Naughty Lyrics

Last night we watched Fourth-of-July fireworks over Wenatchee. Almost as showy was a brush fire on the side of Horse Lake Mountain just above the city, and the responding fire trucks.  At the same time, we watched and listened to the National Independence Day Concert at the Washington Memorial in D.C. They played the usual Russian music (1812 Overture) and familiar patriotic songs (yes, and we watch Lawrence Welk reruns, too). But I couldn't keep the alternative lyrics out of my mind as I heard the music. That all started with cousin Patty--she had older brothers to teach her things that she passed on to me. Jon and Dean, you are to blame for this! It all started with "Beans, beans the musical fruit," which I began singing in a grocery store, and that got a hand clomped over my mouth in a big hurry. Milly shouldn't have complained:  She's the one who chanted marches as we shopped, "Left, left, left, I had a good home and I left, I left my wife and forty-five kids, did I do right, right, right." So as the singers belted out their lyrics, I murmured along. To "Three cheers for the red white and blue," I thought "Be kind to you poor feathered friends, 'cause a duck may be some body's mother..."  To "God Bless America," I'm thinking  "God bless my underwear...through the washer, through the dryer, to the clothesline outside, God bless my underwear, my only pair." And finally, to "The Star Spangled Banner," I thought, "Oh say can you see/ any bedbugs on me./If you do, take a few, 'cause I caught them from you!" Like putting pitted olives on their fingers, it's a level of culture that my grandchildren should grow up knowing.