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ARE WE LOSING JULY 4th?

My Strange July 4th 2007 Experience

July 5, 2007

Was there not a play - "THE FIFTH OF JULY"?

Certainly July 4th comes around every year - the date for sure! But are we headed for the day that's all it'll be, maybe a minor memory? It seems to me, we are losing its meaning, especially our continuing to apply it.

Yesterday, July 4, 2007, I was very ill, in a way I never was before! I might get into that more, later. And the day was so unlike what it usually is - weatherwise. The highest temperature barely got over 70, the lowest 60, which may not really be that low - a ten-degree span. I remember July 4, 1999 it hit 102, and the day before - 103, I think. That day I had gone to a 39 birthday party for a friend out on Fire Island. This year, It was overcast with intermittent rain, cool breezes - rather pleasant actually, but I could have used a sweather or light jacket. The sun appeared a couple of times, looking like one of those old Stephen Foster piano books depicting the Moon! I sat on a bench at Madison Square Park in the E 20s for several hours, not feeling at all well, as I said above. So, I needed to remain still, try to meditate. I had excrutiating pain, caused by a gastro/acid refux condition I have, as well as a hiatus hernia (hiatal?). But this was the worst! Again I will get back to this. Earlier, I'd had lunch at the Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen for the homeless - their usual 4th special of either hot dogs or hamburgers - this time hot dogs and their famous ice-cream with the American flag mounted on a tooth-pick, my later wearing it on my baseball cap. I guess I felt patriotic enough to do that despite how I was feeling - more ways than one, not just my illness.

My not feeling well actually started on Monday July 2nd. I'd been out to the Hamptons a couple of days - having had a large helping of Thru-way Diner, New Rochelle's meat-loaf. I mention that as it did not taste quite right (undercooked?), and there was an awful lot of it. I spent the first day not actually in the Hamptons but in the Commack-to-Bohemia areas. I stopped at Truck Rest Stop Exit 52 (Commack) for a rest as I usually do when I drive out there. But this time I really needed a rest, something obviously coming on. Later that night I returned there to sleep over night, which I also had done a lot. I stopped by the Airport Diner in Bohemia, had something else to eat, my cash being rather low. I did not order the typical dinner - just vegetarian,

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