This is supposed to be a pic of my kid wearing red/white/blue when she was a baby. I can't find it. So you get me. Looking very natural with a flag across my chest. It's how we roll, baby.
Okay, I just came back and re-read this post, and it was like, the most nauseating thing ever. I nearly died. ME! ME! GIVE ME WHAT I WANT FOR MY BIRTHDAY! I KNOW YOU ALL WANT ME TO HAVE IT! YOU'RE WELCOME! I'm VIM-ing just a little. (VIM – Vomit In Mouth)
I can only plead enormous lack of sleep, and temporary insanity. My apologies to any of you whose brains fell out while reading.
What I really wanted to say was this: I grew up LOVING the 4th of July because I was almost born on it. I also spent a number of years living near our nation's capital, and my father was in the Air Force. Star Spangled Banners and Freedom's Call rang in my ears every where I went. Even at the movie theater.
Every movie on our air bases started with the audience rising for the national anthem, accompanied by a patriotic film montage (complete with subliminal messages to get you to go to the snack counter–flowers and fireworks exploding just like popcorn. Fountains that looked like streams of 7-UP. It was awesome!) We said the pledge of allegiance before class every day of the school year. I died of shock when my dad retired and I attended public school for the first time. Where did my flag and song and founding fathers go?
Not that they disappeared entirely. They're still out there. It's just that unless you're in the military or a brat of a military enlistee, I don't know if you get the Baptism by Patriotism we always got. I mean, we used sit on the Jefferson Memorial steps in Washington D.C. on July 4th to watch fireworks and see them reflected in the tidal basin. How much more patriotic can you get?
So. I am a Yankee Doodle Dandy. I do love to have a day off on my birthday as I said in the original post. But I love it because it makes me feel free. And I can have that in this country, all the way to my bones. I'm grateful.
For purposes of contrast between the state of my brain when I try to write a post at 1:00 in the morning and when I've regained my faculties the next day, I think I'll leave my original blech post below. But be warned: if you read it you may come out of it with PTSD.
If nothing else, I urge you to scroll to the bottom and watch the clips of some of our greatest American entertainers. We do sort of rock, Americans.
Hearts, my friends!
Original Icky Post Starts Here:
I was supposed to have been a Yankee Doodle Dandy baby. Yep. My original due-date was July 4th, 19–er–SomethingSomething. But I was too busy having my heavenly going away party to notice I had totally missed my shuttle-launch into mortality. When I finally did notice, I couldn't flag down another ride until 3 days later. And by then the party was over and everyone was tired of waiting. So I didn't get nearly the fanfare I was hoping for.
This might explain why each year on my birthday I want something BIG. Something SPECIAL. I want to be QUEEN FOR A DAY. So each year instead of presents I ask for a day off to do whatever the stink I want, no questions asked. Sort of a "What Happens at the Mall Stays at the Mall" kind of thing.
It used to be too hard for people to do for me. You know, they had to set aside their plans and totally sacrifice for what I wanted. But I learned that if I screamed at just the right decibel and kept a precise psychopathic glint in my eye things suddenly worked out. Now my huz and kids are totally behind me on Janiel Day.
I've had some dandy birthdays. One year I shopped all. day. long. and noshed Mrs. Fields Triple Chocolate Chip cookies as I strolled, nearly throwing them up afterward. It was so awesome!
Another year I watched movie after movie with a friend at the theater until our brains were buzzing and we couldn't feel our tongues anymore from Movie Popcorn Butter Exposure. And loved every minute of it. Felt like I was fifteen again.
Last time I did it I actually spent the whole day at my husband's office in a little cubical just writing. No interruptions. No demands. No throwing up. Got my entire book series outlined. I hearted that so much.
This year I want to do all three things: shop, watch movies, and write. Don't know if it will happen. But that's what I want. No presents. Just the day. And I would be so dearly grateful to my little famdoozle for giving that to me that I would cook whatever they want for dinner every night for a year, even if it was Frooty Pebbles.
We live in a country where dreams come true, right? I can wish for this, right? And stick my laptop–open to this post–on my husband's chest when he wakes up tomorrow so he'll GET THE HINT, right?
This is what I am going to do. And I would appreciate it if you all would send telepathic peer pressure to him so he'll find a way to make it happen for me despite his freaky busy schedule. I'll invite you all to my next book signing if you do, and give you free cupcakes. Or after-dinner mints. Or mint-flavored toothpicks. When that book signing happens.
In the meantime, to get you into a patriotic mood for my big day, here are some true American Greats to feast your eyes and ears upon: James Cagney in Yankee Doodle Dandy, the astonishing mind-bending thigh-wincing Nicholas Brothers, and my beloved favorites: Gene Kelly and Donald O'Connor. They're all classics. I'll leave them playing here while you send your brain-waves to my family. Enjoy!
For James Cagney click here! (Video embedding is disabled so you'll have to click on the link. But it's worth it just to see Jimmy Cagney dancing and speak-singing. Who knew?)
And the Nicholas Brothers. They'll blow your mind. They were amazing:
Finally, my darling Gene and Donald–the man's men of dance–in a rousing routine from perhaps the most perfect movie musical of all time, Singing in the Rain:
There. You feeling all patriotic and Americanized and proud? Good. Now send those vibes to my huz so I can partay hartay on my birthday.
Much obliged.
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