Memorial Day
May. 30th, 2006 02:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ceebeegeeLate Friday I took the train home for the holiday weekend. If you're going to be on the train for longer than a couple of hours, the Acela is really nice (although not particularly cheap). They have a quiet car which is soooo relaxing--no cell phones, no music, no noisy anybody allowed. The whole train looks so much nicer and the trays are bigger. I'd bought a magazine and The Other Boleyn Girl (a great read but boy, did she take some liberties!) and I was enjoying the ride very much until Philadelphia when this really weird older man got on and sat next to me. For a good 25 minutes this man kept standing up, sitting down, fussing, opening up his luggage, closing up his luggage, sitting down, standing up...just fussing, fussing, fussing. Dude--it's the QUIET car. People really want things to be quiet and still. No one wants to notice you. And he kept looking at me and trying to talk and then muttering to himself. I had my headphones on so I could at least give the appearance of being in my own world. Then at one point he tapped me on my shoulder so I was forced to talk to him."Yes?" "Grump grump grump...I'm...uh...going to get as horizontal as possible." WhatEVER! "Uh...sure." Then after all that he did nothing! Just sat there, still pushing papers on his tray and looking over at me. I swear, women can back me up--there is always some weird guy out there who can't stand it that you don't acknowledge him. It's the stranger who points at you and orders you to smile on the sidewalk, or when you're in a hurry, the guy who tries to get in your way. Or the friend of a friend who thinks you're cute and gets all bitter because you don't know he exists.
Anyway, so I had two and a half glorious days in Virginia. Mom and I went to the pool (she belongs to this neighborhood pool association) Saturday and roasted for a little while. I was gobbling up The Other Boleyn Girl--good gossipy beach fiction for the fan of historical trash--and eventually we went back and cooked out in the backyard. Mom's yard is very lush, with many different kinds of trees--dogwood, oak, holly, white pin--and other kinds of flora. Sooo peaceful and shady and verdant. We watched the DVD of Kingdom of Heaven later--again, fun but definitely took some historical liberties.
Sunday we went to see the Nats kick the crap out of the Dodgers. Hoo-ey! Good times. Mom was so cute--what she knows of baseball, she learned from watching me and my explaining the finer points of the game to her. So she wasn't a hardcore fan but was very proud that DC finally got a team again. When we got back home, she brought the sports page into my room, talking about how the Nats have been doing lately, noting that they'd lost to the Dodgers the day before. The thought of my mother reading the sports page and trending the home team is pretty funny.
Yesterday I slept very late, and then we got up and had a wonderfully appropriate Memorial Day. There was a parade in Falls Church, and vendors and food booths. (I snagged a Coach Scribble bag--like this but in a multi-color print, with tags and a dustbag!) We walked around the parade--sadly I didn't see any of my classmates from Mason although I know a bunch of them still live in the area. One of the booths was for the Falls Church Presbyterian Church, and they had an exhibit about their ongoing work in New Orleans. I talked to them about the possibility of volunteering--I definitely want to go for a week down there and I'm on the Habitat for Humanity mailing list for just such an opportunity. I said "I live in New York and I'm an Episcopalian so I don't know if you'd be interested..." The woman gave me a couple of email addresses of people to contact.
After that we went back to Mom's place, she got some flowers from her garden, and went over to Arlington Cemetery where my grandparents are buried. I think the last time I saw Grandpa John's grave was when Memaw died in 1999--I remember visiting as a child, and we saw the Kennedys' grave and I remember the "Baby Girl" grave, the miscarriage that Jackie had in the late '50s. (I was weirdly interested in dead Presidential children at that age--Willy Lincoln fascinated me as well.) It's such a beautiful resting place, on this hilly, grassy knoll, surrounded by trees, "below the Mason-Dixon line, which would make Daddy happy" as Mom said. I looked around and noticed some high-rollers nearby--a major-general, a rear admiral, a vice admiral. One was from Alabama--that would also make him happy (Grandpa John was from Birmingham).
Anyway, so I had two and a half glorious days in Virginia. Mom and I went to the pool (she belongs to this neighborhood pool association) Saturday and roasted for a little while. I was gobbling up The Other Boleyn Girl--good gossipy beach fiction for the fan of historical trash--and eventually we went back and cooked out in the backyard. Mom's yard is very lush, with many different kinds of trees--dogwood, oak, holly, white pin--and other kinds of flora. Sooo peaceful and shady and verdant. We watched the DVD of Kingdom of Heaven later--again, fun but definitely took some historical liberties.
Sunday we went to see the Nats kick the crap out of the Dodgers. Hoo-ey! Good times. Mom was so cute--what she knows of baseball, she learned from watching me and my explaining the finer points of the game to her. So she wasn't a hardcore fan but was very proud that DC finally got a team again. When we got back home, she brought the sports page into my room, talking about how the Nats have been doing lately, noting that they'd lost to the Dodgers the day before. The thought of my mother reading the sports page and trending the home team is pretty funny.
Yesterday I slept very late, and then we got up and had a wonderfully appropriate Memorial Day. There was a parade in Falls Church, and vendors and food booths. (I snagged a Coach Scribble bag--like this but in a multi-color print, with tags and a dustbag!) We walked around the parade--sadly I didn't see any of my classmates from Mason although I know a bunch of them still live in the area. One of the booths was for the Falls Church Presbyterian Church, and they had an exhibit about their ongoing work in New Orleans. I talked to them about the possibility of volunteering--I definitely want to go for a week down there and I'm on the Habitat for Humanity mailing list for just such an opportunity. I said "I live in New York and I'm an Episcopalian so I don't know if you'd be interested..." The woman gave me a couple of email addresses of people to contact.
After that we went back to Mom's place, she got some flowers from her garden, and went over to Arlington Cemetery where my grandparents are buried. I think the last time I saw Grandpa John's grave was when Memaw died in 1999--I remember visiting as a child, and we saw the Kennedys' grave and I remember the "Baby Girl" grave, the miscarriage that Jackie had in the late '50s. (I was weirdly interested in dead Presidential children at that age--Willy Lincoln fascinated me as well.) It's such a beautiful resting place, on this hilly, grassy knoll, surrounded by trees, "below the Mason-Dixon line, which would make Daddy happy" as Mom said. I looked around and noticed some high-rollers nearby--a major-general, a rear admiral, a vice admiral. One was from Alabama--that would also make him happy (Grandpa John was from Birmingham).
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Date: 2006-05-30 06:50 pm (UTC)BTW, could you email me your address? Thanks!
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Date: 2006-05-30 06:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-30 07:03 pm (UTC)