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Narrative

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As I walked down the boardwalk on the 4th of July in Ocean City, New Jersey I was trying to take in as much as possible at 8 years old. I was listening to the thousands of footsteps, looking at all the different American flags hanging everywhere, and everyone dressed in red white and blue, just as I was. My 6 year old sister walking next to me in a dress similar to mine, along with my 3 year old brother in a stroller, with my oldest brother pushing the stroller and my parents walking behind us, all of us here together on vacation. My grandma would rent a house in Ocean City every summer for my family to stay at with her for a few weeks, always including the 4th of July, so we could witness the fireworks on the beach. We were looking for a place to eat dinner before the fireworks, it was a little before sunset and we wanted to have a spot on the beach before the show started, and before the louder groups of people came to the beach, which were usually college kids renting a house together for the summer. After walking up and down the boardwalk more than a few times, we finally decided on Prep’s Pizza, one of my dads favorite places to eat in Ocean City. While sitting in a bright orange booth at the walk in restaurant, I watched the people in the kitchen, rushing and yelling at eachother to get the pizzas made and served, since this was the most popular pizza place on the boardwalk. I watched them until my food came and I was mesmerized by how these people made their pizzas, they all moved so fast you’d think they had been working here their entire life. One person threw the dough and folded the edges to make the crust, another person did all the cheese and toppings, and another person was in charge on the two huge pizza ovens, each were able to fit at least 8 pizzas at a time. You could smell all the different types of pizzas, cheese, bacon, meatball, buffalo chicken. This place had almost any kind of pizza you could think of. My family rushed to finish their food, but it wasn’t a stressed rush. We were all equally excited to see the fireworks together as a family so we were all eating faster without really realizing it, just out of pure excitement. After I had eaten all the pizza that would fit into my 8 year old stomach, my family and I left the restaurant, thanking our waitress on the way out. We started making our way to the beach, with blankets and cameras in hand. We found a spot that was far out enough on the beach, but also not as close to the water because my brother was asleep in his stroller, and my sister was afraid of the loud noises the fireworks made. Also the waves were the biggest I’ve ever seen in New Jersey, and we weren’t sure if the tide was going up or down. So my parents thought it was best to stay away from the water. After about 15 minutes of waiting on the beach towel in the dark, the first firework was shot up into the air. A huge red circle followed by the large, deep sound of the explosion. As the show continued, the fireworks became more frequent and louder. The colors danced across the water, blues, reds, greens, whites, and pinks. I looked around to see everyones faces turned upwards at the sky,

each explosion I heard, a different color would show up on everyones faces. And for every noise from each firework, there was an “ooh” or “ahh” that followed. When the finale started, everyone immediately knew what was going on. The question was already going around the beach, “is this the finale?” “did the finale start yet?”. But when it did start, everyone was aware of it because all of a sudden there was a non-­stop firing of fireworks in the sky, it was a stream of smoke and fire and color making one endless roar of explosions. After the seemingly endless finale, the whole beach applauded the show, it truly was brilliant. My family rolled up our sand-­covered blankets, and made sure everyone was accounted for. Then we made our way to my favorite part of the night, dessert. We went to a fudge store near the main area of the boardwalk, my sister and I shared a box, and my parents got two boxes filled with the nut-­covered fudge I didn’t like. The store smelled like chocolate all sorts of candy. You could also watch the people behind the counter make taffy, which to me was really fascinating. They took the piece of taffy and stretched it out over and over again, then cut it up into smaller pieces to serve. My brother and I got sample pieces of taffy to take home. After dessert we finally made our way back to the beach house. My red white and blue dress stained from pizza grease, sand, and anything else I had ran into during the day. My whole family worn out from the great day of activities, and a night I will never forget.

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