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Airing Out

Airing Out

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There are days in D.C. that bring a bright sun and mild feel to our winter, that air it out like an open window on a chilly night.

Yesterday was such a day, when a 30-minute walk took on grand proportions in the landscape of the hours, and made my afternoon significantly peppier than my morning.

There were bicyclists on the path and runners shedding layers. There were the familiar take-offs and landings at National Airport. There was the monument ahead of me and all the promise of a new year.

I was on a path, moving forward.

The Morning After

The Morning After

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This is no “morning in America.” This is more the way you feel when you learn that someone you love has been hurting more than you possibly thought they were. Why didn’t you tell me, I feel like saying. How could things have been this bad, to produce this end?

But they were telling me, telling us, and we wouldn’t, couldn’t listen. Because listening across party lines is not something we do much anymore.

The great rift exposed by this election has been a long time coming, and it will take a while to repair. I’m not a politician, but it seems to me that the best way — maybe the only way — out of this is to pull together. Unfortunately, the campaign has eroded our ability to do the very thing we need to do for our recovery.

In my office now there is much gallows humor, talk of relocating to Canada or some tropical isle. It’s a good time to leave for Indonesia and Myanmar (which I do on Friday). But I’ll be back soon. How much will this have sunk in by then? How inured will we be to this new reality?

Bus Warrior

Bus Warrior

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A new job, a new routine, a new commute. After a couple of long, miserable slogs on Metro, I tried a bus that whisks me from a parking lot in Reston to a stop five minutes from my new office. It will be a godsend — if I can figure out the parking.

Because if there’s one thing I’ve learned about D.C. traffic and commuting, it’s that every shortcut has already been found, every new route tried. It hasn’t been designated the second worst traffic city in the nation (bested only by L.A., I believe) for nothing!

But so far I can say this: the bus is a fundamentally different way to travel. It moves you through space above ground, for one thing. I see the white stones of Arlington in military precision. I see the Washington monument looming in the distance when we stop at the Pentagon.

Connections are clearer, the way road leads to road. It’s a good way to begin a new chapter, seeing more clearly, perched high above the fray. Not road warrior but bus warrior.

Wonder

Wonder

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The office is almost cleaned out. The farewells are almost said. My work at Georgetown Law is almost done. So I took the afternoon off to see the Wonder exhibit at the Renwick.

I saw shapes, materials and colors that delighted and amused. Insect art, for example:

Or a 150-year-old cedar, hollowed, re-imagined and reconstituted:

And light everywhere, light touching polyester thread to create an indoor rainbow:

For many years I was paid by the word, so “one picture is worth a thousand words” is not a phrase I like to use. But there are exceptions:

Leaving the Hood

Leaving the Hood

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I’m not just leaving a job on Friday; I’m leaving a neighborhood — a lively, jangling, grand and varied neighborhood. A neighborhood where the U. S. Capitol and the city’s  largest homeless shelter are both within strolling distance. A neighborhood of posh eateries and soup kitchens. It’s a place I’ve enjoyed getting to know, so walks to and from Metro are taking on a special poignancy these days.

I trudge up the escalator at Judiciary Square into a jostling, careening space. Crowds of workers move in and out of the courts building. A homeless woman smokes or naps on a stone bench. Express newspaper hawkers call out a cheery good morning.

Across the street is First Trinity Lutheran Church, with a sign advertising its Bible study. A few steps away are the trees and railings where scarves were draped last January 6. There is the light I always try to catch, the one crossing Third Street.

The bridge across the highway offers a sliver view of the Capitol Dome. And then there is the construction site, as workers continue to roof I-395 so they can build a neighborhood on top. I’ll miss seeing the completion of that project.

Soon I’m walking down the alley that leads to my office, a backdoor approach that’s always been my preference. I like slipping into places, like slipping out of them, too.

Picture Perfect

Picture Perfect

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Yesterday I threw caution to the winds and took my usual route around the Capitol. I thought about what happened there two days before — but walked anyway. It is, of course, what we have to do, which is nothing. Not alter our course in the slightest.

The reward: a picture-perfect almost-April day. Trees just greening on the Mall. Tulips in the Botanic Garden. The sinuous curves of the Indian Museum outlined against blue sky. And in that sky, twin contrails.

Everywhere I looked, everything I saw, spoke of possibility and fresh starts. Winter is truly over; spring has just begun.

Walk West

Walk West

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For me, most days, the trip home begins with a walk west. Yesterday it was a walk into wind and sun. Both specialties of the season. One warms the ground; the other lifts seeds aloft and sets them down oh so tenderly a hundred feet away.

Overlooking for now that those seeds have swollen my sinuses, that the wind whipped my hair and the glare made it almost impossible to look where I was going. Still, with all those things, the walk into wind and sun was surprisingly satisfying.

Maybe it’s the freedom. Maybe it’s heading west, always the way to go. Or maybe it’s the trudge factor: putting one foot in front of the other, staying the course, if you will.

And I will. That’s for sure. I will.

See Something; Say Something

See Something; Say Something

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Yesterday I didn’t take my usual walk around the Capitol. And it’s a good thing I didn’t. A man brandished a gun at the Capitol Visitors Center and was shot by police. A bystander was reportedly hit as well, and the whole complex was put on lock down.

I wonder if I’ll take that walk again. Will I vary the route? Go another direction entirely? 

A crazy world is a limited world. It’s a world of fences and walls and bollards; of keeping things at a distance. It’s a world of “see something, say something,” a message I hear repeated on the Metro approximately once every four minutes.

Most of all, it’s a world of suspicion and distrust and fear. It’s not an especially pleasant world — but it’s the only one we have right now.

Lightness of Spring

Lightness of Spring

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Walked out of the office into a perfect early spring afternoon. Jackets slung over shoulders. Tourists everywhere. A long weekend beckoning.

I was exhausted at my desk but quickly readjusted outside. There was a destination, a goal: the Tidal Basin, the cherry blossoms.

It was crowded, as usual. Picnickers, strollers, photographers, all with separate purposes but one mission — to celebrate spring. I thought then as I often do how the walker can take heart from the people she passes — some just coming alive to the world, others happy just to be in it.

I had forgotten the lightness one could have — not just in the air but in the heart.

Pipe and Drape

Pipe and Drape

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We are all aflutter because Vice President Joe Biden is speaking here in a few hours. Preparations have been underway since late last week, and after a sneak peak at the venue upstairs I can say … what a transformation.

The primary agent of change is what is described in events planning lingo as “pipe and drape.” Tall velvet panels — in a lovely, rich, presidential blue — hang all along the room and route. They both soften and ennoble the place.

Instead of being crammed with students sharing outlines, discussing torts, sipping coffee, the room is now filled with black chairs in neat rows. In the back, camera crews are setting up shop. Every department — events, facilities, audio visual, communications, public safety — is doing its part to make sure the speech goes off without a hitch.

We have become a stage set, an empty theater waiting for its star.