Armed and ready for action
I don't really love a parade. Not at all.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's like saying I don't love Mom, Neil Armstrong and the MLB playoffs. I do love these American institutions, partially because, unlike parades, they don't throw things at me.
OK, so people in parades throw candy. The point is if you don't want the candy, I think it's called assault.
But my wife and I weren't at the small town's parade for us _ or for the purpose of filing a potentially profitable lawsuit. We were there for our toddler. We thought he'd enjoy watching all the trucks, tractors, sirens and obnoxious teenagers who look goofy to everyone who's not in on the secret that they're cool.
The Toddler stood with us on the side of the city street, close enough to wave at trucks but far enough away from the parade his mom wouldn't get nervous.
A couple of trucks went by.
He had no reaction.
An ATV roared past.
Nothing.
A school bus cruised down the street.
He vaguely waved in the way British royalty does when the cameras are on.
Then, something new happened.
A fire truck slowly moved past. An arm reached out of the window and tossed a small shower of sugary hail in our direction. A few Tootsie Rolls, some jawbreakers and a Laffy Taffy bounced around the chipped street like a handful of dice and landed at the Toddler's feet.
The Toddler bent over, picked up a plastic-wrapped jawbreaker and looked at it. Did the marble-sized rock of hard candy look tempting to him, sitting there all floozy red in a stasis field of see-through plastic wrapping?
Nope. He didn't want to eat the candy. He was just trying to figure out what to do with it.
A group of people in matching "elect so-and-so" T-shirts walked by and scattered more candy on the road's shoulder before us. The Toddler pulled his arm back and threw the jawbreaker at them.
That was it. People were throwing things at him, so he was supposed to thrown things at them.
To a toddler, a parade is probably a lot like the cantina scene in "Star Wars." It's loud, crowded, the music's not quite in tune and it's filled with all sorts of strange-looking creatures in ugly pants. But, I guess every day in the life of a little kid is like that.
The Toddler had fistfuls of candy now. As he threw piece after piece at the parade that weaved its way trough town, to him, he was just trying to fit in. I picked up a few jawbreakers and a Dum-Dum. He'd run out of candy at some point, and I didn't want him to feel left out.
