Hello everyone, well another week has rolled by us and it has not been a bad one here on the home-front in Washington D.C. One of my friends got engaged this week, another announced a pregnancy and still another welcomed a new grandchild into the world so those were some real positive boosts. I’ve been getting some good walks in around the neighborhood despite mid-summer temperatures and high humidity levels and have been enjoying the podcast Civil War Talk Radio as I walk. It’s been great to hear some expert historians discuss some very specific issues of the war. I’ve been trying to keep myself hydrated which, as silly as it sounds, has been really helping me feel better. I’m usually really good at hydrating, but seem to have let it slip amidst all of the chaos of late. I’ve also been trying to keep a little further from the news and have been picking my guitar more and reading some less heavy material. I’ve started rereading Steinbeck’s Travels With Charley, one of my favorite American travel books of all time, as I start to gear up to get back to writing my own book. I had charged ahead with it when I first got home, but realized I needed to focus more and plan it out a little better to keep the story moving and make it more readable and interesting. That’s tough because every day I was out on the road was a new adventure and had an impact on the journey and my life. The book can’t be a thousand pages long though, so I will need to map it out a little better. I need to focus on the best (and worst) days and hopefully find some rhythm and flow. I hope to start putting pen to paper a little later this week.
Also this week I decided to pick up a violin seriously for the first time in 30 years. When I was in Junior High School, I used to play violin and I was actually fairly decent at reading music. Unfortunately, I was not very interested in it because I didn’t know any of the songs my teacher wanted me to play. While she said I played them well, how could I know? I have always likened it to cooking a recipe for something you’ve never eaten before - you may think it tastes just fine, but if you don’t know how it’s supposed to taste, you’d never know. Anyways, in the intervening years, I’ve seen the violin played in many different styles in my travels around the country and around the world (although in the styles I enjoy most it’s often referred to as a “fiddle”, it’s the exact same instrument). About 2 years ago when I was in Nashville I went ahead and bought one thinking I’d give it a shot on the road – it’s a relatively small instrument and I found a place for it in my van. I had romantic images in my head of sitting in the back of my van at night and playing beautiful music before bed. Sadly, I soon realized that the violin actually takes some space to play with the bow going up and down and my van was too tight to really make it happen. And so it just sat there. I found the space for a guitar instead which takes more room to carry but less room to play. This week I pulled out that violin though and took it for a spin. I was pleasantly surprised that with a little refresher I could remember how to read music and with some sheet music of songs I actually know I could play them that first night (not well, but recognizable). I was impressed and really enjoyed it. Sadly, when I pulled it out last night the bridge fell off and I spent an hour trying to restring it and it was generally a big frustrating mess. But I hope to get it fixed and continue playing with it. This was another big plus this week.
The news has, as always seems to be the case recently, been a big minus this week. Covid cases continue to grow at a rapid rate in the U.S. and people continue to ignore it. Although we have only about 4% of the world’s population, I believe we now have over a quarter of the world’s cases. Meanwhile states continue to push reopening of businesses while shunning social distancing and masks. The world is watching us with horror and much like a train wreck it’s hard to look away. We are displaying in full view our ignorance, our distrust of science and medical experts and our sincerely misguided use of the ideals of “freedom” and “liberty”. I’ve been getting ever more frustrated as I watch the steady implosion of the U.S. while I watch my friends around the world breathing sighs of relief as their countries have gotten this under control. We could and should be doing much better.
For me, life has always been a highway. As a professional driver and guide for much of my adult life, I sometimes think of things in those terms, even with something like Covid which seems unrelated. In my mind, Covid is like crossing the street. For people who live in truly small towns, you are pretty safe crossing the street anytime day or night without getting hit by a car. You might get hit, and if you do medical care may be further away than it is for me, but you’re probably pretty safe wandering through your two-lane town. For those of us who live in more concentrated areas, it is more like walking out into a superhighway. While you may think you should have the “freedom” to do that, and you certainly could, you aren’t thinking about anyone but yourself. You may end up safely on the other side, but someone may have swerved to miss you and crashed into a tree and died. Someone else may have slammed on the brakes and had dozens of people smash into them – some may die and some may lose an arm or leg, wreck their car or miss any number of life engagements because you decided to walk out into that highway. My point is that many of us are not islands, we are part of communities and we need to act a little less selfishly. If you wouldn’t run out into a superhighway, don’t run out into your community like this whole thing is over.
I’ve heard this “freedom” argument we’re having about masks again and again in my life, and it’s gotten tired and tedious. We had this argument (and for some unconscionable reason continue to in some states) when it came to cigarettes inside public spaces. Your freedom to smoke inside somehow trumped my freedom from smoke. Your actions are hurting you first and foremost, but they are hurting me too. The argument that I could just not go to those places is true, but just as easily you could step outside and show some courtesy. I’ve also heard this argument when it comes to seatbelt and helmet laws. While technically you are the one in the most danger from not wearing one, if I hit you and you die but would have or may have lived if you had been properly protected, I will have to live with the fact that I killed someone for the rest of my life. The argument that it was your decision isn’t going to help me sleep any easier. We’ve come around on the seatbelt laws, and most states have passed indoor smoking bans and helmet laws. You may have lost a tiny bit of your “freedom” in those cases, but we’ve all gained a better and safer society. I hate the idea that places are having to pass laws requiring people to wear masks and wish people would just wear them out of concern for their own safety and that of the community around them.
Anyways, as all of this has been going on, as cases continue to grow and states clearly don’t know how to contain this, as selfish people seem to be at their most self-centered, I am starting to make some more long-term plans to stay put here in D.C. Not “forever” kind of plans, but more like “till Christmas” kind of plans. This wasn’t what I wanted, but it’s what has come to pass. Maybe we can turn things around and I’ll get out of here sooner, but I’d rather be realistic than get my hopes up. When I get the brakes fixed on my van in three weeks, I hope to be able to get out of here for long weekends as soon as it starts cooling off a little bit. But for the most part I will keep it close to home with the goal of keeping myself and my folks safe, sane and healthy. I can’t look after the world, but I can look after myself and I have a lot of living left to do on the other side of all of this, so that’s my plan. I’ll have my folks, my camera, my guitar and violin and plenty of books to keep me company. While I will be looking forward to the other side of this pandemic with as much anticipation as anyone, I’m not one to push my luck in the face of overwhelming evidence. All of that being said, I’m still trying to keep busy around here.
Last Friday night we bottled our latest batch of homebrew and then settled in for a Polynesian style party in the basement. This seemed appropriate since I spent the 4th of July in Hawaii last summer. I strung up some paper lanterns and put together a delicious pupu platter and we had some great Polynesian music and a few too many Blue Hawaiians which would cause us all to drag a little on Saturday.
Saturday morning was a bit rough on us all, and I think we all went back to bed for a while after breakfast. We did get up at some point to rally and celebrate the 4th of July with some great burgers and tater tots and a red, white and blue “USA” birthday cake. It was really hot out, but it was cool inside and my mom and I watched the local D.C. fireworks on TV. I don’t know why they can never seem to broadcast until the end of the fireworks show which is always disappointing as we miss the grand finale, but they were great nonetheless and my fair city is a wonderful backdrop.
Sunday I settled in and got some work done on my next podcast. I also enjoyed some reading, edited some photos from our visit to the Richmond area battlefields, and did some planning for our Tuesday travels and my Wednesday tutoring. I felt like it was a productive day and set me up for a productive week. In the evening, I set off on a nice long walk around the neighborhood and wandered down some streets I may have never been on before. I was enjoying exploring when I first got home, but have fallen into a routine lately and just doing the same walk around the same streets. It was nice to head down some different streets and I found it refreshing to look at some new-to-me houses. I’ve spent so much of my life avoiding routine, and for good reason, and yet I find it so easy to fall into one when I’m here. Exploring is one of the things which nurtures my soul, and even exploring new streets in the same old neighborhood has left me feeling better. I think I’ll try and keep it up.
Tuesday we headed off back to Richmond with the intention of seeing a few things in the morning and then turning west to Appomattox and the end of our Civil War journey. We got to Richmond nice and early, and our first stop was Memorial Drive, the site of many recent protests over the Confederate statues there. The Virginia and Richmond governments have agreed to take these statues down and have begun that process. It was fascinating to see an empty pedestal where Stonewall Jackson had sat just a few weeks ago and to see the heavily defaced and soon to be removed statues to Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis. While it was unintentional and an interesting coincidence, they were in the process of removing a statue of JEB Stuart and I got to actually watch the statue touch the ground and be prepared for removal from the area. It was fascinating to be there while history unfolded and it will not be something I soon forget.
We continued our Richmond visit with a stop at the Confederate White House which is now surrounded by a hospital complex. Much like the “First White House of the Confederacy” in Montgomery, I think this is something which can be preserved for its historical value without offending anyone and I hope it will be. From there we went out to Hollywood Cemetery, somewhere my mom has really wanted to visit and I did as well. This is a fascinating place historically and is the final resting place of Presidents Monroe and Tyler, Confederate President Jefferson Davis and Generals Pickett and Stuart as well as many more local celebrities and old Richmond families. There is also some beautiful funerary art on display with some amazingly ornate gravestones and memorials. We ended up staying there way longer than we had planned, and by the time we had lunch, decided that making it to, through and home from Appomattox wasn’t in the cards for the day. We instead went and saw some of the parts of the battlefields around Richmond we had missed last week, and planned ahead for a future visit to Appomattox in two weeks. It was a little disappointing not to make it there this week as it would have been timed to the war (a week after our visit to Petersburg and historically a week after the fall of Petersburg), but that is far less important than having the time we want to have there and not being rushed.
And that’s what’s been happening this week. I’m off to do some math tutoring here in a few minutes, and then plan on spending the afternoon cooking a lovely pot of jambalaya to go with our Dinner and a Movie tonight where we will watch The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I don’t really have a ton of plans for the coming week, but I do now have plans to make plans. The weather will continue to be hot and sticky here so most of my plans will be inside, but I want to get back out into the neighborhoods around my house and take some photos. Next week we will take a brief hiatus from our Civil War travels for a routine eye appointment (not mine), but hope to go on a local adventure TBA in the city. I’ll be reading and writing and even doing some arithmetic, playing some tunes and thinking about the next 6 months of my life.
I sure do appreciate you following along with this blog, even though my travels have ground to a halt. Have a wonderful week out there wherever you are. Stay safe. Stay cool. Stay hydrated. And do the best you can to make the most of it. See you next week.
-Mike