Amtrak 143 is running late, but I am early despite Abdou’s cab sliding through just under two inches of fresh snow on the way to Penn Station. Looking around the crowd, the others headed for The Moment (as CNN has melodramatically dubbed it) stand out in the waiting area sort with Kool-Aid-imbibing gleams in their eyes (and Obama buttons pinned to their luggage and jackets and toddlers). Feeling a bit out of place, I start to question myself: How is it that I am going to Washington?
The conversations started right after the election, but intensified around Thanksgiving. Different ideas were floated involving RV rentals, hotels, and abandoned ancestral residences. As Thanksgiving drifted into “holiday”, it seemed most of those plans were fueled by liquids, clouds, and powder, leaving behind mere inklings.
Despite the “core” friends abandonment, the inkling urged that some feelers be put out. Emails to adored, yet less core, friends go out. A couple, brilliant and sweet and very young, recently relocated from The City to The Hill, accept a request for housing. (I insist to them that if friends more core than I request, I will demure.) Vacation time is allotted, despite a mountain of work for the year’s beginning. As things become more solid, the train tickets are purchased weeks beforehand. (The lack of available tickets so early shows that, yes, other moths are also being drawn to this flame.)
Suddenly, it starts to become real at least virtually. The messages start coming first in the social “networking” sites. “RA is excited about DC.” After posting my own contribution (“Rod looks forward to hanging out with all the New Yorkers in D.C.”), the texts and emails started to rise, along with my excitement.
Many have already arrived, as there is a leather dress-up tea party of some sort co-existing with the pre-inaugural shenanigans. The annoyances of “traveling alone” are assuaged as it seems that going out in D.C. is going to be pretty much like going out in New York, just with a few more tourists about. Oh, and the taxis have a weird pay structure.
As the train pulls out of Philly the texts starting coming in requesting arrival details.
End Chapter One.
