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College Tour

College Tour

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It’s been four years since we did this the last time.

Four years since we sat in a darkened auditorium and listened to an admissions director discuss interdisciplinary learning.

Four years since we were last told how to submit a FAFSA.

Four years (or almost that; we did one brief tour this spring and another this summer) since we sauntered through a college campus following a student ambassador who has mastered the art of  walking backward.

Four years, which seems like no time at all — except that a wispy 13-year-old has become a willowy 17-year-old. And we are embarking on our last few college tours.

Now we’re the ones who understand the difference between early decision and early action. We’re the application veterans, with the battle scars to prove it.

But there’s one thing we haven’t mastered yet — and that is saying goodbye. 

Half Marathon

Half Marathon

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The rain started early this morning, right when Claire was beginning her first half marathon. The sprinkles turned to drops and the temperature hovered in the upper 40s. Runners passed us wearing only shorts and singlets, their flesh reddened by cold. Some ran in jackets, others in spandex tights.

We found a viewing spot at Mile 11, right before a hill, and listened as one enthusiastic spectator cheered the racers with “You’re waaaay past half way.” 

“I heard you before,” some of them said, smiling and laughing and ever so slightly picking up their pace.

Finally, we saw Claire, Number 658. Though she’s only been running for a few months, she was in fine form, bouncing along as if the rain and the run weren’t fazing her. We cheered, she gave us a quick hug and ran off to tackle the last two miles.

Funny thing, she said later — the spot we picked to stand was right where she needed us most. 

Foreign Soil

Foreign Soil

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Tomorrow, Suzanne will be sworn in as a Peace Corps volunteer. Her two-and-a-half-month training program is over. She has improved her French and begun Bariba. She’s taught students at a model school and learned that when Beninese children want to get their teacher’s attention, they snap their fingers and say, “Madame! Madame!” The day after tomorrow she begins the two-day trip to the village in the northern part of the country where she’ll spend much of the next two years.

As she leaves behind the seacoast, the airport and other easy forms of egress, I worry about her more. But I trust that her training has been true and useful — and that she will temper her kindness with common sense.

I think of these things even more after the killing of four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi. Although there have certainly been enough world events to convince me otherwise (especially the Iran hostage crisis), I persist in thinking of embassies and consulates as safe havens, as foreign soil, our soil, in the host countries.

Now that feeling of safety and ease has been violated. That doesn’t mean I’m going to let these feelings get the better of me. Ambassador Stevens was a former Peace Corps volunteer. He wasn’t afraid of “rough” travel, of arriving in Libya (then still in the throes of revolution) on a cargo ship. I still believe in the “peace” in Peace Corps.

But world events are making that harder to do.

That Other Tuesday

That Other Tuesday

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It’s not just the date that’s the same; it’s the weather. Just a bit cooler, but with all the promise of a warm, low-humidity day.

And it’s the day of the week, too.  September 11, 2011, was also a Tuesday.

If each day of the week has a unique flavor, a character of its own, Tuesday is when the weekly routine has begun to buoy us up again.  We’ve made it through Monday. We can do another day; yes, we can. And if so, then we can even make it through the week.

And so we plunge ahead with renewed dedication. (Or at least that’s the ideal.)

Tuesday, September 11, 2001, was not such a day.

Tuesday, September 11, 2012, will not be, either.

A Year Ago Today

A Year Ago Today

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It was an ordinary late summer afternoon, silky air, the sort of day you wished you didn’t have to spend inside. And, as it turned out, many of us didn’t have to.  Because at 1:50 p.m. we were turned from our homes and offices onto the street by a 5.8 magnitude earthquake.

Though we later learned we should have sheltered in place under our desks (ignoring every protective instinct we had), we headed outside.  And for the next few hours the streets of D.C. were filled with panicked and then (once we got used to the idea) bemused office dwellers.

I had leapt from my chair without purse or cell phone but (strangely) with the Diet Coke I was holding when the building began to shake. For the next hour I frantically tried to reach family members on borrowed phones. At home I found broken china and a closet ankle deep in photos, papers and clothes that had been shaken off their shelves.

The earthquake happened a year ago today. A year of record heat and drought — with the occasional hurricane and derecho thrown in.

The tremblor seemed strange at the time. But strange is becoming commonplace.



The “D.C. Earthquake Devastation” photo that made the rounds on the Internet last year.

Twenty-one!

Twenty-one!

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Claire arrived two weeks later than we thought she would, waiting for a break in the heat wave (back when heat waves meant temperatures in the 90s instead of the 100s) to make her debut.

She was a cuddly baby, a tempestuous toddler and, well, we’ll just say a lively teenager.  Now she’s a lovely, caring, accomplished young woman heading into her senior year of college. And today she turns 21.

Back when I wrote parenting articles and the children were younger, I would routinely mine their antics for anecdotes. I don’t do that anymore, of course. But on some days I can’t help but note how proud I am of them, how they continue to amaze me, how very grateful I am to be their mother.

Today is one of those days.

Olympic Stories

Olympic Stories

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The warm-up visualization our yoga instructor led us through last night took us to London. “Flow east across the ocean. Look down, see the Thames as it curves through the city. How do you know it’s the Thames?” he asked. And then, with laughter in his voice, he quickly answered: “It’s the only dark thing you see.”

“It’s late there,” he continued. “But the pubs are still full. The eyes of the world are on this city.”

Maybe it was the drama in his voice, maybe it was the mid-summer doldrums, but whatever it was, it made me very excited that the Olympics are starting today.

I remember writing about the ice dancing event in Vancouver in in one of my first posts in this blog. Have I really been writing almost daily here for that long?

The Olympics, like any event that happens every two years (or every four) helps us measure time. The music, the uniforms, who wins and who loses, where we lived and who we watched it with — all these wrap themselves into our memories and become part of the experience. Watching the Olympics unites us in a good way. We are riveted by competition, not by tragedy.

It’s eight hours until the opening ceremonies. Let the games — and the stories — begin.

Anthony Page holds the Olympic torch in front of Big Ben. Photo: London 2012 Olympics Official Site.

First Race

First Race

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This morning, Claire competes in her first road race. She’s been running for a couple of months now, and she’s ready to compete. And I’m excited she’s doing it. Running meant a lot to me when I was her age; it gave me confidence that I, a klutz, could actually do something athletic.

Claire has never had that problem. She is naturally coordinated; she makes ice skating and rollerblading look easy. But this is still a big deal because it is such a disciplined and regulated activity. It is the sort of thing one does to push one’s self. And as such, is a good illustration of the kind of person Claire is becoming.

So this morning when the race begins, and Claire feels that little flutter in her stomach that’s reserved for the new things we do in life, I’ll be feeling it with her.

Meanwhile, in My Other Life

Meanwhile, in My Other Life

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Today is the day. At 10 a.m., the Supreme Court justices will file into the Court and hand down their decision on the Affordable Care Act. For the last few weeks many of us here in our nation’s capital, especially those of us who work in a law school whose professors have been  involved in analyzing the legislation, have been waiting impatiently for this moment.

Will the justices uphold the act or strike it down? Will they banish only the individual mandate, the part that tells us we must buy health insurance or pay a fine? And if they do that, how will the rest of the act stand (the so called “severability question”)?  And what of the Medicaid part of the ruling? How will that play out?

This time last summer I was reporting and writing an article on this topic.  So I’ve followed the challenge through the lower courts and now to this ultimate one. Like much of official Washington, I was riveted by the oral arguments in March. The constitutionalism of health care legislation is not a specialty of
mine, but after spending a month interviewing experts and writing about it, I learned  enough to understand and appreciate the issues.

Which makes me wish I had time to write about every major issue facing this nation. The more you learn, I think, the more you care.

Outdoor Performance

Outdoor Performance

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A summer evening at Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts. Spreading a blanket on the lawn, sharing wine and conversation as the sun slants through the trees. Birds in the rafters, fireflies  in the air.

For all good suburbanites the experience begins with the drive there, and this one was better than average. Crowell, Brown’s Mill, Beulah — back roads that made me feel like I was out in the country, which Wolf Trap once was.

Outdoor performance has a character of its own, the crowds diffused by the presence of grass and trees and the high steady murmur of the wind. At a certain point in the experience you almost forget what you’re there for. But then the curtain rises, the lights come up, and the performance begins. It’s then that you remember you’re there for the dance, the music, the play. (Last night it was Ballet Hispanico, a beautiful and improbable blend of ballet, modern and Latin dance.)  It’s then that the illusion and the reality merge.

Photo: Wolf Trap