The Trip to Washington DC

In August, I took my first trip to Washington DC. It was my first thought after getting home last year from a great visit to Gettysburg PA. "Where should I go next year?" The choice of Washington DC was made easier by the fact that it's a direct flight from our overlooked, medium-sized town. Easy to get to from here. I'd always wanted to go. I've talked to many who visited before, and often it was their senior trip in high school. My class went to the Poconos. I sat out that trip--my protest vote.

View from the Lincoln Memorial steps

Never have I heard more of a variety of languages and accents than in DC. There was a group of students from France (probably middle school age) passing on the left. There was a group from Sweden going the opposite direction. There was a family that spoke what sounded like an eastern European language. There were a few people with an African cadence. The Middle East. Asia. The multiplicity was dizzying. It gave me hope that, even though we have a brain-dead autocrat in office, the rest of the world still looks to the US as an ideal. I've known this, but never experienced it around myself in such a tangible fashion.

I saw most of the major monuments. I lingered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, trying to conjure up that day in 1963 when Dr. King spoke. It felt like I was on America's front step. People sat on the steps and milled in front, quietly taking it all in. There were signs that

asked for quiet as a sign of respect for the monuments. They were largely heeded. The view from the steps, across the reflecting pool through the World War II monument and on to the Washington Monument, can't help but inspire. The sordid part of this country's history is never far from my mind, but that spot made it recede for a little while. Here we were, ready once again to rise above it, like we did in 2008. Or will we? The racist and nationalist strains in American life are never far from the surface.

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial (notice: "Veterans", not "War") has always been transgressive as far as memorials go. There were the statues of three soldiers as you enter, but the main part is a black wall with the names of those who died during the long conflict. The wall descends slowly into the ground, evoking the quagmire that the war became. The names pile up as the wall lengthens and deepens towards its midsection. There were others there looking for names they knew. The earliest

year for names is 1959, the last 1975. Even I remember that last year, with the image of the Huey on the roof of the American embassy. All that time and effort, all those lives, only to end up in an ignominious bug-out from Saigon, many South Vietnamese begging to come along. Maybe things would've been different if the rationale for the war, the supposed attack in the Gulf of Tonkin on two destroyers, had never been invented in the first place.

SS-20 on the left; Minuteman on the right

I suffered museum fatigue by the end of the trip. There are so many. The two highlights were the Air and Space Museum, and the Museum of Natural History. The instantly recognizable icons of the early days of aviation, and the space race. A replica of the lunar lander greets you as you walk in, the actual lander still sitting forlornly on the moon. Its body insect-like and partly covered in gold-colored insulation. When cast mentally against the vast cold vacuum of space, it looks almost inadequate. Yet it succeeded. There are ICBMs, both US and Russian. There are the German vengeance weapons from World War II, the V-1 and V-2. The V-1 is small, basically an early drone, but one can draw a direct line between the V-2 and the later US Minuteman ICBM. Too much was learned from the losers in that war. Werner Von Braun, the German rocket designer responsible for Hitler's terror weapons, has his

V-2 rocket

fingerprints on both weapons.

I saw the dinosaurs in the Museum of Natural History. Tyrannosaurus Rex bathed in a lurid red glow. Stegosaurus and Triceratops and Diplodocus, all were once part of my plastic playset. Here were the actual bones, proof positive that these megafauna really did roam the same lands we now walk. For all their fearsome reputation, it only took one asteroid to wipe them out and open the way for mammals. No one at the exhibits seemed to be thinking that the same cataclysmic event could happen to us. Despite our big brains, we are not favored. In fact, because of our big brains, we stand an arguably better chance of doing ourselves in. Who needs an asteroid when you've got rampant consumption of fossil fuels, the product of ancient decomposing plant matter? Thanks to us, the Cretaceous period may have the last laugh yet.

So...What's Next?

I took much of August off as far as writing goes. Finished the most recent story in early July. Seemed like a good time to think about another attempt at a novel. I have a brief outline written that feels good. There's a lot of detail to fill in, but I don't think I need to wait for that. My instinct is to start and see how it goes.

It will be a challenge. I have four (maybe five) failed attempts behind me. But with some publishing success, the chances of completing a draft have to be better. My last attempt was begun about 16 years ago, and I'm a better writer now. That should count for something.

Still, it's a very different beast from a short story. Short fiction has suited my limited free time, but a novel will eat much of that up. It's much easier to sit down to a short tale after a full day of work rather than a long-form narrative, where every so often you must find the thread in order to continue. That means re-reading from a certain point in the story, or even from the beginning.

Time has become precious again. At my age, I feel the pressing need to start this next attempt. If it crashes and burns, there's always another try. But my determination to make this one work is strong. Hopefully, it's enough.