Flashback Friday...Washington DC Trip

October 1996


Back in the day, when Cliff was a Marine, he attended the Staff Academy in Quantico, Virginia. We were living in Joliet, IL at the time, and I felt comfortable enough with the distance to drive by myself with a 4 year old, a 2 1/2 year old, and one in the oven, so that we could attend Cliff's graduation.

The graduation itself was pretty unremarkable. (Well, except for that part where Patrick was being really obnoxious during the ceremony, while I was trying to be prepared to take Cliff's picture. And I pulled him close and scream-whispered in his ear about how he'd better knock it off right now. And he still kept it up, so I pinched his behind. And then he screamed, "OW! Mommy, don't pinch me! DON'T pinch me! That's NOT nice!" Yeah. Not one of my finer moments.)

Anyway, after all that pomp and circumstance, we stayed a couple of nights in the Quantico BOQ. We shared one ancient bedroom as a family, and a communal bathroom down the hall with who-knows-how-many of our closest friends. Pretty posh. (I hear they have since remodeled.)

We thoroughly enjoyed Washington DC. We only had a couple of days to spend before we had to head home for Cliff to make it to work on Monday, but we packed in quite a bit. We hit all the big monuments, walked by the White House (the line was impossibly long so we opted not to stay) and went through several of the Smithsonian museums. We also went to Arlington, hoping to see some progress on the Women in Military Service for America (WIMSA) museum...but they had just broken ground and there was really nothing to see. (I'm a charter member and my profile can be viewed on screen there, now that it's done. I haven't been back to DC since, though.)



That's little Patrick to the left, Cliff's behind, and sweet Troy.



Funny how random memories can be. One of the things I remember most is trying to feed the pigeons. We bought popcorn from the nearby cart expressly for this purpose...and this young dad with five little kids in tow came over precisely where we were trying to feed them and the kids proceeded to try to annihilate the birds. One had a giant plastic dinosaur he was swinging by the tail trying to whack them, another was throwing his matchbox cars at them. The dad just laughed like some sort of hillbilly and said, "Git 'em!" I was pregnant (and therefore free to speak my mind) and I just looked at him and said, "You've GOT to be kidding me! Seriously?!" He said nothing, but eventually got the hint and moved his brood along. (Probably to go torture some homeless people...or light things on fire.)



Get a load of how skinny Cliff was! They used to PT him to death at that unit. I swear, half their day was mandatory PT. Honestly, I fed him well. He just worked it all off.




Sweet boys on the carousel.

(Trivia: I saw some boys like these at the bank the other day. They were playing under the counter, tickling each other and laughing while their mom counted out rolled coins. It reminded me of a day just two months after this trip, when I was in the post office, licking stamps for Christmas cards. {Remember licking stamps?} My boys were playing under the counter, much the same way. A woman came over to me and offered to help me stamp my envelopes {I had over a hundred}. I gratefully accepted her help, and when we were done, I thanked her. She looked me in the eyes and said, "God loves you and your children." I have to admit, I was taken aback...and my voice cracked as I replied, "Thank you. I know that." And then she went her way and I went mine. But I never forgot her kindness, or her unabashed words.)

God does love us...and our children. {Even moms who pinch their kids...and kids who throw things at pigeons...and dads who encourage them to do it.}