Irony

Like many of you, I was excited to celebrate this past July 4th holiday weekend. An extra day off is always party-worthy. We stocked up on fireworks, and I even took the time to explain to my kids that the holiday had actual historic significance (what a shocker). As the sun began to set, my husband set handed the kids some pop-its and sparklers, and proceeded to launch several loud, and probably somewhat dangerous, rockets and bombs - which my 10 year old son was concerned may not be legal. While our neighbors may not be happy with the colored paper shrapnel that was raining down on their lawns, I can assure all readers of this blog that all of our explosive purchases were entirely legit!

As a person who works for company with a deep and focused safety culture, I of course remained concerned about my kids getting injured. (At least that's the excuse I'm using to cover up my overprotective, hovering, tendency to ruin all the fun, parenting style.) So every few minutes I interrupted the excitement with a "don't jump on the trampoline with the sparklers!" or "don't throw those pop-its at your sister!" or "I know you want to run into the smoke but that thing isn't done exploding yet...get away!!!" exclamations. Of course, when one of the rockets failed to launch into the air, got lodged into its make-shift PVC pipe launch pad, and exploded at eye level, creating an "Apocalypse Now" style scene with my husband yelling to the kids, "get down, get down, get down!" I did feel somewhat justified in my concerns. (Though not surprisingly, that moment was rated "best of the night" by both of my kids.)

So you can imagine my embarrassment when I took off running, glass of wine in hand, to head to our garage deck in order to see the Hollywood Beach fireworks, then planted my foot in a hole in the ground that I didn't see because it was pitch dark, then proceeded to twist my ankle and fall flat on my face. (Though, you must give me credit for not spilling the wine!)

Hence, here I am, ACE bandage around my sprained ankle, crutches leaning conveniently on my dining room table...pondering the concept of irony. What's more ironic - that in my attempt to fully embrace a celebration of our country's independence I have become dependent (yes girls, I actually had to send hubbie to do the grocery shopping yesterday)...OR, that in my over concern for the safety of my family I completely failed to pay attention to the most obvious dangers right in front of my face causing my own injury? Maybe not as poetic as the Alanis Morissette, black fly in the Chardonnay type of irony, but ironic none the less...don't cha think?