My radio crackled, but I already knew the call. The July 4th display over the 5th Precinct was alive with light and sound. For everyone else, it was a celebration. For me, it was time to go see—Edith, an 85 year old, and her complaints about loud noises were legendary.
“The loudness is simply dreadful!” she squawked over the phone before I could even say hello. “There are these awful hisses followed by terrible booms! It’s just one big bang after another!”
When I arrived, she was waiting on the porch—a tiny, furious silhouette against the flashing lights. As I approached, a wall of sound hit me—a wave of screeching guitars and pounding drums blaring from inside her house.
“Is that—Mötley Crüe?” I yelled over the music.
“Oh, that’s the only way I can get to sleep,” she shouted back. “Playing that music at full blast helps me nod off!”
I gestured at the sky, “But you’re complaining about—the fireworks?”
“Listen to me sonny, I don’t want any backtalk!” she snapped, pointing a trembling, hairy boney finger at me. “My chia pets are vibrating off the mantelpiece! It is completely out of hand!”
I took a deep breath. “Edith, have you been hitting the vodka again?”
Her fury vanished, replaced by one of profound disappointment. She looked at me as if I were the stupidest man on the planet.
“Well, of course!” she said. “How else is a person supposed to get through all this noise?”
Floyd Kelly 
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