Independence on 4th of July

This is one of the rare occurrences I’m a completely free agent (well except for the wonder pooch) on a holiday.  The wife continues her pillaging through northern Virginia (see photos below) and I am heading back to my home town for some rest and recreation.  Hurricane Arturo has moved the traditional hometown baseball game and fireworks to Saturday but I’m fairly certain the restaurants still serve food and the bars beer.  At least that’s what the Keene Friend assures me of and since he has another day off we’re going to investigate (Buddy is psyched).  We’d hoped to share some birthday celebrations with another close friend but he headed out of town.  There is a chance for a Cantankerous Friend sighting but he’s ministering to a hospitalized dad (prayers for him please) so maybe not until late in the day.

Independence Day always leads to thoughts of what it means and looking back on the history of the day.  It’s fascinating to ponder what the founders would think of what they created.  I think they’d be a little astounded that they generated such an imperfect yet wildly successful proof of the power of human freedom unrestricted by the yoke of the European class system that produced it.  Even when we’re poorly led this country shines as a fountain of possibility.  I think that’s what the medieval thinkers of radical Islam hate most about us; the power of belief.  The genie of free thought can never be put back in the bottle after its released; the taste is too sweet and that’s why they’ll never succeed.  Happy Birthday America, I thank God every day I was blessed to be born here and allowed to defend you for a quarter century.  The honor was mine.

Zamperini With Hillebrand

I was going to say I heard some sad news yesterday but in reality Louis Zamperini certainly got the most out of the 97 years he was allotted. A life to be celebrated. I wrote last year about the fantastic Laura Hillebrand book Unbroken which chronicled his incredible life first as an Olympic runner and then a World War 2 P.O.W.  A powerful testament to power of the human spirit I wrote about above.  He passed this week surrounded by family in the country both of us love.

I finished a fascinating book of short stories yesterday called Faceoff.  I usually stay away from short stories since I prefer getting the investiture with characters only full length novels can offer.  This book was produced by an association of thriller writers to fund their organization for another year.  The fascinating part had each story co-authored by two well-known thriller writers who each brought one of their iconic characters to the story.  I’ve written before about my pantheon of literary heroes and a lot of them were included.  While I didn’t know all of the others – we had Harry Bosch, Lucas Davenport, Aloysius Pendergast, and (wait for it) Jack Reacher!  I loved each story and it provided some great leads into other authors I’ll need to explore.

Finally, as I mentioned above, my wife continued her “musqetera” reunion down in Virginia.  She and Athos spent the day yesterday at the National Harbor of Maryland, something that was created after we last lived down there.  It was kind of scary for me because they also thoughtfully included an outlet mall at the same location.  I was wondering why my credit card was vibrating in my wallet all day so at least that mystery was solved.  She sent the following pictures to salve my wounded bank account.  She even found the huge missing statue.  The last time I was in D.C. playing tour guide I went to the end of Hains Point looking for this statue of a giant emerging from the earth and it was gone.  We used to live right across the river from it in D.C. so I felt a little miffed that it was moved without out permission but at least it found a good home. 

Wife at National Harbor

She Found the Statue!

Even Dedicated Shoppers Need a Break

And to Keep up Their Strength for More Shopping

Wife and Athos 

Wife with the Traditional Panamanian Photo Pose

Statue with Foot in Mouth

Musqeteras on the Loose

Notice that She Strategically Excluded all Shopping Bags From these Photos

Now to get ready to head north and celebrate the day with friends!