By land and by sea, they flock here to be reminded they're free

BRISTOL — Mere feet away from the still near-empty parade route, Scott Boudreau waded out of the water at Union Street Beach before 9 a.m. Thursday, a look of satisfaction on his face after his family anchored their boat in 6 feet of water.

“We beat the traffic,” he said of their trip down Narragansett Bay from the clan’s East Providence home. “We just set up right there on the route and swim back and forth getting our snacks and drinks.

“We packed all kinds of things,” he said. “I am pretty much the only one that does this.”

Boudreau said that apart from beating traffic, the Bay foray was a good way to beat the heat. At a parade where 50 were treated for heat exhaustion in 2018, that may have been a good idea on the sunny, 81-degree day.

While the Boudreaus' seven-year-old waterborne tradition may be unique, their motivations are not. Predictably, Bristol was brimming with people for its 234th Fourth of July festivities, the nation's longest continuous celebration of liberty.

“Wanna know why I celebrate? This is why, right here,” Scott Boudreau said, giving a big hug and smile to his 17-year-old son, Noah, who intends to enlist in the National Guard after his 18th birthday. “All of these people protecting us and our freedoms out there.”

Farther up the parade route, in front of Leo’s Pizzeria, Shirley Francis-Fraser sat down to watch the parade for the first time with her husband of 20 years, Allen Fraser.

“I have been watching it for decades [without Allen],” Francis-Fraser, a Providence resident, said. “My father, William Francis, was a sergeant with the Providence police, and he would be in charge of the brigade marching every year from when I was a kid.”

She shared her admiration for the men and women in the U.S. Armed Forces and the opportunities their work brings for those stateside.

“Their sacrifice and investment in this country enables us to have the freedom to draw from that investment to progress in our lives,” she said. “That investment is communal, economic and educational.”

Her husband, originally from New York City and in Bristol for his first Fourth in town, added to that.

“Patriotism is where love of your country meets sacrifice and support for your country,” Allen Fraser said. “That doesn’t mean you have to agree with everything. You can respectfully disagree with things.”

To that point, blogger Steve Ahlquist tweeted out photos of an immigration-policy protest happening closer to the beginning of the route, near Chestnut Street.

"We just want to keep this conversation going in Rhode Island," said Lauren Pothier, co-organizer of the protest called Close the Camps.

Her group of around 9 people dressed in black and marched in silence with signs holding up the names of young people who recently died in immigrant detention facilities across the southern border.

"For every cheer we got, we also got booed," Pothier said, adding that the protest's only goal was to be seen. "I was actually surprised at the number of cheers we got."

While freedom and liberty may be hard to define, the celebration itself was enough to explain her thoughts on the words.

"A lot of people can't go out and do simple things like go for a swim or enjoy a parade," said Elexis Darden, an East Providence resident, after swimming off a boat.

Kevin Nardolillo, also of East Providence, added that security is an underpinning that should not be discounted.

"Freedom is being able to come out and enjoy life," he said, "without someone looking over your back."

For their neighbor on the route, Bristol’s Joy Jennings, her family’s immigrant history and her own experience as a Catholic missionary inform her ideas on patriotism.

“My parents worked hard to be here,” she said. “It’s about freedom of diversity.... The freedom for all people from all countries to succeed.

“I see us [the U.S.] as a good example for what life can be.”