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We got to the Metro station at 6:45 a.m. and waited for 45 minutes to catch a train downtown only to have them full up. I even tried just getting on one as really there was plenty of room if people in the middle would have been a little more willing to set aside their belief in personal space. The next thing I knew, someone had thrown a banana peel at me (no kidding, from a real banana) and someone else shoved me off the train. For a second I was so shocked I didn't know what to think, then the next second I couldn't stop laughing--someone had thrown a banana peel at me!
We ended up having to go out to go forward. By this I mean we hopped on an outbound train to a station that was almost empty so we could get on a train going in the right direction. And it worked! After an hour and a half, we had meet four new friends and were downtown. We buddied up with two local guys and a guy and girl who had driven in from Michigan, calling ourselves Team McPherson Square because we decided to stick together after agreeing the best place to get off the train was the McPherson Square Station. We all kept tabs on each other to make sure no one got lost/left behind and made decisions together.
After seeing the masses walking to the Mall, we figured it was too late to get into the inauguration, so we made plans just to get on the parade route and get decent seats. But we kept getting herded and sent in different directions by security. It was quite the sight to behold.
Before we knew it, we had crossed over the parade route and got spat out onto the Mall. We ended up about 50 yards in front of the Washington Monument. We were packed shoulder-to-shoulder, but we could see the jumbo-trons and hear the speakers, and if we shifted the right way to see between heads, we could make out the Capitol Building in the distance.
You may think you saw how many people were on the Mall yesterday, but let me assure you, the pictures were all taken around 11 a.m., well before people stopped flooding the mall. The crowd just kept growing, and the excitement grew exponentially with the numbers. We had all come to see history being made, and in that moment, we transcended cultural beliefs, places of origin, religion, creed. We were all there with a hope for something different, something more. While that may sound kinds of naive and hokey, that was truly the feeling in the crowd.They only time I didn't feel unity among us was when former-President George W. Bush came on stage. In fact, I was a little disappointed in the spectators. While I don't agree with a lot of decisions Bush made during his administration, I understand that we all had a voice in putting him in office. We asked him to be our leader, and he took that burden upon himself for eight years. He also deserves the respect the office of the President of the United States deserves. While I believe in freedom of speech, I also believe in self-control and knowing the correct time and place to voice your opinion. And a ceremony celebrating the peaceable transfer of power from one President to the next is not the place to boo and sing "hey, hey, hey, good-bye." But after that, things calmed down and excitement returned.
Cheers echoed off the monuments that honor the leaders of the past when our leader of the present appeared on stage. The excitement of the moment settled over me more warmly than my winter clothing and the blanket I had wrapped around myself. I knew in that moment, in that place where history had been made time and time again, I was witnessing something great. Something bigger than the crowd that had gathered. And when Obama placed his hand on the Bible once used by Abraham Lincoln to take his oath of office, I suddenly became aware of something much different. We were placing a huge burden of expectation on this one man. We are expecting him to change the world--we were probably asking more of him than any president in living memory. And I think, as he fumbled over the words he was asked to say, our new President knew it as well.
His speech was powerful, probably made more powerful to me by knowing I was there when he spoke those words. He had the authority of the office he now held. And while I don't agree with everything he said or with all of the things he has promised, I know that he is now our President. He is the new face of our nation, and I pray that we will be able to live up to all of the faith we have put in him.
Spirits continued to run high as we made our way off the Mall. I was surprised by the patience of almost everyone (of course there were a few people who complained and a few others who were rude along the way), but we eventually made it to the White House where we saw the organizations lining up for the parade. By that time, the parade route was closed to any more pedestrians and we were popsicles, so we just kept walking until the feeling returned to our toes and the adrenaline wore off enough that we all became hungry.
We hit 18th and M only to realize we were not getting on the Metro any time soon, especially when we received a text about a woman who was trapped under a train on the red line and the stop was shut down until she could be rescued (on a side note, she was later freed and only had minor injuries). So we just kept walking all the way into Georgetown. We finally found an Italian place that had less than an hour wait, and six strangers who had become friends in one morning, sat down to eat and watch the parade and news on the bar television.
We continued out walk through Georgetown and finally crossed over Francis Scott Key Bridge into Roslyn. A quick stop at the Metro information booth revealed that the trains were still incredibly full and delayed, so we just kept walking until we got back to my car. So 12 hours and 5.88 miles of walking, we ended up back at the beginning.
That is a day I will always remember. Now I just need to get back to work and wait another four years until we can do it all over again.
- Location:Washington, DC
We started off at Mt. Vernon Saturday where I tried to make like Nicolas Cage and sneak into the secret passageways.
When that didn't really work out, I compared my teeth to those of our first president. I couldn't take a picture of the dentures themselves, but trust me, they look painful enough to make anyone dread the dentist.
I guess I just don't have that leader's smile, me having good, modern dental hygiene and all. So my sister tried to make friends with Martha.
And of course, after about five minutes, they were the best of chums.
Day two was devoted to the Inaugural Welcome Concert. We arrived at 9:30 a.m. and got great seats. We were halfway up the reflection pool by the Lincoln Memorial.
(Give me a break--I was really cold.) You might not think these were great seats, but we were in front of about 3/4th of all the other people who were sitting behind us. So you can ask one of the 100,000 people sitting on the lawn of the Washington Monument, and they will agree that we had great seats.
The music was also fantastic. As many of my friends know, I am obsessed with Bon Jovi, and when Jon Bon Jovi came out and sang with Bettye LaVette (another of my favorites), I was in heaven.
So maybe I got a little too excited and ended up looking like a complete dork and my sister will never let me live this down. But come on, it was John Bon Jovi!!!
But by far the best performance was by someone who totally surprised me but Sara will say "I told you so," and Celeste will laugh, and Corinna already said "I told you so."
I freakin' loved Garth Brooks. He had the crowd dancing and singing, which granted wasn't very hard because we were all dancing and singing long before the show even started. But he made the crowd go crazy, and I would have been happy to watch him for another hour.
I also loved that this concert wasn't just about big-names putting on a show--it was about honoring the people who had gathered along the reflecting pool in generations before. It was about Marian Anderson singing there for President Roosevelt because she was black and not allowed to perform at Constitution Hall. It was about Martin Luther King, Jr. and the March on Washington that brought thousands of people together to fight for a freedom that should never have to be fought for. And it was about the soldiers who are honored in the memorials that surrounded us, who fought for freedom and who gave their lives to give us the America we believe in.
But if I cried, I'll never tell.
Of course, it was really to hear president-elect Barack Obama speak that we all turned up. And speak he did.
I could even see him, kind of. To help you out, he's the blob the big red arrow is pointing at.
Obama gave the most wonderful speech about change and unity and all the things he has said since the beginning of his campaign. He encouraged us all to take responsibility and do our part to make this nation a better union. I still can't believe I was there to actually hear him speak on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. I'd ask you to pinch me, but that might be a little hard over the internet.
Today my sister and I got to participate in one of the service project that took place around the city. We went to the Martin Luther King, Jr. Library downtown and helped serve food to the homeless and hungry. We worked alongside a great family, the Gadsons, who came out to get involved as a family.
Cameron is nine, and Ethan is only seven, but they worked like pros. Because they were at the end of the table and such a great looking family, reporters wouldn't leave them along--local Channel 4, a major Canadian network, reporters from Korea. Cameron blew me away because every reporter would stick a camera in his face and he would give them the most amazing responses, never once stopping his careful placement of food on a homeless person's plate. And look at those smiles? How could you not love this family?
We also went to an art museum and the National Archives today, but that was nothing compared to the time we spent working with and in the community. Although I did buy a bunch of buttons today only to look more closely and realize that I bought a grammatically incorrect button! I can't believe I spent an entire 80 cents on a button that doesn't know the difference between and adjective and a noun, which made me wonder about the authenticity of DC street vendors.
A funny side note, we couldn't seem to get away from Josh Groban in the past two days. Not only did he sing at the welcome concert, but he was at the library as well. And as we were getting on the Metro to come home, he was giving an interview for MSNBC right next to us. I think he was stalking us, which I might think was cooler if I actually liked Josh Groban.
So in honor of Tammy, I am posting this video of my stalker Josh. This one's for you, Tammy!
- Location:Washington, DC
This was an incredibly busy weekend. I know I often complain about having too much to get done on the weekend, but in reality, I prefer to be busy. Not that I don’t love spending three nights and two days doing nothing but reading, writing and catching up on TV, but that gets kind of old after awhile.
Saturday I got some shopping done before heading to a couple of holiday parties. On my way to the first party, I needed to drop all of my moving boxes off at a recycling center, but for traffic-ridden DC and my directional challenged self, that didn’t go as smoothly as it should have. There was a car on top of the median that was holding up traffic in both directions on I-395 and then I was talking on my cell phone and missed the tiny, ill-marked side-street where the recycling center is. So I got to the first party late. The second party was way out in the boonies of Virginia, so I white-knuckled it all the way there. I was so nervous about getting lost in the middle of no where that I think I stopped to check the directions about 20 times in 20 miles. I ended up making it just fine and seeing some deer and a fox along the way.
Sunday morning I went to church and then went to the Holocaust Museum in the afternoon. This is about the fourth time I have been to that museum, but my friend had never been and really wanted to see it. I honestly don’t know if I can emotionally handle going again. If you have never been to the Holocaust Museum, you really should go at least once. It is more powerful than any history lesson you will ever get in school and isn’t as hard to get to as the actual concentration camps in Europe. But it is very emotionally draining.
- Location:Washington, DC
Too many people have sacrificed money, relationships and even their lives to make sure that all Americans could cast their vote today. I know it sounds melodramatic, but I am happy I could pay homage to them by voting.
On a slightly different topic, I was so confused by Illinois' new electronic ballot. It had all these arrows and a wheel and a funky-shaped red button. I have been out-of-state during the last two presidential elections so voted on an absentee ballot, so it was kind of a shock to step up to my little booth and not find a de-chadder attached to a metal box. And what happened to the square cardboard booth of my childhood? This was totally sci-fi voting. Someday I will tell my children's children stories about how we used to vote by punching holes in paper. How primitive!
- Location:Aurora, IL
I've recently gone through a phase of reading Revolutionary War books, including Cokie Robert's "Founding Mothers" and David McCullough's "1776". A few years ago I was all about the "real" story of Arthur Pendragon and other stories of the middle ages. And in high school, I had an obsession with Greek history and mythology--my freshman year in college my major was Western Civilization, an area of study that later became my minor.
But the more I read history books, the more I realize that no matter how analytical and objective the writing is, every writer needs to take some license and ends up writing fiction mixed in with the fact. What separates the fiction from fact on the bookstore shelves is merely the way it is presented.
As I am writing this historical fiction book, I find myself turning to secondary sources of history and longing to have primary source at hand, which is a little hard when Houma, LA, is about 2,500 miles away from where I am right now and Hurricane Katrina made airfare prices so out of my financial range that I have had to get creative.
Yet I have found amazing Web resources for places like the National Weather Service that let me see what the weather was like on a particular day 75 years ago, or I can rifle through the university library's archived issues of "Good Housekeeping" from the Great Depression, or I turn the pages of an art book and see what arts saw there during that time period. And most of all, I love making phone calls and talking to people who were really there and experienced life on the bayou during that time.
While my story is fictional, it is rooted in history. And I am loving all the research and conjecture and getting dusty in basement archives. Black newsprint stains my fingertips and my shoulders are starting to hunch from sending so much time on the computer. But it is worth it, and I love the smell of old newspapers.
So though I am a fiction writer, I am also a historian. I am bringing stories to light that have been hidden in basements and minds and reference books and databases. These stories deserve to be told and loved, and I get to help facilitate that. How cool is that?
- Location:Rexburg, ID
