Declaration of Independancing in the Street

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to celebrate a three-day weekend, you know it is gone be a heckuva party.

My weekend kicked off when I borrowed one of neighbor Justin's fleet of station wagons and drove across the city in crap Thursday-afternoon-before-holiday-weekend traffic to obtain the Holy Grail (or at least the Required by Law) object of patriotism.

American Barricade.

You could go on about jingoism, militarism, unilateralism, imperialism, all damn day.

Heaven knows, the editors of the Nation and the folks at Democracy Now do.

But why bother, when you can just intone the name American Barricade. That pretty much says it all.

Especially if you're googling it madly trying to find directions to drive there on the Thursday before a long weekend. Because it seems there are American Barricades in many American cities. Not to mention all across those quaint nations we've been invading.


I felt like a regular Yankee Doodle, making my way through traffic as thick as hasty pudding in my big ol' automobile, blasting classic rock on the car radio and turning the A/C up real high. Doing my part to contribute to American pride, and to global warming.

The barricades were for our neighborhood block party. Very Life, Liberty, and pursuit of Happiness.

Especially that last bit.

I am pretty sure party in the street is just what the Founding Fathers had in mind when they threw off the yoke of British oppression.

The British really are oppressive, after all. They serve their beer warm. Here in America we have nice coolers for icing down our beer.

Red, White, and Blue coolers, dude.

As Chuck observed to our newest neighbor Jeff, who in the demi-spirit of Sam Adams is a brewer if not actually a patriot, Ben Franklin said, "Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy."

I pointed out that Franklin also said, "Fart Proudly." Probably not long after he had that beer.

Chuck, not wanting to be outdone, observed that Franklin advised men to sleep with older women, because they would be grateful.

Personally, I am not sure I can imagine anyone being grateful for having sex with Ben Franklin.
As far as Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll goes, our block party isn't much on the first.

The second, well, let's just say you won't find anything you wouldn't find in the fields of Mount Vernon.

But the Rock and Roll, that is where we shine. This being America, everybody on the block is in a band. There's the Reverb Brothers. The Blueprints. Plus assorted other folks who get up to take the mike at some point. There is mucho dancing in the street.
Then we atone for our great national sin of stealing this land from its native inhabitants.

We do this by lighting the fireworks someone hauled all the way out to the Indian Reservation to buy.

By 11 pm, the barricades come down, the empties are cleared off the street, and we retreat to the neighbor's back porch, where the folks who started the block party 18 years ago jam out an acoustic set.

Welcome to Geezerpalooza the hostess said. Please, we young uns insisted, Just Call It Back Porchapalooza.

Whatever you call it, it was good clean fun. And I should know, since I scrubbed it out personally.


I'm like Washboardington Crossing the Delaware. With metal thumbpicks.

Take that, King George!