Leaf peeping at the Shenendoah with the Summerhays

A few weeks ago, Steph, Jake and I drove up to Shenendoah National Park for the afternoon to see the fall foliage. The fact that Stephanie and Jake have a car now, combined with my desire to go "leaf-peeping" (and having my life practically threatened by my native-Virginian friend), made a trip inevitable.

We had many adventures, including red-knuckle driving through pouring rain and wall-like fog. But ultimately, the colors (as you can see below) were definitely worth it.

Lucy and Ethel went to D.C.... in the rain.

My mom, my aunt, and my cousin came out to visit me in D.C. a little over a week ago. They happened to bring with them rain, sleet, wind and temperatures in the forties. Let's see, humidity + wind chill + temps in the 40s = DANG COLD.

We had many adventures and ended up losing/breaking/demagnetizing two umbrellas, a camera, two metro cards, and quite nearly our sanity.

But it was really great to see my family and show them around the city I love, even if it was colder than spit.

In the Capitol rotunda. Dayna inspecting her camera after a mishap with...dropping it on the floor.

Good ol' Brigham Young

The cool little train-ish thing we got to take under the Capitol. (We didn't want to walk outside, it was cold and wet!)

Trying to manage umbrellas, cameras, blankets in the wind and rain.

Digression

Today, instead of catching up on my blog/journal, I wrote two lengthy, chatty, deliciously detailed letters to my dear friends on missions.

Even though my conversations with my good friends were, by definition, one-sided, it was still good to spill my thoughts and let them know what is going on in my life. In my mind I could hear their reactions/voices/laughs.

Tomorrow I will come back to the real world, go to work like normal, and catch up on my journal. But today, I am content to listen to the rain patter against my window and proverbially put my head on my friends' shoulders.

Even thousands of miles away (soon to be many more thousands as they leave the MTC), it's good to know that good friends will always be around to lift you up or help you feel loved when all you feel is alone.

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."

September 7, 2009 or Biking 40 miles to Mt. Vernon. In the Rain.

After a very fitfull night of sleep (for me), 16 of us departed from the Barlow Center at 8:00 a.m. (That in itself is a feat.)

We went down to the same place we rented kayaks and rented 16 bikes, locks, and helmets. Some people didn’t want to get helmets, but I convinced them because they were only a dollar. I took them by the shoulders, looked them in the eye, and in a half-joking tone said, “isn’t your brain worth $29.95?” When they replied yes, but they don’t cost $29.95, I said, I know isn’t it great, they’re only one dollar. I hope you think your brain is worth that.

Then we were off. It is 18 miles one way to Mt. Vernon from Washington D.C. Why did we decide to bike? Around mile 15 I was asking myself the same question.

Luckily it was delightfully overcast and just the right temperature for strenuous activity.

We took the Mt. Vernon Trail (which is appropriately named because it ends at Mt. Vernon) from the rental place (near Watergate hotel).

Mt. Vernon was very cool. I paid more than I’m used to for entrance (I’m used to free), but the facilities were very nice, and the museum was very interesting. Pictures were rarely allowed (we weren’t allowed to take any pictures in the mansion or the museum), but I can testify that it is a very pretty place. I can see why General Washington (as he was referred to at Mt. Vernon) liked it.

The house itself was very beautiful and just off the banks of the Potomac. They showed a short video about Washington’s contribution to American history that dramatized his courtship of Martha (who was a widow). The whole time I was very impressed with their relationship. They carried lockets with pictures in them and wrote to each other when they were apart, but Martha tried to go with General Washington everywhere she could, including to war.

They never had children, but they raised Martha’s children from her previous marriage. Also, when Martha’s son died in his twenties, they took his children into their home and raised them as their own.

We saw George Washington’s dentures, the original George Washington kneeling in prayer painting, and the tombs of Martha and George.

Also, we learned that General Washington’s greatest legacy to the American people is that he stepped down from office. He refused to be king, and then resigned from the office of the President after two terms. If he hadn’t done that, the political tradition of our country would have been completely different.

Sadly, I didn’t get many pictures because I didn’t want to swerve into oncoming traffic. I mean, I am pretty coordinated, but juggling handlebars, water, and a camera seemed to be a bridge too far.

Also sadly, many many bugs tragically ended their lives today, on my face. It’s not tragic that they died, but it is tragic that they decided to kamikaze into my eyes, nose, or mouth.

Remember the rain from last night? It found us again, but strangely we didn’t care as much. It’s amazing how many things you don’t care about when you’ve biked 34 miles and you only have two to go. Rain, appearance, and general hygiene are all included in the “not important enough” category.

About the bikes. If you pictured us all on fancy ten-speeds with handle bar brakes, think again. Picture us all on bikes with handlebars that could fit a basket (some had baskets), just one gear, and reverse-pedal brakes. Yes, not only did we bike 36 miles to and from Mt. Vernon, we did it on single-speed dinosaurs. Some of them were falling apart. One girl’s chain came off several times, and then her handlebars got loose and turned upside down. My seat gradually sunk down to the base of the bike. At the beginning of the ride, I was able to fully extend my legs when I pedaled. At the end, you might have mistaken me for one of those tall clowns on an oversized mini tricycle. Knees up to my ears.

But I am glad I went. We traveled mostly along the coast of the Potomac, but saw some beautiful Virginia cities in the middle. When you slow down, you are able to see a lot more of the country. Some moments of the bike trail were indescribably beautiful. Albeit, forcing each shaking leg down in a downpour, just focusing on the next pedal, doesn’t help you appreciate the bucolic atmosphere, but those moments were shortlived. Many more beautiful than painful moments came out of our trip. (Although I bet many painful moments are yet to come.)

And I’m proud of us. 16 moderately-fit people did a very athletic thing and we all survived.

And even biking on the single-speeds was fun. I haven’t ridden a bike like that since I was a kid.

When we got home, we peeled ourselves off our bikes, wrung out our clothing, and did our best to learn to walk again. After dinner, we ran around getting things together for FHE. Ben (my co-chair) gave a really good lesson about asking questions, and then I led a round of “get-to-know-you” bingo. Or “bing” as we called it, because there were four columns instead of five (I thought five was too many). I instructed everyone to get up and talk to as many people as possible to get to know them, and then brought everyone back together to play the game. I said a statement (e.g. this person lived in Portuguese foreign language housing and shares a birthday with Dr. Suess) and then they put a skittle/m&m on the square with that person’s name (Marydawn) on it. The prize was toilet paper. We all need it and we all suffer without it, so it couldn’t fail. Afterwards, the Burtons provided many, many donuts for us to partake of.

Now, I am carefully sitting on my bed, trying to avoid the huge bicycle-shaped bruise on my tush. I imagine tomorrow will be fun, gingerly sitting in my seat at work, carefully walking up stairs, and prying myself out of every position held longer than five minutes.

But, it’s okay. I kind of like it. It’s nice that I did something that was hard for me. It was nice to push myself and succeed.

General George Washington (he was 6'2"), Martha (she was 4'11"), and their two grandchildren. And me.

In case we got confused as to which part of the property was historic, the movie theater and pizza hut or 250 year old house...

The beautiful bowling green in front of the mansion. (It reminds me a Pemberley!)

I want porticos when I grow up and have a mansion.

Me and the mansion (no pictures inside at all, but it was very beautiful).

View of the Potomac from the back porch.

An artist's concept of what General Washington would have looked like in his early 30s. Did you know he was a surveyor? I took surveying, and the equipment has changed a lot, but also it hasn't changed that much...

I thought this cartoon was cute.

Washington died unexpectedly at age 67.

I, surprisingly, didn't die on the 18-mile ride home, but I was thoroughly soaked. You can't really see the contrast, but the front half of my body is dripping.