While this year marked Caitlyn’s second Fourth of July, this was the first year we actually attempted to notice the holiday. We spent yesterday afternoon by Lake Washington, where Caitlyn occasionally put her toes in the water when she could be pried away from the sand. She jumped in the sand, she ran in the sand, she fell down in the sand, she shoveled the sand, she carried the sand. She also asked whatever family member was handy, “I need more water, PEAS!” I’m feeling particularly pleased with myself for being aggressive about the sunscreen, even remembering to reapply it …

With the possible exception of the grass in the central park, I think we have all survived the Fourth. I have a complicated relationship with the holiday, even if we ignore the current discomforting foreign policy. Mostly, it’s about the fireworks. I enjoy the sparkles and the lights, but I’m finding that the older I get the more uncomfortable I am with the sounds and the smoke they cause. The big fireworks for large displays (the kind over the beach in Santa Barbara, or over any of the Seattle-area bodies of water) are fine, somehow. It’s the smaller explosives, the …