September 11, 2009 or Traipsing through Valley Forge (but we had shoes, unlike Washington's troops)

We just got back from our weekend trip to Philadelphia. It was packed with fun, rain, grease, and George Washington! Don’t worry, I will explain all of those and how they relate in a minute.

First, a travelogue.

We left D.C. around 8:00 a.m. and watched BYU’s “A More Perfect Union” on the way up. Since I didn’t take American Heritage, I have never seen it, and I actually really liked it. It was very appropriate for the weekend and I learned more about the constitutional convention.

When the movie was over (and when I simply wasn’t interested in the movie), I leaned my head against the window and watching the rain fall on the Virginia/Maryland/Pennsylvania countryside. It rained the entire day. When we got to the Freedom Foundation, we got “oriented”, our keys, settled into our dorm/barrack like rooms and immediately set out exploring. It was definitely still raining and about twenty minutes walking around the grounds everything from the knees down was completely soaked.

Here are some pictures from the grounds of where we stayed.

A statue of Washington praying. (Even though we learned later that Washington never knelt when he prayed, I still liked the sentiment.)

I support Washington praying, whether he stood or knelt. If I had 12,000 men quartered in Valley Forge for the winter, I would pray pretty fervently too.

The lamppost makes this picture super artsy.

We had a good lunch (Philly cheesesteaks), then set out for our Valley Forge tour. At this point, I had decided to change to sandals and capris, that way, my pants wouldn’t get soaked and sit against my cold skin. I could go traipsing around in the wet grass, then come back to the bus and actually dry off (skin dries faster than corduroy).

Our tour guide was very animated and very excited to be our tour guide. I was very impressed with his cache of specific, detailed knowledge. It was very interesting. I learned a lot about Valley Forge that I didn’t know before. We couldn’t complain about being cold in September, because we had warm rooms and a very mobile bus to go back to. It just seems like the spirits of the 3,000 men who died there that winter would remind us that we were in Valley Forge and many, many people suffered unimaginably horrible things.

Yet they stayed with Washington. It made me wonder who I would follow to Valley Forge and not abandon. I could probably count on one hand the number of people on this earth that I would trust so completely and so blindly. I imagine that he must have been a very remarkable man to incite such fierce loyalty in the war and then later on in the country. Washington was absolutely instrumental in the forming and success of our country. I don’t know if he was charismatic, imposing, or just a man who commanded the respect of everyone in his company, but people listened to him. And he had the blessing and burden of being the one people listened to. Poor guy, he just wanted to go back to Mount Vernon and live with his wife in peace, but civic duty kept calling him away from his comfortable home. During this trip (and Mt. Vernon earlier in the week) Washington has grown on me tremendously and I am now very interested in his life. And he has won my respect also.

Our Valley Forge tour guide. He led us out of the warm bus to the cold, wet field to teach us a little bit about history. He was great and very entertaining.

This is a good view of the canon (and Malcolm)

Fashion matters most when staying warm is involved.

Artsy rain/statue picture. The guy on the horse (not Washington) has a very strange story. You wouldn't believe it if I told you, but in short, years after his death, his family came to move his bones to their estate a few miles away. His body was remarkably preserved, but the box they were going to put him in was only big enough for his bones. So they had to boil his body in order to cut the flesh away and fit his bones into the box. Weird weird weird.

A real coal train! (As novel a sight as anything else we saw!)

Another artsy fog picture. The trees are beautiful and who knows where the tracks lead? What is around the next bend? The possibilities are endless.

A view of some of the huts that the troops built that winter. They used all of the trees within a couple of miles for housing or firewood.

A cute cute baby that was traveling with us. How can you resist that face?

Some beautiful stained glass windows we saw near Valley Forge.

We had an hour before dinner when we got back. Some people brainwashed by history went back out in the rain, but a bunch of the girls sat around in the lobby with blankets and hair dryers trying to defrost our toes. Guess which group I was in…

After dinner we had the privilege of hearing from General George Washington. He really came and addressed us! It was great! A very entertaining hour and a half. The actor was certainly not a novice. He was not a poser. He was not inexperienced. “George” had a very vast knowledge of his life and was witty to boot. At the end, the actor dropped his façade and addressed us as himself. We got to ask questions about him and his life and about his knowledge of George Washington. This man knows everything there is to know about George Washington. He really was fantastic. For example, he explained where the cherry-tree urban legend started and explain that in his professional opinion, George Washington was not a Deist. Washington was deeply religious, but didn’t go to church. He wasn’t a Deist, because he believed that God has a hand in the lives and destinies of men.

After “the General” we went downstairs and had some ice cream. We stayed downstairs and talked, laughed, and told stories for hours. It was probably my favorite part of the whole trip. I’m grateful to have good friends here. For those who finished their ice cream early, there was a game room upstairs with everything from Trivial Pursuit, ping pong, foosball, guitar hero, and the wii available to us. Before I went to bed I participated in an “around the world” game of ping pong. I’m not sure what it was called, but we rotated and every hit was by a different person. If you missed twice you were out. Our professor even played with us!

General George Washington! He was part actor, part historian. He has definitely made the life of George Washington his life work. He told us later that being George Washington is his full-time job and he loves everything about it but the hair. Hates the hair.

The General teaching Marydawn the Minuet. He was very gentlemenly. Even though he was "appalled" that she wasn't wearing a floor length dress like a "real lady."