In Which History Gets the Better of Us

So the Small Town is obsessed with its history. Obsessed to such an obsessive point that visitors might think that without the Small Town, we would all be drinking way way way too expensive tea and remembering the War for Independence as that sweet little skirmish we had with our Mother, the Queen.

We've got museums (like three teeny ones) in the Small Town that are chock-full of our lore and also all kinds of cool stuff that has washed up on our shores. We've got books in the book store and at the library with photos and more elaborate stories of our impact on naval history, fishing history, American history. But mostly, we have a band of totally dedicated Revolutionary War reenacters (lots of them parents like me) who reenact battles on boats and also in classrooms and around town. And they do it on 85 degree days in traditional clothing. Made of wool. With their kids.

Like they did here all weekend. Which was good timing, seeing as my sister and her family were visiting, and there is nothing 16 and 14 year old boys like more than an educational stroll through history on a Saturday afternoon. Poor dudes. But their little sister and my kids: hellllooooo? Muskets! Bayonets! Meat on a spit over an open fire! Tents! To spend the night in! Outside! And lemonade sold in bottles with corks!

R, bedecked in her usual athletic short/t-shirt ensemble, hair in knots and in her face, part Bad News Bear, part homeless urchin, says within minutes of the tour through the encampment: "MUUUMMMMMA! Sign me up! Sign me up TODAY! I want a gun and I want to sleep here and I want eat that meat and I wanna fight in the war and I wanna wear those pants and MUUMMMMMAAAA! Can I please please please please be a soldier too???"

Completely warms a Mother's heart, no? Before I was forced to start the lecture on war and peace and George Bush and such, this is what we learned from our guide:

The Redcoats wore red to intimidate their enemy and so their blood wouldn't show.
All men between 16 and 60 were required to own and know how to use a musket.
Which most fisherman around here knew nothing about.
A musket took about five minutes to load and shoot. (Downside.)
All men in the service were given a rasher of rum. (Upside.)
Muskets need to produce a spark in order to ignite gun powder.
Rain was not good for spark action, so the war was cancelled on rainy days.

R reconsidered her options. I could literally see her brain firing sparks of its own. She inspected the crap out of those tents, she inspected the clothes the girl children were wearing ("nightgowns?" she said). She inspected the boys whittling by the fire and the small "guitar" (a fiddle) a woman was playing and the meat; girl likes her meat. B and their cousin were equally entranced but I was pretty sure neither would opt to sleep out there that night, and even R seemed a little iffy by the end.

But not iffy enough. That kid has always had a need to say "yes" to anything, sometimes even before knowing what she's saying yes to. She asked, "So can I do that? Can I sign up for that?" (because everything -- private school, yacht clubs, leer jets -- are in her mind just something one simply "signs up" for) and I said, because I am nice sometimes, "Maybe, but not tonight." And she was good with that, since her cousins were here and there was candy in her future.

I said, "You'll learn more of this stuff next year in a second grade, isn't that great?" and she said, "uh huh" and I said, "maybe these guys will come into your classroom and teach you more about it" and she said, "you think so?" and I said, "i hope so." And her sparks started firing (and I was all, OMG, she is totally the next Doris Kearns Goodwin) and she looked at me, from underneath her now lemonade-sticky hair, and asked all wide-eyed and wonder-time-ish, "DO YOU THINK THEY WILL BRING THE GUN?"

I told her that I think it's probably going to rain that day so the war will be cancelled, but that I am sure that they will bring other cool stuff -- like the BAYONET she asked; um, no, I said -- but other cool stuff that is just as awesome -- like the tent?! she asked; um, yes, like the tent maybe -- but mostly, they can tell and teach you things about your Small Town that maybe you never knew and you can ask all kinds of questions and learn all kinds of things about our history and your history, since this is your Small Town now too. And stuff happened here? she asked, and I said, yes it did.

She thought about that. She looked around. She looked at the harbor and the rocky, brutal coast and these volunteers all dressed up in the clothes of men and women who were not much more than fisherman and sailors who learned how to use guns and fought with them and sometimes died because of them, and she said, "alright" and then she said, "i hope they bring the lemonade."

And I seriously hoped that the ghosts of the soldiers who no doubt roam the Small Town got a little chuckle out of that and remembered the girl's just a kid.