Pictures and a Fancy Camera

I was reading a friend's blog and they mentioned wanting a fancy camera.  After years of waiting, I finally got a nice digital SLR camera last year.  A Canon EOS Digital Rebel XS.  I have a standard lens as well as a 70-300 mm zoom.  I actually bought it at Sam's Club for about $700 for the whole package.  It's a 10 mega-pixel camera.  They have a 15 mega-pixel camera out now.  Most of the pictures I take are about 5 mega-pixels (3888 x 2800 pixels).  I have blown up prints to 20 x 24 inches and they're still very clear.  I can take larger (raw) images, but they take up so much space and I don't really need anything that large, and it takes a special program to open/edit the raw images.  I have a 16 GB card in the camera, and have had over 1600 pictures on the card without it coming close to being full.  I will drain the battery in the camera before filling up the card.  In DC I took about 600 pictures in one day (many with the flash) and that's when the battery died  The one thing that I love about the size and quality of the pictures is the fact that I can crop my pictures down to pull out the details that I like.  I don't like to take pictures that have been "taken before."  I have a tendency to look at things a little differently, and like my pictures to reflect that.  I rarely have any need to edit the pictures for exposure and whatnot; I will take the color out of pictures from time to time just because I like black and white.  This year I've been trying to learn how to take good pictures using the manual settings; and I've taken a lot of really bad pictures because of it, but I'm getting better.  The full-auto setting is easy to use, but I didn't wait all these years to just get another point and shoot digital camera.  I'm glad I got it.

Washington DC Day 1

Lisa was doing a workshop, and had to be out of the hotel room by 7:00 am, so of course I was already awake.  I was on the Metro heading from Bethesda, Maryland to Washington DC by 7:15 in the morning.  It was 30 degrees and I had no plan for the day.

I always had done an agenda for DC if by chance I ever got there.  There were things that I just wanted to see.  I’d heard that I could spend a week alone at the museums of the Smithsonian.  Being somewhat of an American history buff, I knew the Museum of American History would be a must on day one.  But the museum didn’t open until 10:00 and I walked out of the Metro station at 7:30.  I had 2 ½ hours to fill.  I walked the couple of blocks to the White House where those with passes were just starting to move with their tours.  As I walked next to the fence at the White House, it struck me that I felt alone.  I wasn’t even around any of the homeless people I had seen outside of the Metro station.  I was able to cross the street and to the fence at the South Lawn of the White House, and as soon as I stepped up to the fence, three Capitol Hill Police officers also showed up.  I no longer felt alone, and realized that even though I may have felt alone, I was always being watched.



Far Side Caption: The National Menorah, Christmas Tree, Scaffolding, and Mobile Crane.



The National Christmas Tree and Menorah caused many sidewalks to be closed, so nothing was a straight walk. As I walked toward the Washington Monument, a police car pulled up and approached a homeless woman.  It was then I realized that there is a buffer of about three blocks in every direction surrounding the White House that there are no homeless people, I also realized how much security there must be beyond the obvious police car on every corner.

The Washington Monument was much larger than I thought it would be.  I pulled off my glove to touch it.  It’s real, and I’ll hold the memory of that touch for a lifetime.  I then walked toward the Lincoln Memorial.  Between the two, is the WWII Memorial.  I wasn’t ready for that. 

I had read about the memorial, and knew the basic layout, but the emotions I felt caught me off-guard.  My eyes watered up as I looked over the stars on the wall, so many lives.  What would be different today if even one of those soldiers had survived?  There was a WWII veteran there with his son, and his grandsons.  He was wearing his VFW hat and had a very distinctive curve to his spine.  He needed assistance in walking down the ramps that warned of being slippery when wet.  He positioned himself in the center of the memorial looking at the stars on the wall.  He pulled himself up as straight as he could, and bowed his head.  I cried.

By the time I walked to the Lincoln Memorial I had composed my thoughts.  There were about 50 Chinese tourists there, along with a group of Navy OCS candidates.  As I walked the steps, I could picture those images of Martin Luther King Jr. on those very steps.  I was glad to see there is a maker on the spot where he spoke.  I was in one of the pivotal places in American History, and felt proud to be an American.  In the memorial there was a young boy there with his grandfather.  I tried taking a picture of the boy staring up at the face of Abraham Lincoln.  I missed the shot because I didn’t want to be obvious, so I did one of my famous backwards, upside-down, from-the-hip shots; and it didn’t work.  Walking down the steps, I couldn’t believe there are many cities that have used as much marble and granite. 

The Vietnam Memorial holds the name of a cousin I never met.  He and I share a great-great-great-grandfather.  Finding his name on the wall was more challenging than I thought despite a very good system of identification: panel 16-E, row 70.  Finding the panel was easy, row 70 was the challenge.  I never would have guessed that row 70 was almost six feet off the ground, it was at my eye level.  There was a group of new naval recruits there.  I heard their drill sergeant ordering them to look for a name that they “felt a connection to.”  As I was leaving I said to one young recruit that I appreciate her service, and that I hoped she never ended up on a similar memorial.

I found a memorial for the original 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence.  My family has so many connections to American history, but I don’t think I am related to any of those men; men who came from the most common of occupations; men of honor.

The sidewalk in the Mall was covered with gravel, I thought it was in case of ice, but then thought it kept roller-blades and skateboarders off.  I walked past the Washington Monument again; and took another opportunity to touch it.  All morning long I couldn't believe the color of the sky and the clounds blowing past, it was so beautiful.



(I didn't take this picture)



The Smithsonian Museum of American History – I was glad to find out that the entrance to all of the Smithsonian museums was free; allowing all Americans (except the crazy homeless ones) the opportunity to see who we are as a nation.  My first stop in the museum was to see the Star Spangled Banner.  It’s in a dimly lit room, behind layer upon layer of protective glass, and it made me cry.  I wasn’t sure why. I never thought that a banner of paper-thin fabric and loose threads would hit me that way.  I fly the American flag everyday at home.  I guess I never really thought it meant that much to me to be an American.  I knew I’d still see things in that museum, but they wouldn’t compare to that flag.

Abraham Lincoln’s hat, George Washington’s Sword, the gold nugget that started the California Gold Rush, the desk of Thomas Jefferson where the Declaration of Independence was written, Archie and Edith Bunker’s chairs, C3PO, the Inaugural Ball dresses of the First Ladies, the “towel” of surrender that the Confederates used to end the Civil War, Dorothy’s red-ruby slippers, the sword that was surrendered at the end of the Revolutionary War all had me thinking that some people just had some incredible foresight on which important relics to keep.  The closest thing to the Star Spangled banner, on the emotional scale, was Kermit the Frog.  He made me smile because he was part of my childhood, and then a little wave of sadness because so many will never know the Jim Hensen Kermit.  I spent almost 5 hours in that museum. 

When I left I thought I’d walk up to the Capital.  It was there that they were decorating the National Capital Christmas Tree.  They had cones surrounding the tree and trucks of the workers that were decorating the tree, but the trucks were very close to the edge, and the workers were standing around watching the two youngest guys on the crew put up the lights.  Some ornaments were already on the tree, when I decided to ask if I could help out.  I explained that I am a teacher in Colorado and that my kids would get a kick out of me being able to help.  They said too bad I wasn’t from Wyoming because then it would be okay.  I said did I say Colorado?  I meant Wyoming.  They said, sure! Help yourself, and thanks for the help!

I smiled all the way to the Metro station.  I was going to transfer to the red-line that would have taken me back to Bethesda, but decided to stay on the yellow-line and go to Arlington.  I have always been fascinated by cemeteries, and have been to a lot of them, but nothing prepared me for the scope and feelings of Arlington National Cemetery.  I saw the Kennedy graves, and missed the changing of the guard by 10 minutes, but what struck me was a family of three sons, all were 70-80 years old who were standing on the road looking out amongst the graves when the one with the good eyesight said, “There he is.”  It was their father’s grave and they hadn’t been there together, ever.  He had died in WWII, making him 1/100^th of one of the stars I had seen earlier in the day.  Two of the brothers couldn’t see well enough to read the marker.  They were trying to read it, but all they read was the sign right in front of them which said Pedestrians Keep Off The Grass.  I stopped walking past them, and turned back.  I told them to cross over that chain, and visit their father.  Nobody would question their actions.  The two with the bad eyesight did.  The one that could see stayed with me for a couple of minutes.  He told me that he’d let his brothers go first because they had memories of their father, and he didn’t because he was too young when he died.  All three boys had come from Idaho and wanted to do this for years, but couldn’t.  He said they did it now because another brother had already died before he had a chance to get there.  He then thanked me, shook my hand, and joined his brothers.  As I walked away I looked back and saw the brothers there with their father, their hands on his marker.  I missed the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldiers because I stopped and talked to this family.  I don’t regret missing it at all.  The sun was setting as I left Arlington.

I took the yellow-line, transferred to the red-line, and ended up in Bethesda in time for dinner.

I may have to start a bucket-list....

I have not been to Washington DC before, until last weekend.  I had two days to spend on my own.  The trip was filled with awe and emotions.  I don't have a bucket list, but I could cross off helping decorate the National Capital Christmas Tree proving my mother right when she said, "You won't know until you ask."