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"  I spent last Fourth of July watching the Macy&amp;#039;s fireworks show from my hospital room in New York City. Well, I dragged my chemo pole across the room, sat on the ledge and pressed my face up against the window so I could see at least part of the fireworks. Then I gave up and watched the rest of the show on TV. This holiday weekend, though, I&amp;#039;ll get to see an even more spectacular fireworks display - at least to me. And I won&amp;#039;t even have to leave my hometown. The big holiday party starts very early in the morning when a few determined folks dash onto the beach at our community&amp;#039;s lake at the appointed time. They claim picnic tables, set up folding chairs and lay towels in the sand. Later in the day, they bring coolers full of food and drinks, and the charcoal for the grills. That&amp;#039;s when it&amp;#039;s fireworks day at our lake, and it&amp;#039;s a very big deal around here. It&amp;#039;s also a throwback to a different era - an era when people had red, white &amp;amp;amp; blue pot and pan parades and sang &amp;quot;My Country &amp;#039;Tis of Thee&amp;quot; on Fourth of July. And oh, how I love it...especially this year. It&amp;#039;s all part of a three-day holiday celebration in my New Jersey lake community where we have frog jumping contests, a pet show, softball games and a bon fire. There&amp;#039;s also a &amp;quot;minimalist regatta,&amp;quot; in which participants construct a boat out of three sheets of plywood and some duct tape, and then race it to a buoy and back without sinking miserably while the entire community watches and cheers. There&amp;#039;s an ice cream eating contest, arts and crafts, a fire truck wet down, a tug-of-war and a dunking booth in which I&amp;#039;ve trashed talked kids who tried to knock me down. I know most of them; I&amp;#039;ve been their soccer coach, class mom or playdate hostess. My own kids dunked me on the second try. Man, that&amp;#039;s cold water! But the fireworks day is the biggest day of them all when the kids swim for hours and the parents catch up with the neighbors. We eat, drink and listen to the orchestra, which sets up in the middle of the beach around 6 p.m. Two years ago, when the band started playing its first song - a Sinatra tune - my younger son yelled across the crowded beach, &amp;quot;Mom! Let&amp;#039;s dance!&amp;quot; And we did. When it starts to get dark, the local mother&amp;#039;s group sells glow sticks, and everyone takes to their chairs. The first firework pops into the night sky over the lake, and everyone oohs and aahs while the orchestra begins playing its medley of patriotic songs, including &amp;quot;You&amp;#039;re a Grand Old Flag,&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Yankee Doodle&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;Anchors Aweigh.&amp;quot; After the finale lights up the whole beach, we all stand together and sing &amp;quot;God Bless America,&amp;quot; just like a scene out of a Mickey Rooney movie or The Andy Griffith Show. Parents with little kids head home, while everyone else stays and dances the Electric Slide. The party goes into the wee hours, and then the next day, we get up and go to our fishing contests, volleyball games and horse shoe tournaments. In the 14 years we lived here, I&amp;#039;ve always loved our community&amp;#039;s Fourth of July celebration. But this year, it&amp;#039;s particularly special for me, if for no other reason than the fact that I don&amp;#039;t have to roll my chemo pole over to see the fireworks, and that my son will be in my lap. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/life/parenting/a22083/4th-of-july-minus-the-chemo-pole/?src=shelter_footer>