Our minor league baseball team here in Charleston — the Riverdogs — has a beautiful stadium not far from the Citadel campus. It’s a terrific little ballpark, full of family-friendly fun. Friday night homegames, for instance, come with a dazzling fireworks display at the end, win or lose. And this is no small fireworks display. I’m talking about a minutes-long sequence of big boomers and flourishing fountains of color that light up the night sky. The whole business is quite extraordinary.
I should know. Our house backs up to a gorgeous expanse of tidal marsh off the Ashley River, and on the other side of that wildlife-filled marsh sits, in all its resplendent glory and firework-launching preparedness, the ballpark. We have one hell of a view when the ‘crackers start going.
The downside? Well, for starters the boomers tend to hit late at night — it’s 11:10 here, and this week’s rendition just finished up — so they tend to wake up wee hobbits trying to sleep hereabouts. The second problem is Sydney the Wondermutt, who is trembling afraid of fireworks, thunder, and — we had to move to The Citadel to find this out — cannons. Poor pup.
Who would have thought a dog would be afraid of a cannon.
The really sad thing is that she’s also afraid of anything she associates with the things she’s afraid of:
Fear of thunder has led to fear of rain.
Fear of fireworks has led to fear of crowds cheering.
Fear of cannons has led to fear of football (since they fire them at home games whenever we score.)
Poor puppy.