Until we started spending our Julys in Italy several years ago, the Fourth of July was always a big deal in our family. For years we would spend our summers together with the rest of my family on a mountaintop in western North Carolina and the Fourth always seemed to be important. There were pig pickings, local fireworks shows, picnics by the pond. And my brothers were always into doing their own fireworks display for the family, the two of them stopping independently in South Carolina on the drive up from Florida, stocking up on entire trunksful of explosives which they would choreograph for the family and a small group of friends and neighbors on a spot lower down on our property where the chance of setting the woods ablaze with an errant spark was smaller.

The Menard boys’ fireworks show was always a highlight of the summer for our children and for Suzy and me. The sight of my older brothers running around with Bic lighters setting of twenty foot strings of firecrackers that exploded non stop for two or three minutes (covering the grass in tons of shredded paper), choreographing multiple bottle rocket launches and, in later years, launching individual mortars from giant tubes, appealed to our inner pyromaniac. A few beers were usually drunk as well. There’s a reason it’s called the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

The Fourth of July is not, unsurprisingly, a major holiday in Italy. We try, however, to celebrate it and do our part of supporting the tradition, even if the Italians fail to put on a fireworks show for us. They seem to know that we celebrate something on July 4, but more often ask us if it is la Festa del Ringraziamento – Thanksgiving. They seem convinced that we eat turkey on the Fourth and seem confused when we tell them that we eat wurstel (hot dogs) instead.

Until this year we have never really done much in the way of fireworks on the Fourth but yesterday when we were out running some errands with Marco he told us of a large store that sells fuochi artificiali – fireworks – and so we decided to check it out. When we arrived at Zeus the special fireworks annex next door to the main store was closed for lunch. Imagine, a fireworks store closed on the Fourth of July! A sign announced, however that from the day after Christmas until New Years day it was open 24 hours a day. New Years is the Italians’ biggest opportunity to get in touch with their inner pyromaniac and according to Marco they do just that, lining up for their opportunity to buy packs of ordinance to impress the neighbors and scare their dogs. You know something is very, very important to Italians if they will actually get in a line and wait for it.

So we called the number on Zeus’ door (or more precisely Marco did) and asked them when they would be reopening, explaining that his American friends were desperate to celebrate the Fourth of July. And as good pyromaniacs, they broke from their lunch break and opened up the store for us. And if this candy store for explosive lovers won’t draw my brothers over to Italy for a visit, nothing will. On the plain metal shelves behind the plain counter behind the plain plate glass window were all sorts of boxes of exploding things, with crazy labels showing sexy women and exotic venues and showers of sparks. There were standard fireworks, such as bottle rockets and mortars, but the specialty is the single package box. Place on the ground, light once, get the hell away and watch for one, two, five minutes, the length of the show depending upon the size of the box and the cost. And the cost is not cheap, as you can watch €100 go up in smoke, literally, for a 45 second show. We opted for three different boxes, one for our Fourth of July conflagration, one for a pizza dinner we are doing later in the week and the biggest for our July 14 Cucinapalooza dinner, which we will be hosting for 20-30 guests.

We loaded the explosives in the trunk of our car and drove piano, piano, ever so gently back toward Cannara, stopping in Santa Maria degli Angeli for lunch, our car parked just out in front and in plain view so we could see if it got rear ended and went up in flames. There would be a lot of explaining to do in that instance, especially in the post 9/11 and post Iraq war world. Fortunately our IEDmobile stayed in one piece and after lunch we loaded a half dozen Benedictine beers in the trunk along with our mobile armory. There’s a reason they call it the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

And so after dinner on July 4, 2013, a dinner not of hot dogs but of bistecca alla fiorentina grilled to perfection in our outdoor barbequeue and washed down not with Budweiser but with Montefalco Sagrantino, we set up our small fireworks show for our small group of 4. I captured the entire thing on videotape, including the stirring soundtrack of Whitney Houston belting out the Star Spangled Banner, a recording of her classic rendition of the National Anthem at the Superbowl a lifetime ago. Although there is a lot of dark footage, I urge you to watch through until the end (it’s only three and a half minutes) and challenge you to not come away feeling proud to be an American. I know we went to bed that night, which was technically the Fifth of July, feeling just a little more patriotic and good about our country.

God bless America!

Ci vediamo!
Bill and Suzy