Pressdog.com

Sparklers Will Be the Only Things
Heating Up at this Party

By Bill Zahren
Posted on 11/16/02)

My soon-to-be-11-year-old daughter, Haley, leaned against me early one night, her large brown eyes pleading with mine.

"Daddy, I told everyone we were going to have sparklers at my birthday party, so it’s all up to you."

Go forth, therefore, and find sparklers. Sure, it's November. And while every day is a sparkler day in say, Orlando, it's hardly the height of sparkler season here in the upper Midwest. It's hell-and-gone from the queen of sparkler days, July 4.

I went to DrugTown, a nearby drug and sundry store. DrugTown has all the off-beat stuff. "Hey, we got any sparklers?" the yet-to-shave 16-year-old checkout guy relayed my request loudly across the store to the manager on duty.

The assistant manager just choked back his amusement. "Sparklers? Ah, no."

Thanks for not laughing at least, Mr. Assistant Manager Helper. At least you didn’t laugh AND send me back to the daughters sans sparklers. Pathetic is the alpha male who comes home empty-handed from the hunt.

Haley took it pretty well. We have some sparklers left over from July 4 (you always want to keep some on hand in case you feel festive) so we'll have some sparkling on or about her birthday in a few weeks. Just not the amount of sparkling Haley had hoped for. Somehow I think she'll recover.

Frankly, I'd rather face scouring the entire greater Des Moines area for sparklers in November than deal with another subject that came up briefly during the whole Birthday Planning Discussion:

Inviting boys to a sleepover.

My brain kicked into Movie Script Mode and created this unfortunate scenario:

Interior of a tony suburban kitchen, late night. 11-year-old BOBBY staggers over to the stink, fills a utilitarian plastic tumbler and starts to drink.

Tight shot of a match being struck on the black butt of a 10-gauge, pump-action, sawed-off shotgun. Match pauses to illuminate the blued steel barrel.

Follow the match up to a cigarette and you can see it's ME. My dog, CHESTER, sits on the floor, awaiting the command, "Chester, CROTCH."

ME:

Thirsty there, Bobby?

BOBBY drops the glass into the sink and gives a little gasp. I jump down from the counter, holding the shotgun in one hand, barrel pointed at the floor.

ME:

Well, get a big drink, son. Be sure and get plenty, because the air’s dry down here in the family room, I know.

BOBBY:

I gg-guess.

ME:

Yeah, real dry. A kid could work up a thirst. For water, that is. (BEAT) Now say a kid got thirsty for something else, something more than water. Well, that would be a shame.

BOBBY:

Sh-sh shame?

ME:

Yeah, a damn shame. Last boy who got that thirsty around here, well, nobody ever heard from him again. Sure, they found parts of a lower torso over there in the creek with some kind of animal bite marks all over the crotch ...

CHESTER:

Growwlllll.

ME:

... but there never was any positive I.D. Too mangled, I guess. So it’s good you’re satisfying your thirst here at the sink, Bobby. Then you can go back to your sleeping bag way over there in the family room and get all snuggled in there. Chester and I are just going to sit a spell in that chair over there (pointing with the ‘gauge.) Right next to Haley and the other girls. Now we’ll be careful not to wake them, because they need their sleep, and Chester gets real cranky when Haley gets woke up early, know what I mean, Bob?

BOBBY:

(Edging away.) Ah, I have to go to the bathroom.

ME:

OK, you go take care of that, son, and then get right back to sleep. We’ll be just over there, (pointing with the ‘gauge again) making sure nobody breaks in or goes wondering around the house in the middle of the night. Can’t be too careful, you know.

Thank goodness I don’t live on a movie set, don’t own firearms and don’t smoke. But I would have to sleep in the chair if there were non-related 11-year-old males sleeping in our house. And that’s going to screw up my back and be "so embarrassing, Dad" for Haley.

So let’s just stick with the sparklers and invite the boys to the party -- but not the sleepover. That way, with all the lights on, I can watch them, and they can watch me watching them, and we’ll have no confusion over who is the bull of this herd -- and Chester won't get all tensed up.

Fade to black.

CHESTER (OFF CAMERA):

Growllllll.

The End.

Printer-friendly version