DC Wanderings

DAY ONE
Sunday, 18 January 2009

A huge credit to Bill, we were out of the house, fed, packed, and with lunches in hand by 9:30 a.m. We remembered to leave food and an open door for Kiko, and turn down the heat goal for both furnaces. We took two cars to the airport, since our Honda is in the shop. It was the usual zoo getting through security. Picture six people taking off their shoes, coats and belts, opening up three laptops, shoving about twelve of those grey bins plus twelve carry-on items in addition through the grey curtain and then trying to put it all back together on the other side of the scanners.

After we got to our gate, I took my driver’s license and Katie and Connor’s passports (although it turns out they did not need photo ID after all) out of my coat pocket to put them away. As I was putting the passports in my purse, I noticed that my license wasn’t with them. I looked all around my seat, checked the pockets of my coat again, flipped through all the pages of each passport to see if it was inside one of them, checked my wallet to make sure I hadn’t already put it away and then forgotten about it (?!) but it was nowhere to be found. I knew this was beyond silly, because I had just taken it out of my pocket to put it away! I stood up and looked all around my seat and on the floor, went through the above routine again to no avail, and then asked Katie to watch my stuff while I retraced my steps from security.

On my way back down the concourse I tried to imagine how I could have lost my driver’s license. The only thing that seemed possible was if it had fallen out of my coat pocket when I took off my coat to go through the scanner. At security, they searched through their lost and found and came up empty. They asked me if I’d looked in all my pockets, been through my purse, and was sure I didn’t have it. In their experience, most people who thought they lost something actually have it, but in the confusion put it in an unlikely spot among their possessions. We checked through a few dozen of the stacks of empty bins but drew a blank. I thanked them for trying and said I would come back right before my flight took off if I still hadn’t found it.

On my way back to the gate, I wondered if I would really need my driver’s license again on this trip. Would I need it to transfer in Phoenix? Probably not. We didn’t plan to rent a car, so that’s another non-need. But how could I get on the plane to come home? Would security accept my Multnomah Athletic Club card and a major credit card? No way. I concluded that I just had to find it before we boarded the plane. But how? I couldn’t stop thinking that I could feel it with the passports in my pocket when I took them out to put them away. Where did it go?

After I confessed the bad news to Katie and Bill at the gate, I noticed that someone was sitting in what had been my seat. I couldn’t think about it any more right then, so I went in the bathroom and put on some make-up, since I hadn’t done that before we left the house. If I was going to be a complete idiot, at least I could look good doing it! Back at the gate, I noticed Katie now had a copy of The Secret Life of Bees and congratulated her on finding it. She said “Yeah, thanks. Dad found it for me here at the airport at Powell’s.” Good old Powell’s.

I stole a glance over at the woman sitting in my old seat. Something white under the chair caught my eye. I think I involuntarily said “Oh!” right out loud. I walked over and picked up my driver’s license from under her chair, mumbling apologetically to her, “This is what I’ve been looking for.” Before putting it safely in my wallet, I held it in front of Bill’s laptop screen for him to see.

“You found it! Where was it?”

“Under the chair where I was sitting.”

The rest of the journey was uneventful after that. In the Phoenix airport, the kids bought snacks and played Mao. At one point we heard this whole crowd at the restaurant next to us cheering like crazy. That was the go-ahead touchdown by the Cardinals in the playoff game against Philadelphia. More cheers followed as they sealed the deal with a two point conversion. I spent the long flight to Baltimore getting half way through the final (?) installment in Stephenie Meyers’ epic vampire tale. The sleepy shuttle ride into D.C. got us to our temporary home at about 1:15 a.m. Nighty night.



DAY THREE
Tuesday, 20 January 2009

Getting up at 3:30 in the morning was not as hard as I thought. We had all laid out our warmest combinations of clothes the night before, and Bill packed a lunch and made us each hot chocolate to-go while we were getting dressed. Our starting point was seven stops out from Metro Center, so only about a dozen folks got on with us. Bill jokingly asked “Anyone going to the inauguration?” as if there were any other reason to be taking the train in at four in the morning!

By the time we reached L’enfant Plaza the car was packed to capacity with standing room only. It took us 45 minutes to get out of the station because everyone had to go out one by one through the turnstiles. We tried to stay together in the crush of people rushing to get into the mall and stake out a spot, but somewhere in the dark we fell behind Alex and Dillon. Luckily, Dillon answered his cell phone and talked us over to where he was standing, beneath the strobing tower next to the first giant jumbo-tron just past 4th Street, and on the left side of the crowd facing the capitol’s rear reception area. The blinking lights made him easy to find, but we moved a little back so we could have good views of both the giant screen (which was blank and black for the moment) and the actual capitol in the distance.

We were surprised to find many people asleep under piles of flattened cardboard. We stood right behind one such mound and stood our ground. A shorter woman immediately protested our resolve to stand right in front of her. She said she had been there since 9p.m. the night before and intended to take pictures and she just couldn’t have tall people in front of her. We thought she might be joking and just giving us a hard time, but she mentioned it several times and seemed to expect us to move. Finally Bill decided to talk to her and told her we had come from Oregon with our whole family to be there, and asked her where she was from. She said Alexandria, Virginia. It seemed that the effort to get to know her broke the ice and we promised to lean out of her way any time she needed us to, so we agreed to get along.

A young man and his girlfriend standing in front of us were from Los Angeles. We asked them if they felt they were bundled up enough for the cold. They seemed to have thought ahead, but it was pretty frigid for all of us. The hardest part was just having nothing to do for hours and nothing to distract us from feeling cold. We were annoyed by the strobing lights and couldn’t wait until daylight came and erased their usefulness. Maybe then they would be turned off and we’d finally be rid of the infernal flashing.

The kids sat down for a while and tried to play cards. I passed out granola bars and sandwiches when we remembered to be hungry. After a while Alex began to be seriously concerned about his toes literally freezing. He remembered reading about ice crystals forming in your blood vessels when frostbite occurs and questioned my advice to stomp our feet and try to wiggle our toes. Wouldn’t that just cause the ice crystals to rip through our blood vessels? I didn’t think we could possibly be that far gone yet, but I offered to help him put some HotHands chemical warmers inside his socks.

When he sat down and removed his shoes and socks, I think Alex was genuinely surprised that his toes had not yet turned black and in fact looked perfectly normal, although he couldn’t feel them because they were numb from cold. I slipped a little charcoal-and-iron sack into each of his socks and helped him put them back on. We had already been using the HotHands in our gloves and knew that they helped take the edge off the cold just enough to stand it. After Alex dared to bare his toes for the treatment, I repeated the procedure with each of the other kids. It turned out to be excellent foresight on my part to stuff my little mini-backpack with those things for the occasion. We used every one I brought, even though I thought I had way more than we would need.

The long wait was punctuated by small delights: the lightening of the sky pre-dawn, as the few clouds slowly turned from black to purple to pink before arriving at their familiar white; a text from my friend, Anne, who was somewhere far behind us but also on the mall, so we were together; the glow of the first sunny rays on the back of the capitol; a voicemail from Mabel as she was going about her day in Portland and suddenly realized today was the day and she knew where we were; the energy subtly rising all around us as sleepy campers emerged from their cardboard igloos and down sleeping bags; the wondering gasps of people on the shoulders of their friends who were seeing the vastness of the crowd from a more clarifying perspective.

We cheered when the jumbo-tron spurted to life at about 9:30, even though the first images were only pages of text giving us information about warming stations in the area, closed streets not to try on our way out, advice on keeping warm, and emergency procedures. We shouted for a movie to distract us from the cold for another two hours. As if to grant our wish, a rebroadcast of Sunday’s concert at the Lincoln Memorial appeared on the screen, with subtitles in case we couldn’t hear the out-of-sync sound coming from the speakers. Since we were traveling on Sunday, we missed even seeing this concert on television. Although I would have welcomed any distraction, I was particularly pleased to get to watch this one.

We didn’t really think about how this must be an abridged version of the entire concert. We recognized Denzel Washington and cheered when he mentioned people from Oregon, and danced in place and sang along with the Inaugural Celebration Singers and Bruce Springsteen’s rendition of “The Rising.” We sang “Lean On Me,” along with Mary J. Blige. We laughed at Jamie Foxx’s impressions of our president elect. We shook our heads in wonder at the unlikely pairing of Bettye LaVette and Jon Bon Jovi, but somehow it really worked as they sang “A Change is Gonna Come.” We were inspired to be reminded of Abraham Lincoln by Tom Hanks. We smiled when the kids wondered who James Taylor was, as he and John Legend showered the people we love with love. We sang along with John Mellencamp—now ain’t that America? We just kept stamping our frozen feet all through “My Country ‘Tis of Thee” with Josh Groban and Heather Headley and the D.C. Gay Men’s Chorus. We got our groove on with Herbie Hancock, will i. am, and Sheryl Crow singing Bob Marley’s “One Love.”

Tiger Woods gave a sweet tribute to the dedicated members of our many armed services as he introduced the Naval Academy Glee Club, who sang “Walk On,” from Carousel with Renée Fleming. Jack Black and Rosario Dawson reminded of the National Parks legacy that Teddy Roosevelt expanded on, and then Garth Brooks and the Washington Youth Choir got the crowd fired up with “The Day the Music Died,” and “Shout.” Usher and Shakira got all funky with Stevie Wonder and “Higher Ground.” Samuel L. Jackson reminded us of our long struggle for civil rights as he introduced U2’s tribute to Martin Luther King Jr. :”In the Name of Love.” After some words from the president elect, Pete Seeger and his grandson, bolstered by the Boss, led a rousing sing-along to “This Land is My Land.” We sang along, and veered off in our own harmonies and descants on the chorus. There are some pretty amazing voices in the average crowd of Americans!

Even more than the words he spoke, the sight of our president elect and his family enjoying the same familiar famous musicians singing the same familiar famous songs and dancing and grooving to the beat right along with us made me feel like we are truly one. Our president is elected from among us and he has agreed to serve us for four years, and endure what for me would probably be unbearable public scrutiny, but which comes with fame. He has a monumental task ahead of him, and I hope he feels, in addition to the weight of that burden, the support of the many people who are willing to work along with him for the success of this country.

We didn’t get to see Beyoncé lead off the finale, “America the Beautiful,” as all the musicians returned to the stage and they and the entire audience sang along the second time through. It was almost time for the main event, and the jumbo-tron switched to a live feed showing the celebrities coming through the building and out the back door to be seated. One of the first people we saw being seated was the aging Muhammad Ali. I guess I shouldn’t be amazed at the number of famous people who came to the inauguration. If I was excited to be there, why shouldn’t they be?

As we watched people file outside one by one to be seated, the sun was shining and warming us wherever it’s rays found their way through the crowd. Former presidents and their wives, members of congress, senators, judges, our outgoing and incoming president and vice president all came out the same door. I loved the children’s choir from San Francisco. They were so sweet and full of enthusiasm. I was worried about how the invocation would go, but as it turned out I think it was fine. I was glad Dr. Warren used a lot of borrowed words and didn’t try to editorialize too much.

Aretha Franklin is amazing and I loved her hat! Anyone with so much personal spark and stage presence, and with a voice like she has, can do anything she wants and be absolutely right. Her rendition of “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee” was ripe with the swelling emotion of all the attendees. Joe Biden was characteristically over eager in his swearing-in, but I don’t think he can be anything but himself. We were delighted by the musical quartet. Each player’s individual talent is beyond reproach and their glee seemed evident on their faces. (We learned only later that they were playing along with a prior recording because of the cold, but I prefer to believe that the enjoyment was genuine, if maybe a little self conscious about the uncharacteristic “lip synching.”) The oath of office administration was a little rocky for Obama, as he tried to wait for the judge to say it right, and then he messed it up anyway. Live shows have their challenges, don’t they?

We were all very intent on listening to the words of our new president. He approached the task in soberness and so did we. It was not a speech for stirring up a crowd, and yet we were stirred by the sense of heritage and responsibility he invoked. He instilled in us both gravity and hope. Connor, having recently memorized Lincoln’s Gettysburg address, wondered aloud if someday school children might memorize this speech. Who knows?

I’ll admit that we were so weary and frozen, we started to look for the exit almost as soon as the speech was over. We could, of course, still hear the words of Elizabeth Alexander’s poem as we were picking up all our trash and belongings. I must admit I prefer a more structured type of poetry myself. As I carried my grocery bag of trash, I was horrified at the volume of litter all over the mall. Not everyone is from Oregon and has “Leave only footprints, take only memories,” engraved on the fleshy tissues of her heart. We followed blindly along behind the moving people, listening to the benediction, until we arrived at the closed off 7th Street and it finally registered that those billboard notifications warned us there would be no outlet until 14th Street because of the parade.

As we backtracked and trudged toward 14th Street, we detoured toward the port-a-potties. I handed out a few more granola bars, and we walked on for several blocks.
At one point, people were turning and waving toward the sky. It was the now former president’s helicopter, taking Mr. Bush and his family, and maybe the Cheneys too, off to their next chapter, wherever that may be. Outside the mall, we were in a traffic jam of pedestrians. Everyone was cold, everyone had been up since the wee hours of the morning, people had every reason to be grumpy, but somehow we all found a way to be cordial and friendly and muster up a little more patience. Every entrance to the subway overflowed with people, and many were closed anyway, because of the parade. We sat down in a back alley against a building and rested, removed the HotHands from our shoes, and ate a few apples and sandwiches and the rest of the granola bars.

When we felt like moving again, I said that after standing so long, I would rather walk even a long way to find a less crowded subway stop than stand for what promised to be a several hour wait at the nearest one. Everyone agreed that walking would feel better than standing, so we headed south. I didn’t realize how far it would be, but we ended up walking clear across the Potomac, over the closed 14th Street bridge, to Crystal City. We walked for at least an hour and a half, and there were hundreds of people with the same idea, walking along with us. At one point I heard someone behind me singing “…pioneer children sang as they walked, and walked, and walked, and walked, …and walked.” We felt almost like refugees. I had to stop and tie my stupid shoelaces about five times. We finally ended up at the National Airport Metro station and there was no line at all.

It was about fifteen or twenty minutes before we were back in the center of town. The stops near the mall were still crowded with people waiting to get on, and we felt like we might still be waiting to get inside the station if we had gotten in that line and stood. It was 4:30 and getting dark when we reached our stop, Friendship Heights. Just outside the station was a very welcome sight—a restaurant! We all agreed on Booeymongers, for the second day in a row. I ordered the giant “Obama burger,” with bacon and sauted onions. We were all very hungry and spent little time relishing the hot food, but got it all over our fingers as we watched bits of the parade on the little TV on the wall.

Back at the house, I could think of nothing better than an hour’s nap. At 6:30 I got up and showered and got ready in my fancy clothes. I tried to dry my hair and make it look decent. I was worried about how warm I would be, going by Metro to the Folger Shakespeare Library for our little ball. I had already decided to wear wool socks and boots and keep my fancy shoes in my bag until we got there. Bill said he had noticed an item in the closet that might help. I looked for myself, and sure enough, there it was! I know from many an RPG that you must consider useful items found behind doors and essential to your mission as obviously placed there providentially for your use. Not using it was out of the question.

We had one errand before the Metro. I needed a safety pin for my blouse, and somehow I did not have one in any of the pockets of my well-stocked purse. We walked around the corner and into the Embassy Suites hotel. The concierge directed me to the front desk for a sewing kit and they sent me upstairs from the lobby to the nearest restroom. When I was all put together, we walked back out and to the Metro station. We had a moment of considering a cab, but they would have to call one especially for us, and we were impatient to get moving. It was a walk of several blocks from Union Station, but I was very cozy in my item, and I could keep up with Bill easily in my walking boots.

At the coat check, I removed my fancy shoes and checked my bag, boots and the item. We were more than fashionably late, and had missed the short official program, which we didn’t know included George Lucas. No matter, I did not regret my nap. I noticed the food looked good and made a mental note to get myself a plate before too long. Bill ran into a man he knew and introduced me to him and his partner. I spent a long time talking with the partner, who was a fascinating man who had made quite a career, aside from his medical practice, of being the wise and fun uncle to his brother’s children. He gave me several very good tips of place to see in D.C. with children. I thought the Spy Museum might be a big hit with my boys.
After a while we moved into the inner room and found another acquaintance of Bill’s. His wife was an interesting scientist who worked at a museum in town and was complimentary of my sparkly top. I didn’t know how to return the compliment without seeming lame. Several of Bill’s friends from ISTE came over and spoke to us for a long time and I suddenly realized that the caterers had cleared away all the food. I wasn’t starving, but mildly disappointed. I really need to get better at seizing the moment. We let them take some goofy pictures of us by the empty table, holding a rose from the centerpiece. Then Bill was ready to go, but I insisted he come with me into the dancing room. There was a live jazz band, and we went around the empty dance floor until that song came to an end. I was satisfied that we had danced at an inaugural ball, and we could go home.

I was very grateful for the item on the walk back to the Union Station and also home from our stop. The kids had ordered a pizza and were watching a movie on TV. We were happy to hop into a comfortable bed at the end of a long day. I had a feeling we would sleep very well.

A Day in My Life

Sunday, 4 January 2009

We have been out of the school routine for three weeks, so it seems awfully early to be getting up in time to shower and dress for a 9 a.m. meeting. Luckily, we don't need to worry about breakfast, since it's fast Sunday. Frost is covering everything, so we're glad to pile sleepily into the Honda, which has been parked in the garage, so it doesn't need to be scraped down or warmed up. Dillon is driving, but we are leaving in plenty of time to make it over to Paul's ward on time for the blessing of Grace Amarise.

Dillon has been driving for many months and has become quite expert at turns and merges and stopping smoothly. As we exit I-5 South to head east, the ramp takes us out over the east edge of the river on a wide left turn back over the freeway. Bill reminds Dillon not to take the exit too fast, because it might be icy. Dillon takes his foot off the gas and moves it to the brake. As soon as his foot touches the brake we become a pinball, sliding on the ice and bouncing between the concrete walls of the off-ramp as we continue the turn and are funneled onto Belmont Street. During those eerily slow-motioned seconds, we have managed to crunch all four corners of the car, but when we reach the main road, it is ice-free.

"Is everyone okay?" Bill asks, and we nod in return. "The car is still drivable, you might as well continue on to church."

"No. I'm not drivable," Dillon asserts, "I want to switch."

At the light, Dillon puts the car in park and does a Chinese fire drill with Bill. Dillon winces as he finds the door resisting a little too much as he tries to get out. I see Bill shake his head at the car behind us and mouth "We're fine," before he gets into the driver's seat. After several blocks, Bill observes, "Dillon, I don't know that it would have been any different if I was driving. That road was just a sheet of ice."

"No one behind us hit the wall," Dillon laments.

"That's only because they saw us fish-tailing and slowed to a crawl."

"Glad I could be an example," Dillon allows, grudgingly.

"Don't worry. We're all okay, AAA will come and tow the car and the insurance will take care of the repairs. That's what we pay them for," Bill offers as reassurance.

We park against the curb at the church, so we don't leak radiator fluid all over the parking lot. As we go into the church, Bill asks Paul if he could take us back to our house after Sacrament meeting, since by then our radiator will be empty.

The chapel is filled with chatter as people say hello, and Happy New Year and compare stories of trouble from the snowy weather. Paul reminds me that I had met the Wattses at his house when Grace was newly born. We greet Aaron's parents and his sister, Mindy, and her family, who attend that ward too. Some people in this small congregation wonder about us, and are disappointed to learn we are only visiting for the day.

The bishop starts the meeting almost on time. He is very young, but obviously cares and is kind and genuine. The chorister is enthusiastic and fun to follow, although his arms fly more like a bat than a falcon. We sit in a mixed up family group on the bench, with Bill, Benjamin and Connor to my left and Emaline warming my lap. Katie and Dillon help Paul with the older girls, and Marcy holds Grace.

After the sacrament, ten or eleven men stand up and go to the front to squeeze into a tight circle around Grace. Paul's blessing is sweet and is centered around Grace's strong foundation in the gospel and sharing it with others. She is quiet for the whole prayer and is so cozy in her sweater/romper Marcy didn't have the heart to change her into a dress. After the blessing, Marcy takes her out to nurse, the older girls move back a row to play with the Watts, and Emaline squirms around on my lap during the testimonies.

At the end of the meeting, Dick invites us to come out to Oregon City, where he is headed, to attend the ordination of his grandson, Adam, to the Melchizedek priesthood and the office of an elder. We scrap our plans to return to our ward and accept. We each bring a car seat from Paul's van into the church lobby, and he drives us to our house. On the way there, he asks more questions about the accident and is startled to realize that Dillon had been driving. When he saw us drive up to the church, Bill was driving, so I guess he assumed that's how it went. I think that is actually cool for Dillon to hear, because it reinforces what Bill had told him, that it could have happened to anyone.

We hug Paul goodbye and go inside to get the VW keys. Bill hands them to Dillon, but he protests.

"Don't I even get a one day suspension?"

"Nope! Get back on that horse," Bill advises.

We pile in and head for Oregon City. I hand Bill my AAA card, so he can call a tow truck, but his phone rings. It's David. Since we missed going up to Grandpa Bill's grave on the 28th, they would like to meet us there today at 5 p.m. We'll each bring a poinsettia and we won't plan to stay long--it's a date. It takes about thirty minutes to get to the Young's meeting place, but the drive is uneventful and Dillon does a great job. We arrive just as Sunday school is letting out. There are about twenty people in a little classroom to witness the ordination.

A tall man says hello to me and shakes my hand as he says, "Hi Melissa, I'm Terry."

"Wow! It's great to see you!" I manage before Aaron starts the little meeting. Terry is the divorced father of three beautiful children, and his daughter, Aubrey, was a young woman in our eastside ward that I used to teach.

Aaron simply introduces the stake authority, and then he says a few words of welcome too. Adam takes his seat in the middle of the room, eight men join in, including Terry, and Aaron does the ordination. This simple and profound rite of passage brings tears to many eyes and there are hugs all around. Adam shakes everyone's hand and hugs more than a few. He is still the same young man, but something about just making the decision to go on a two-year mission seems to have focused him and given him real purpose. I ask Terry about Aubrey and he tells me she lives in Washington with her husband and they became proud parents in 2008. I never stop marveling at how everyone I know grows up, whether I'm there to witness it or not.

There is still an hour of meetings left, so we separate and go to class. I follow Michelle down the hall to the Relief Society room, where she is scheduled to teach the lesson. We get there just as she is being introduced. Michelle is a wonderful teacher and invites a lot of discussion. The lesson is on strengthening the marriage relationship, and her example alone is some powerful teaching, but she offers some ideas and we all share from our own experiences. At the end of the meetings we all gather in the lobby and group up again to go in separate cars. Bill drives right in front of Aaron to block his way out and rolls down the window.

“Hey, Aaron! Now that all our kids are in your cars—see you later! (Ha, Ha)”

We actually have to follow Aaron for a while as he takes on the back way to avoid the roads that are closed because of the snow. We eventually get back onto a familiar road and we all end up at Aaron and Michelle’s fantastic farmstead. We all pull out our helping hands and put together an impromptu feast. The teenagers make mounds of cornbread, I stir up some shrimp to supplement the beef that has been cooking in the crock pot. While Aaron washes some fresh eggs in the other sink, Michelle cooks up some green beans and I fiddle around making gravy from the crock pot juices. Eventually we get thirteen of us around the dining room table and eat ourselves silly with all the good food.

Unfortunately, we can’t stay long. We have plans to meet David up at Sunset Hills cemetery. With hugs all around, we take our leave and drive back to the big city. When we’re almost home, we call David to coordinate the meeting, but their family has already come and gone from the cemetery because of some quirks that came up in their schedule. We go home and grab our poinsettias anyway, and head up there for our own little family memorial.

It is dark and cold at the gravesite. We gather around the two headstones of grandpa and grandma and set our flowers down in a way that seems fitting. Bill is the only one in our family who ever knew his father, but we all have some memories of his mother. Each of the kids shares a memory, but they are mostly from the very end of her life, when she was so different because of the Alzheimer’s. Bill reminds us that although she might not have seemed so those last couple of years, for most of her life Phyllis was a smart, warm, extremely capable and caring woman. We pile somberly back into the car and return home.

Alex is there to greet us and wonders if while doing his laundry, he could spend some time taking a bath to try out a cool Christmas gift (for the bath) from one of his friends. Fine with me I tell him, but it seems that furthermore, he would like to use my big, jetted tub downstairs instead of the normal-sized jetted tub upstairs. I really hesitate, but finally consent since I can’t think of a good reason to say no. In hindsight I wonder why a parent needs a reason, really. It’s just that I know Alex always craves one so much, and I sometimes find it easier to change my mind than provide one.

In the flurry of getting kids ready for another week of school, talking about the insurance claims and car repair, one final snack, and moving kids toward getting ready for bed, I don’t pay much attention to Alex. It does seem like he is taking a long time getting around to taking his bath. I finally go down to check on the laundry status and find all my bathroom rugs soaking wet in the laundry-room sink! Alex seems to be in the tub now, so I can’t go in and check out my bathroom, but WHAT the…!!! Katie wanders into the laundry room and notices my distress. She assures me that she and Alex cleaned it all up and I don’t need to worry about it. Right.

After emerging from what must have been a disappointingly tepid bath, Alex sheepishly admits that the tub had overflowed in his absence. He was used to waiting a certain amount of time for the upstairs tub to fill (13 minutes). When he had checked on my tub after that long, it was only about halfway filled, so he thought he had lots of time. His best guess now is that he had forgotten to push the plug down at first, but when he checked, the weight of the water had finally pushed it down and it was actually filling up quite rapidly, though he didn’t realize it. I find nearly every towel I own soaking wet on the bathroom floor. I can tell they really tried to be thorough, but the carpet in front of my closet is completely soaked and is seeping under the wall into the closet. This will need a major drying out. (After soaking up as much water with beach towels as I could, it took two space heaters two more days to dry it out.)

I get the three younger kids to bed and as Bill is brushing his teeth, Alex comes in to say good-bye. “Hey Alex, did you flood my bathroom?” Bill asks, incredulously.

“Well, yeah. But I didn’t mean to.”

It is impossible to think of anything to say at the end of a very long day. We are exhausted both mentally and physically. Bill confesses to me after I return from taking Alex back to his dorm that he is not sure he wants to take the family up to visit the gravesites any more. It just makes him too sad that his children seem to only remember their grandma’s oddness at the end. Of course we agree that is not how we want to go, but how much of that can you control?

I’m pretty sure tomorrow will be boring after today.