National Pride

Until this past weekend, I had never been to Washington DC before and given my love of politics (although that love might be dimming in the recent past), I was excited to check out our nation’s capital.  We arrived Wednesday night and had two full days to enjoy Georgetown (our home base) and the capital before heading up the Potomac for Jason and Lauren’s wedding.

While I loved Georgetown, with its cobblestone streets, cute restaurants and local parks, the overall two days were somewhat jaded due to the current political events compounded by the fact that I am reading "The People’s History of the United States" which doesn’t always paint politics and those in DC in the most favorable light.  Instead of feeling pride when looking at the Washington or Lincoln Memorials, I saw another rich old white dude doing everything within his means to keep and expand his wealth and power.  And when walking past Capital Hill, I thought back to the vicious cycle our government continues to drive us through: the wealthy control everything resulting in social and class unrest; laws are therefore passed to appeal to the crowds (e.g. labor laws and civil rights) however in realty these laws do little to change the problem and are only put in place to avoid mass riots; when these laws fail we go to war and deny people their basic rights such as free speech; once the war is over we target and blame the immigrants and then we repeat the process. Yes, unfortunately unlike Martin who had a strong sense of national pride when in Berlin, I was left feeling empty.

This Little Nugget helped bring some joy to the day!

I did have a moment of awe sitting out front of the Supreme Court where women were given the right to make their own decisions about their bodies and marriage equality was confirmed.  But I suppose even worse was I had a sense of excitement and potential foreshadowing when walking past the Watergate Building. 

Having fun on the steps of the Supreme Court

Politics aside, we also had some fun including exploring the Smithsonian Natural History Museum, some quality time with Grandma and Grandpa, and a really fun wedding, celebrating Jason and Lauren with all of our old friends from Zurich.   

Heading into the Smithsonian

Checking out the BIG elephant

All dressed up!