Cranky Pants

I once was at an airline counter with my friend Dennis when he accidentally told the attendant who took our bags the wrong destination. This was before everything was automated, when humans still worked the desk and did things by hand. He said we were going to Chicago, but that was just our connecting flight. We were headed to Traverse City. She got very angry when this was discovered because the bags had already snaked their way around the big metal carousel, and it would take a bit of effort to retrieve them and make the necessary corrections. She was very rude and deliberately mean, and Dennis, who is a nervous flyer, was getting agitated. I tried to defend him and ended up blurting out:

“Well, Ma’am, he said he was sorry, and there is really no need for you to be a Mrs. Nasty Pants!!!”  

I really do not know where that came from, but we laughed about it later when we were on the plane and settling in with a glass of wine.

I have been a Mrs. Cranky Pants lately. Out of sorts. The Fourth of July and its attendant-destructive “celebrations” always make me nuts. The reverberations of it confound my nervous system for days on end.

I consider myself a patriot. Not the kind who thought it was a good idea to storm the Capitol and kill policemen, but the kind who votes, canvasses, donates, and gives her time and treasure to try to make this joint a better place. I’m that kind of a patriot. I love my country.

….and I HATE the Fourth of July. 

I am not alone in this, of course. There are legions of us who dread the day. Animal lovers, environmentalists, firefighters, cops, ambulance drivers, and clean-up crews—we are all bonded in opposition to the national “party”.

It is hot. Sweltering in most parts of the country. Record-breaking heat. I just went for a quick visit to see pals in Texas where they are reeling in the hot, hot heat of this wild summer. I attempted to take a walk at nine in the morning on the streets of Fredericksburg and had to give it up. I am a walker; it is almost psychotic how much I need to walk, and for the duration of my stay there I did not. Could not. 

Too darned hot.

Canada, our dear neighbor to the north, has been literally burning to the ground for months now, devastating whole provinces and spewing dangerous chemical smoke into our communities all along the northern states.

It defies all reason that in the face of this, a whole nation of “patriots” spent last Tuesday shooting gunpowder into the sky—watching it explode and spark. Now we know the dangers of this. Birds are killed, fires are started, fingers are burned, and in neighborhoods not satisfied by the thrill of fireworks—places where folks shoot actual guns willy-nilly into the air—innocent bystanders are maimed by stray bullets because … Happy birthday America?  

On July 5th, it took over four hundred volunteers to collect the nearly 7,000 pounds of trash left in the water and on the shores of Lake Tahoe. That’s just nasty. And this was all because the revelers LOVE their country?

Surely there is a better way to show it. Surely we can one day evolve beyond this terrible practice.

My dog Roxy is over fourteen and her hearing is not so keen these days, but some of the booms were loud enough to penetrate her audio fog and frighten her. Huge numbers of us stay home on the holiday wrapping our pets in Thundershirts and considering sedation.

A Lyft driver who lives in Echo Park told me that the cacophony is so bad in his area that he has taken to renting a hotel room in Westlake every year in order to sleep and save his sanity. So, it’s not just the pooches that suffer. We humans do too, though we have options that our four-legged and winged friends do not. 

I do want to give a congratulatory nod to the places that are adopting new policies and did drone shows instead of the usual fiery displays. The drone pageants are quieter, safer, and very cool beans. Way to go, city of Orange!!!  

Maybe this will catch on? Maybe we can make the switch in a big way somewhere down the line? For the sake of the planet and this great, messy tumult of a country. Pretty please with apple pie on top???

The hope of that is easing my aggravation slightly, ratcheting down my rancor a teensy bit, and I am thankful for it.

There is always something to be grateful for. I had to write this whole dang essay to get to it, but here we are. Deep breath.

A lot of folks have asked me whether I bought a car yet, and the answer is no. I am still learning a lot about how transit works in the fair city of Los Angeles, and I am afraid that if I get a car, I will get in it and be just another driver driving, driving, driving. So for now I am lacing up my enormous orthopedic shoes and walking my cranky pants down the road.

On we go …