thumb was, if you aren’t running a fever or it isn’t time for dinner, stay out until your name is called. And so we did.

That made the Fourth of July all the more delicious. It was a day spent in anticipation of sparklers and showering fountains of safe-and-sane fireworks, and of course whatever cache of illegal firecrackers and roman candles that my brother Jim had secured on the local juvenile delinquent black market. How we got to adulthood with all our fingers is a wonder.

By the time nightfall finally arrived, someone had already scorched a barefoot sole on a sparkler’s ember. You didn’t dare complain in my house, for fear of being sidelined for whining. And no one wanted to be sidelined when the fun was finally starting.

My dad never was big on ceremony and not given to windy, patriotic speeches. He was born poor and didn’t know it, served in the Navy in the Pacific in World War II and had the jungle rot to prove it. He was a proud union painter. He drank Schlitz, tended to the hot dogs and bought the fireworks, igniting the most dangerous-looking ones with the red glow of his Viceroy.

Mostly, he let us figure out the Fourth of July for ourselves — and kept the garden hose handy in case we got carried away. I reveled in the chaos and the colorful phosphorescent lights, the acrid smoke and even the stench of those weird snakes in a box that stained the sidewalk for months afterward.

Some of our best efforts could have blinded a pet or burned down a neighbor’s house, but you took your fun where you found it in those days before belt-and-suspenders parenting. It was grand as only simple childhood pleasures can be.

In addition to everything my father taught me, I learned something important from him about the Fourth of July. It was one of the rare times a year he flew the flag of our country. The flag meant a lot to him, but he disliked seeing people wave it around as if patriotism was a competition. 

If you’ve read this far, you probably realize I haven’t written a word about the deadly pandemic, the heartbreakingly high unemployment, the waking nightmare of systemic racism, or even the president, as lowly as he is.

For that, I do not apologize. I just needed a day off and thought you might need one, too. I’m taking mine around 1968, on the Fourth of July, but feel free to pick your own year.

The beer and watermelon are cold, and the hot dogs are on the grill. There are plenty of sparklers to go around. Try not to burn yourself.

But if you do, remember to have the good sense not to whine about it. You don’t want to get sidelined. All the fun is just getting started.

John L. Smith is an author and longtime columnist. He was born in Henderson and his family’s Nevada roots go back to 1881. His stories have appeared in Time, Readers Digest, The Daily Beast, Reuters, Ruralite and Desert Companion, among others. He also offers weekly commentary on Nevada Public Radio station KNPR. His newest book—a biography of iconic Nevada civil rights and political leader, Joe Neal— “Westside Slugger: Joe Neal’s Lifelong Fight for Social Justice” is published by University of Nevada Press and is available at Amazon.com. Contact him at [email protected]. On Twitter: @jlnevadasmith