Star-spangled holiday

link Staff photo: Tony Bullocks

Area residents watch the Smoke on the Water fireworks display Saturday at Greene Acres Park. More photos on page 12.

Staff Writer

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The holiday action started well before the sun came up for Jason Aven and Joe Cabezuela as a thunderstorm rolled through the area and flooded their Clovis fireworks business tent Saturday morning.

But by noon the water cleared and the carpet was merely damp as the coaches from Hereford helped a continuously long line of customers pick out the perfect pyrotechnics.

Aven said a lot coaches and teachers who are off for the summer sell fireworks as a way to supplement their income.

The venture is a family affair for Jason, as his wife Kami and daughter Rainey, 12, made the trip to Clovis on Saturday to help him out.

“I like meeting new people every time we come in,” Rainey said. “It’s nice.”

Kami said the family usually has its own celebration with fireworks on the fifth of July after buying out whatever fireworks they have left over — which usually isn’t many.

Gad Garcia and his daughter Nayeli Garcia, 4, of Clovis, were shopping together at the fireworks tent early in the afternoon Saturday.

The pair browsed options like the “Big Timer” and “Artillery Shells,” but when asked what fireworks Gad was holding in line waiting to check out, he laughed and said “No idea — whatever looked the most exciting.”

Gad said he and Nayeli would be joining friends Saturday night at Greene Acres Park for a barbecue and the Smoke on the Water show, a get-together that marks his favorite part of the holiday.

“It’s the ambiance — everybody is in a good mood and enjoying the day off,” Gad said.

Shane, Ginger, and Julia Summerlin, of Roscoe, Texas, and Evon Grubbs, of Abilene, Texas, made the more than four-hour drive for an annual family reunion in Pleasant Hill.

“We schedule it every year for when everybody can be off and get together,” Shane said.

When asked about their fireworks selection, the group smiled and almost collectively said “the big stuff.”

But Shane clarified with “not enough.”

Ginger said her favorite part of the holiday, echoed by Evon, is “family and eating.”

At Greene Acres, families started setting up tents and getting grills hot for cooking as early as 11 a.m. Saturday to get prime lakeside real estate in preparation for the nighttime fireworks show.

William Hall, of Clovis, was spotted snoozing in a lounge chair under a tree in between trips to the barbecue trailer where he was cooking ribs.

Hall said his children wanted to set up the barbecue stand for the first time at the event this year, so Hall attended to help cook, although “I would rather have been at home or somewhere fishing,” he joked.

Hall said one thing he loves about the holiday is “everybody sits around being lazy, just relaxing.”

Pastor Don Bates and wife Belinda, of Clovis, said this was their first time attending the Smoke on the Water event as they just moved to town from Flagstaff, Arizona, two years ago.

The Bates’ hung out as volunteers from Living Water Community Church set up a snack trailer to raise money for the congregation.

Don said the Fourth of July has deep meaning for him.

“My dad was a pilot that was shot down on D-Day, in World War II, and survived,” Bates said. “So Independence Day, to me, means you look at the lives that were lost, and what happened, and the men and women that have laid down their lives for us to sit here in the sunshine. It’s a day to say ‘Thank You.’”

For Belinda, it’s “a day to celebrate that we have the freedom to worship and to be who we are — to have freedom to be who we are and what we are.”

As dusk settled over the lake, “Groupo Cielo” provided the music as kids with sparklers and glow sticks lit up the park.

As it got closer to 9 p.m. and the start of the fireworks show, kids started scooting toward the water’s edge in anticipation.

When the show kicked off. visitors donned their free 3D glasses provided by the Chamber of Commerce, and the sound of the fireworks was punctuated with excited gasps, a few baby screams, and some occasional frantic ducks quacking.

The impressive finale of gold, glittering aerials elicited applause from the crowd, and as the lights died out the masses made their way out of the dark park to try and beat the traffic.

Chidren’s reactions to the show ranged from “it was pretty cool,” to “awesome.”

Rizzo Cordova, 8, of Clovis, said his favorite part of the holiday was the fireworks, and he was particularly impressed by the finale.

“When all of it started to go in the air, I was all, ‘How did they get all those fireworks to go off at the same time?’” he said.