Testosterone, fireworks and booze
Safety classes can’t save us from ourselves. Trust me: I know.
A small news story particularly caught my attention this week: On July 4, in Calais, Maine, a handsome young man named Devon Staples put a firework mortar on his head. He was drunk, reports say, and trying to impress his friends. When the fuse ran out, he was killed instantly.
By all accounts Staples was a great guy. He played “Gaston” at Disney World in Florida, charming little girls and women alike. But immediately on hearing the tale of Staples’ demise, strangers laughed. It was a clear case of user error; he was an obvious nominee for the Darwin Awards.
His poor mother, in the midst of the media blitz, told reporters that she would ask the state of Maine to begin requiring safety training courses before allowing someone to use fireworks. Devon’s death was just one of several recent fireworks-related tragedies in Maine, which had legalized the festive explosives in 2012.
She compared fireworks to regulated items such as cars and guns. “At least it’d be a little bit more than, ‘Here you go,’” she said. “That’s an explosive. They didn’t just hand me a license and put me in the car.” I respect her grief. But I don’t believe a training course would have saved Devon.
Classes don’t change stupid, alcohol-fueled bravado. People take drivers’ education and gun safety courses. And accidents happen anyway.
Everyone knows that if you spot an 11-foot alligator, it’s dangerous to jump in the water to fight it. And sometimes, someone does it anyway, with the results that you’d expect. Almost certainly, the problem isn’t a lack of gator-safety knowledge. It isn’t something a class could fix. I know all this because I have common sense. I acquired it a few years ago. The problem is that men suffer from an invincibility problem from birth until sometime before they turn 30. Those are the years that we join military and discover the wonders of alcohol, drug consumption, sex, and fast cars. Sometimes all at the same time.
I could have been Devon. I know that mania. A decade ago, when I was 22, I thought that fiery stunts were cool and innovative. I was the special kind of idiot that gets a gleam in his eye when he sees the first fireworks stand of the season. I danced with the death dealer known as Black Cat many a time.
By the time my friends and I could drive, fireworks were part of a balanced late night summer or winter break diet, along with cigarettes and a case of beer. I remember battles with Roman candles, lighting cases of firecrackers in mailboxes, and bottle rockets held in our hands until they went off or began burning our hands.
In a Roman candle battle in a Sagemont elementary school playground, I lost a nice pair of Diesel jeans (and nearly lost my manhood).
We survived by the grace of God. We should have rightfully taken trips to emergency rooms, friends holding bags of fingers white as sheets. Or worse. Fireworks are stupid. They are explosives. But no, I don’t want to see them outlawed. Even now, in my sane adulthood, I love them. They are dangerous. But we’ll never make our world safe enough to protect young men from themselves.