It’s Sunday night–New Year’s Eve–and I find the sound of fireworks down the street oddly comforting. They sound like “normal.”

My first acquaintance with neighborhood fireworks came on a mountaintop in West Virginia in the late 1940s. Our neighbors, the Howells, went all out on the Fourth of July and New Year’s and provided a treat all the children would never have had otherwise and no doubt recall to this day. The six McKeever offspring would get upstairs in our bedrooms and open the windows, providing a ringside seat since the Howells lived only three houses away. I’d never seen anything like it. The poverty in a coal-mining camp in those days was something to behold, and even though no doubt the “adults” in the camp called Affinity pooh-poohed the Howells’ spending that kind of money only for it to go up in smoke and bangs, it was a wonderful occasion for the kids.

That to me made it a good investment.

When we moved to the New Orleans area in September of 1990, it never occurred to us that locals would do anything more than the residents of Charlotte, NC, or Columbus, MS, where we had lived for the previous two decades. New Year’s Eve was a shocker. Driving home late that night from a friend’s house where we had gathered for supper, you would have thought a heavy fog had settled in. It was the smoke from fireworks. And the noise–every kind of noise, from the house-rattling boom of rockets to the sharp blast of bombs to the rat-a-tat ear-assaulting bang-bang-bangs of hundreds of firecrackers at once. Forget about trying to sleep through that. Just let it run its course; next day’s a holiday anyway.

Oddly enough, here in Jefferson Parish, fireworks are illegal. Each year Sheriff Harry Lee makes public pronouncements about his intentions to arrest violators. He might as well be trying to hold back the sunrise.

The best approach, of course, is for municipal governments to bring in professional companies to put on the whole show. Pre-Katrina, New Orleans did that at Woldenberg Park on the river by the French Quarter and Kenner provided one at the little tourist village on the river they call Rivertown. I suppose a lot of people attended them, but we never did.

My street provides all the fireworks I can take.

When grand-daughter Darilyn was about three, Marty and Misha took her to the fireworks show in downtown Charlotte. She did all right until the finale. In the last 60 seconds, they exploded something like 700 rockets. The sky was ablaze with explosions and the noise was deafening. Little Darilyn put her hands over her ears and said, “Mommy, it’s raining stars outside and we need to go inside.”

The year 2006 is ending. May it rest in peace. It’s been a tough 12 months. “Thank you, Lord, for your faithfulness.”

“And Lord, bless New Orleans with a new year of encouragement and progress. Thank you for all the friends everywhere who are determined not to forget us, who pray for us and send volunteer teams our way and are still collecting financial help. We feel so honored by their kindnesses.

And one more thing for 2007, Lord. If You see fit to let the Saints win some playoff games, we’d appreciate it. In some ways, we’d like to ask You to let us win the Super Bowl, but I’m not sure that would be a good thing. We’re a lot like the Chicago Cubs in baseball and have learned to live on eternal hope that next year will be our year. It would be anticlimatic if suddenly we got everything we ever wanted from this football team in one brief year. We wouldn’t have anything to hope for next year.

So, we’ll be pleased with a playoff win or two. And thankful whatever happens.

It’s gotten quiet outside. Wonder if Sheriff Lee’s deputies have arrived.

(P.S. Monday, New Year’s Day. This morning as I walked on the levee, I was struck by the lack of fireworks debris. A little here and there, but nothing like in the past. In fact, there have been times in the past when the paved lane atop the levee would be literally (litter-ly?) covered by the trash from a night of fireworks, and I have been known to take a broom up there and sweep it. Not much last night, however, and I slept like a baby through the occasional noise.

Today, some of our favorite teams are playing bowl games and at the same time, “Monk” is on the USA network, a whole day of him. I only discovered this program in the last year and it has become my favorite hands down. Adrian Monk is a detective of sorts, but the unusual thing is that he is an obsessive-compulsive. It’s hilarious, and so bizarre, and so bright. We’ve even noticed that they sometimes insert performers who sing a Christian hymn or speak with reverence of the Christian faith. And how remarkable is that!

Margaret says anyone who would take a broom and sweep the levee above the river because it had fireworks trash on it should certainly understand about obsessive-compulsive disorders. Guilty.)