For the first time in 20 years we were not at the beach, or on the road home from the beach, for the fourth of July. We were home. All of us together. Jake fresh off the plane from London wearing a Union Jack t-shirt and buzzing into his 23rd waking hour. Everybody asking questions and asking the next question before Jake got a handful of words out in response. (He found a Polish penny on the streets of Pompei. How cool is that?) Maddy and I glad we'd had the car ride home full of complete sentences before this celebratory eruption of the King Family Together Again. Everybody laughing, eating olives, tabouli, baba ganoush, and hummus that broke the blender (RIP). Tender blackberry cake that Gus made (and has the wounds to prove it).

After we ate we went out on the back porch to the darkness under the trees. We had sparklers. First time ever. Watt showed everyone how to dance with them. Jake pondered the chemistry of pyrotechnics and Tucker took off at a run, sparkler in each hand, arms outstretched, swooping and diving through the dark of the yard while the rest of us whooped and cheered and our hearts rose up through the leaves into the starry night.