I made a bowl of oatmeal, accidentally dropped it into the briny blue (first time for everything), threw on a green Miss Rachel tee, and drove to West River to meet a gaggle of eleven-year-olds on their first field trip to one of my favorite places. After a long day of great questions and tried patience, several of them together asked me to make sure they could come back in the summer.
Sweaty and sunburned, I enjoyed cruising straight into downtown DC traffic-free at 6pm by way of Suitland Parkway to meet visiting friends. I walked the couple to Eastern Market, stopping to hear them identify the plays sculpted on the side of the Foulger Shakespeare Library and enjoy perfumed gardens, brightly painted front doors, and terrible parking jobs.
We nestled into the bar at AA2 tripping over our ital-yano and I had to stop Kieran from sending out my favorite dish. Sampling salad and pasta until Saji snuck us through the speakeasy upstairs, the sun retired behind North Hall, silent before the storm of a summery Saturday flea market.
Walking back past the Capitol, the sky had clouded up, partially veiling the crescent moon, and pigeons circled the well-lit dome gliding and then darting after moths. My friends talked about tilting Greek columns and the subtlety of security detail. They took lean-to pictures in front of fountains and found their hotel a few miles up the road.
I'm not sure anything is as comforting as making someone else comfortable or as enjoyable as being enjoyed.
