Fireworks

The dogs and I were watching the news at noon today when there was a series of loud bangs from fireworks somewhere in the neighborhood. Tee Tucker went crazy. She was bouncing around and barking wildly in all directions at once. Harriet curled up into a small ball and laid beside me and shivered so hard you could have mixed paint. The reports from the fireworks were over in less than 5 minutes but it took the dogs over a half hour to calm down.
I'm not sure just what the attraction is with setting off fireworks that just make noise. I understand and enjoy the large aerial displays that happen at New Years, the 4th of July and at some sporting events. I just don't see the allure of the noise makers that are sold as "Safe and Sane" for the 4th of July from stands all through the area and of course the bottle rockets, sky rockets, roman candles and the M80's M90's and M100's . They start fires and cause no end of trouble in the neighborhood for the residents and the police. They have also made the last two Independence Days a pure hell for my two dogs.
I know that all the fireworks sold here are to be of the "Safe and Sane" variety and that if you buy the other kind in Canyon County you sign a paper saying that you will not set them off in areas that are prohibited. Well guess what, that doesn't work, never has never will. The police almost always take the calls of illegal fireworks as area information and then go look for more fulfilling police work. The fire departments don't have enough personnel to stop it all and frankly they don't try any harder than the police.
The only way this will end is for the rest of us to put a stop to it. We need to educate people about the damage that is done by all fireworks. We need to make the politicians change the laws to stop the sale of illegal fireworks anywhere in the state. We need to make the possession of them illegal. We need to demand that the police act on the calls they get and not just blow them off. We need to find other ways to celebrate the 4th other than with thousands of small explosions for days on end. We need more parades, more discussion of the history and a community sponsored aerial display rather than the village idiots playing with bottle rockets.