Seven for 7/4

It was a small parade and a small crew of seminarians, but I figured it was worth a small blog entry.

This morning, Tracy and I got to be among the lucky seven to represent Luther Seminary in the Independence Day parade through the seminary's St. Anthony Park neighborhood. It was the community's 60th annual Fourth of July celebration and apparently the only parade today in St. Paul proper. What could make a gig like that any more prestigious? I'll tell you what: free Luther Seminary shirts. And we got those, too.

The others who were proudly coerced into parading down Como Avenue included fellow seminarians Linda, Rachel and my buddy, Chris, and Chris's wife, Heather, and their daughter, Ella, who a day earlier celebrated her third birthday.

We were positioned near the tail end of roughly 50 entries, between an old firetruck and a bunch of classic cars (some people who were walking star-spangled dogs cut in front of us for a while, too). We might have gotten more oohs and ahhs if we were riding in an antique vehicle or handing out copies of Martin Luther's Small Catechism, but we nonetheless got to wave our hands and flags at a few blocks worth of smiling faces. I especially appreciated it because I think it was my first parade in which I wasn't lugging around one or more drums.

Afterward, Tracy and I moved on to the most patriotic place anyone could spend a July 4 afternoon: the Mall of America.

Happy Independence Day, everybody!