Even though I was born and raised in Arkansas, Washington DC, the federal district and last plantation in America (ha), is the place that has always felt like home.
I miss the diversity. I miss the streets and the row houses. I miss the pedestrian friendliness of it all. I miss my 1920s Art Deco apartment building with long winding halls similar to the Shining inside.
I miss the ethnic restaurants and the museums. I even miss the snarky Washington City Paper and knowing enough about the local business to get all the jokes. Sometimes, I miss the goofy stuff like the exploding manholes or the fact that it takes several hours to get anything done at DMV.
I miss the educated and curious about the world people. There were lots of runners and running clubs. I always got a kick how they would have this TV show called “It’s Academic” on Saturday (or was it Sunday) morning which was QUIZ BOWL. That’s right QUIZ BOWL on television. The most amusing part is that the school’s cheerleaders were there. Cheerleaders for quiz bowl. Now that is RICH! There was free classical music at the National Museum of Art.
I miss the crazy influx of interns in the summer who walk around thinking their hot shit. I miss playing frisbee on the mall and watching the people play tennis on the public court in Adams Morgan. I miss the chuckling at the UPS trucks double parked on the street with the parking ticket stuck under the window.
I miss the four stories of escalators in the courthouse. I even miss the court security which was the same people for the entire time I was there. I always forgot I had a camera in my purse. It was to the point that I had a permanent “hello my name is” sticker on the back of it. (or course this means it wasn’t digital).
I like how there is enough of a willingness for intellectual debate that when a church group puts up ads on the metrobus, an atheist group will pop up and purchase some ad space for atheist propoganda. Yes equal time.
Dupont Circle.
And snow. IT would actually snow once in a while with a bonafide good dusting.
I miss the craziness of having to call work or school to tell them that you will be late because a Presidential motorcade is blocking your route.
It’s a neat city. But you know what always bugged me about it? Everyone is beautiful. Seriously, they are all fantastic looking! Even the naturally ugly people are perfectly coiffed and well-dressed, in shape. Everywhere I looked. At least in the city center, I don’t think I ever saw anyone there who looked like they came from Arkansas if I was not looking in a mirror or they weren’t in a group of tourists. (You know how in Arkansas, you can just TELL when you see someone, say, in the parking lot at Target who comes from a major metropolitan city…they ain’t like us, Jimbo, they diffrent.)
I do believe the city has ugly, nay, even some *ordinary* looking people there. I just think they are a dirty little secret community of brilliant but embarrassingly unpolished workers relegated to an underground network of dingy tunnels and closets of Wal-Mart apparel.
Hey Lucien and I lived there and we aren’t “Beautiful”