It’s a toss-up whether my favorite holiday is Christmas or the 4th of July. I didn’t realize, in fact, it wasn’t common to have the Fourth be a favorite holiday unless you grew up in Zelienople, Pennsylvania. The entire town shuts down, a massive parade goes down Main Street complete with all the Little League teams, tractors, decked out bicycles, horses, every.single.emergency.vehicle (too many), and of course the Resurrection Band with Betty, its storied majorette. Seriously, the Wall Street Journal even featured her years ago — when she was only 79.

Plus, much of my maternal extended family comes home. As a child, my best friend would spend the day with us. We’d set up badminton in the back yard and grill and play games and end the evening with sparklers and fireworks. I love the Fourth.

This year was different, but still stellar. In the absence of the parade and town festivities, we made our own, including reviving the Banyay Band: A New Generation. We set up in my parent’s front yard and serenaded the cul-de-sac and Landon, as is his style, danced.

The other reason the Fourth was so big this year is I WALKED for the first time in eight months after some pretty significant femur and hip surgery. It was a mighty challenge then (and is still a challenge even in mid-August) but such a huge milestone to get around without crutches. I’m still working hard with rehab and have until mid-October to be super strong on the right side before I go in to have my left side operated on.

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We also celebrated my dad’s retirement! (He’s working part-time for the remainder of the year in transition.) Mom surprised him with a European River Cruise originally scheduled for late this summer, but delayed thanks to COVID-19. It was a wonderful afternoon to celebrate and honor his years of hard work and being fan engineer extraordinaire!

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