The 4th of July

In 1999, I remember seeing a photo of the fireworks above the Charles River in Boston on the front page of a major Philippine newspaper. At that moment, I remember thinking how great it must be to experience that and wishing that I could be there to see the show the following year. It was just one of those things that I quietly muttered to God as a wish and quickly forgot about. The seeming impossibility of that thing happening just made my mind brush it aside to one corner of my brain. At that moment, the possibility of me even being in the US was small to nil. (This was before the whole Disney offer, which is another wonderfully weird story.)

A year later, I found myself at the bank of the Charles River, standing with thousands of people, watching that same show. I held my M's hand (we were just dating then) as we listened to the Boston Pops playing classical music to the awesome display of pyrotechny in the sky. I realized right then and there that I was living that small wish that I had made a year before. The weird thing is, we didn't even plan on being there. M and I decided to meet in New York for his birthday and stayed with his brother, L. On the fourth, M and L just decided that we would drive to Boston to spend the 4th with their two sisters who lived there. So we left late in the afternoon, undmindful of any schedule. As we entered the Massachusetts turnpike, we saw smaller displays of fireworks going off in the distance. M then mentioned that the fireworks in the Esplanade should be starting at around 10:00 pm. So they both decided that the three of us were going to head there and try to catch a glimpse of this legendary Boston tradition.

That's how I ended up there on that night. We craned our necks to watch the 40-minute display. But as grand as the spectacle was, I could not believe how much grander God's generosity was to me. Little did M and L know how God was granting one small wish of mine through them at that particular moment. Since then, I have celebrated every 4th of July here in Boston, and I am reminded of that little wish that I made. A wish that I considered impossible and forgot about, which God deemed important enough for Him to grant to me.