Pyromania

Once again, the 4th of July is coming upon us. Some of us are rubbing our sweaty palms together and salivating just thinking of the up coming holiday festivities. Yes, this is the one time of year in which the little pyromaniac in all of us is allowed to come out.

What is it about fireworks that turns a seemingly nice young man into a stark raving maniac? First off, take any law abiding fellow--I'm talking about a guy who wouldn't break the speed limit getting himself to the hospital before bleeding to death--and make the suggestion of going for a ride to buy some fireworks and he's off, navigating the local highways as if he were driving in the Daytona 500.

But it's the lighting of the fireworks that really draws the monster out of a man. One can see the change start to take place about two hours before dusk. A guy will start getting anxious and begin pacing the floor.

He'll start to stammer in his speech and his hands will sweat profusely. Next, he'll hear voices coming from the bag of fireworks hidden in the closet, voices beckoning him to take them outside and light them.

As night descends upon the city and the time for lighting fireworks draws nigh, one of the last stages of the 4th of July mania takes place. A guy's eyes will glaze over, his mouth and eye sockets go dry, and any last trace of sanity takes a temporary leave of absence--and this is all before he goes berserk.

Once the first of the fireworks are lighted, an otherwise perfectly sane man will push all common sense to the ozone of his mind. He'll tear the bag of fireworks from the hands of any person holding it. He'll pull out a handful of sparklers, light them, and then run around in a dry, grassy field like some half-crazed sparkler nymph. All the while, someone's running behind him with a hose or bucket of water dousing all the brush fires he's started. If a firecracker doesn't go off after it's been lighted, the 4th of July nut will rush over and pick it up to relight it...just in time to have the thing blow up in his hand.

The people you really got to feel sorry for, though, during this great holiday celebration are all the little kids. At times, one may hear others discussing the subject of what's wrong with today's youth? They seem so confused. The blame, in part, lies with the 4th of July holiday itself.

All year long, kids are told not to play with fire. Every opportunity a parent has to drill the point home, they do. If a news story comes on the T.V. about a house fire caused by some youngster playing with matches, parents across the nation will lecture their children for an hour saying things like, "You see, that's why you don't fool with matches."

But, on the evening of the 4th of July what do we adults do? We encourage our children to light matches and ignite sparklers which set off sparks and flames in every direction. Then we encourage them to run around and wave the thing overhead to make designs in the air.

If our kids shy away from doing this, what do we tell them? "Oh come on. Don't be such a wimp!"But when the celebration is over, adults return to, "I thought I told you kids not to play with matches!" And we wonder why children seem confused?

So as this 4th of July approaches. . .waaaait, ssssomththing is hhhappenin' ttttto mmmme. IIIIII hhhhhear vvvvoices fffffrom the clclcloset, mmmmmy speach iiiiiiiis fffffunnnny, IIIII'm drrrrrr-ooling, and mmmmy hands are ggge-tting damp!