Metro to adventure, carried on wings of angels

Friday, April 28, 2017
Washington DC, District of Columbia, United States





(Jenny writing today . Josh passed out asleep.)















Today we took the Metro for the first time!

And today was full of blessings - so many I can hardly count them.


I am not the best navigator, so the first blessing was that we found our way to the King Street Metro station and Josh got to ride a subway for the first time.


The second blessing was that while we got on the subway going the wrong direction, there were only two stops on the blue line before it goes back the other way - and thus we were only delayed about 10 minutes. (Little whoops that could have been a big whoops!)


Third blessing is a bit of a story, but here's the short version:
We have a friend in D .C. who just so happened to put in for tickets to the most amazing museum in town 3 months ago - received six tickets - and had not yet found friends to go with him, so he had tickets left to share for this specific date: TODAY.  The museum I'm talking about is the newest museum on the Mall - the National African American Museum of History and Culture. I can't even begin to describe to you how blessed I feel for having been able to share the experience of this museum with Josh. Certainly not before sleeping tonight. But sometime in the future I promise a whole blog post about this stunning place. I have to leave it at that....

...except to say that while we were eating in the café at the museum I asked Josh to write something. Here is what he wrote at the time:


"Hello everybody my name is Josh and today we went to the African-American Museum. We had lunch at the Sweet Home Café and we had a great, great meal which included apple pie, fried chicken, collared greens and macaroni and cheese."




You might say the food was heaven on a stick, but not on a stick.







The rest of the museum was blessing four, five, six, seven, eight, nine and ten .....please remind me to tell you more about Miss Mary and Mr. John, a lovely, elderly African American couple who came all the way from their home in Palo Alto, CA to see the museum this week, and who struck up a conversation with us in line. It turns out Mr. John and Josh and I were all born in Madison, Wisconsin. Miss Mary and Mr. John were returning for a second day to explore the museum and contemplate their conflicted feelings about Mr. Thomas Jefferson, who wrote "all men are created equal" and yet owned 609 slaves over the years. In the museum there is a statue of Thomas Jefferson and his mighty words on a tall wall behind him, but also stacks of bricks surrounding him - each brick with a name on it - a brick for every slave he owned. We probably would have missed that detail of the museum without Miss Mary and Mr. John.








Eleventh blessing: stopping next for ice cream - always plentiful on the National Mall .


Blessing 12: Seeing the American History Museum, then finding the exit (not our fav)


Blessing 13: Seeing the Museum of Natural History - and encountering a video there about Deep Sea Exploration. Very cool. (Mike - we thought of you and Cousteau the whole time)



Blessing 14: Actually having FUN with GOVERNMENT STUFF. After a break for apples and Chex Mix (which we had packed) and 20 oz. Sunkist sodas (from a street vendor), we resolved to do one last thing: see the U.S. Capital. While walking there Josh put up with a fair bit of mom lecturing him about Congress, and I give him a LOT of credit for that. I made him memorize the names of our Senators (Ron Johnson and Tammy Baldwin) and the name of our particular Representative from WI-05 (who has a difficult name, and is not pronounced SENSENBURGER, but rather Sensenbrenner!) We then placed a call to WI-05 Representative Jim Sensenbrenner's office not once, but twice. The first time we asked for a personal tour, which unfortunately could not be arranged with such short notice. (But worth a shot.) So we walked up to the Capital and walked to the Visitor Center.
On the way we realized we had the perfect amount of soda in our 20 oz . bottles to have a great bottle flipping contest on the steps of the Capital. And it was great. (If you don't know what I'm talking about, ask any teenager, they'll share a great YouTube video.)



Anyway - it was an epic contest - but it took so long we missed our chance to see the inside of the U.S. Capital - the tour center closed at 4:30pm! Whoops. Oh well. We had fun.



Oh yeah - then we made the 2nd call to Sensenbrenner's office at around 4:45 (on a Friday no less) just to say "Hi there - we're from WI-05 and we're standing outside of the Rayburn building right now. Isn't that where your office is? Do you have a window office?"  We joked that they should go to the window and wave.  This call was pretty funny - and probably not the kind of call they've been receiving lately. (Sensenbrenner is Republican. Most of the calls I make to his office are asking for an independent investigation into Russia hacking of our election and Trump's connections to Russia. This is why I have Sensenbrenner's office number saved in My Contacts in my iPhone. Also DON'T REPEAL THE ACA!!!!) I couldn't help but make these two points again before hanging up....because Mr. Sensenburger is scheduled to be holding a town hall in WHITEWATER tomorrow at 1pm, which I am missing because I'm here



Blessing #15 We stopped at the best bathroom in town at the National Botanical Garden, taking a quick spin around a place that was originally not on our itinerary... where flowers were plentiful and beautiful and fragrant and rejuvenating, as was the air conditioning and cold water fountain. :)


Blessing #15 We caught the correct blue line Metro home



Blessing #Infinity:   We arrived back at the home of the Amazing Alexandria Brightbills and had a beautiful spaghetti and meatball dinner with Ruth, Tim, Grace and Charlotte, then jumped on the trampoline and landed 2 front flips (Josh), and we all watched National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets together in preparation for tomorrow at Mount Vernon .



They say to count your blessings. I can't even begin to try. Today was astoundingly full of blessings.



I'll end with this one thing -- For my noon meal I ate apple pie with my son and looked up to see this quote from Maya Angelou on the wall - next to a photo of Dr. MLK Jr. eating with his family: "I'm concerned that Americans are losing that place of meeting. There are very few times we can be more intimate as to share food together."  For my evening meal I was sitting with family, sharing a blessing, and sharing stories of the day and travels near and far....




There are days with blessings that cannot be fully counted -- only experienced, and then -- a clumsy attempt at the retelling.

Comments

Susan
2017-04-29

Wow. What an amazing adventure! I'm elated and exhausted just reading it. And I'm not one bit surprised the angels are right there with you. Give 'em a kiss for me.

Aunt Soo
2017-04-29

Hi J & J, what a team you two are. Picking all the best spots to visit. I'd say it's a trip of a lifetime. Representative from WI-05 Sensenbrenner totally missed an opportunity to be part of your fantastic adventure. Thanks for another fun packed read. I love this blog, like Bunky said it's 'Heaven on a stick but not on a stick'. Teehee mm

Angie
2017-04-29

I would say not clumsy at all my friend, but rather beautiful Jenny style! It sounds like an amazing day, one that you both will remember. I'm psyched you're able to be out there seeing your fam and sorry Mike and Luke couldn't be with you. I am sooooo interested to hear about the African American Museum so I'm gonna keep you to your word to blog about that!
Safe travels and many more adventures you two!!!
Love Angie

2025-02-16

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