The second parade was in the evening and a completely unexpected pleasure. We'd been invited to a party along the coast by a business colleague and it turned out this little community had an evening parade on the 4th of July. More than that, it was a major ordeal, lasting more than one hour. Apparently, the town takes it quite seriously and even pays some participants who come from far away, while others in the parade may be looking for future business from the fairly well to do coastal townsfolk. The upshot for Harry was a spectacle of marching bands, jugglers, performers, horses, and many more fire trucks and this time I got to watch him and listen to Harry talk about it.

And, if that wasn't enough for the day, we got a message from Harry's Uncle Ben that Harry's cousin Chloe had been born that afternoon. Since their birth center wasn't too far out of the way, we decided to go straight there, arriving about 8:30pm. We'd have expected Harry to have fallen asleep in the car, but apparently he was still keyed up from all the excitement. When we arrived, Aunt Lisa was just about to try to get some rest and, I must say, Harry did a commendable job being quiet for most of the time we were in the room with her and Chloe. However, he couldn't resist verbally identifying Uncle Ben ("Uhp-Ben"), Aunt Lisa ("Ziza"), and even Chloe ("Klee"). Then, once we got back out into the waiting room with Ben, Harry ran amok with the toys there and did so for rest of the time we stayed. But that was OK, Ben was a little keyed up at that point as well. Finally, after 9:30 we got back in the car and Harry finally fell asleep, an hour and a half after his usual bedtime.


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Harry and Gramma
Dad's colleague Becky
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July 4, 2001 - Wednesday
I had kind of forgotten how exciting a parade can be. Harry saw his first two parades today and the simple joys of a young child were infectious. The first was in my parents' home town, not too far from us. I've been playing in a Dixieland band at that Old Home Day celebration for most of the years of my life and I did that again today. Unfortunately, that meant I missed Harry and the parade. I did see Harry behind the band (pictured left, me in the dark blue shirt) and his mother says he was calling "more, more" when we finished each piece. And, in a typically toddler moment, she says Harry thought everyone was clapping for him during an awards ceremony before the parade.