My first trip to Washington, D.C. was in the spring of 1982. I was 17, a junior in high school, and traveling with classmates as part of the Close Up Foundation program. To my teenage history loving brain, visiting our nation’s capital was a bucket list experience.
The trip was my first commercial flight from the Texas Gulf Coast community where I grew up. Given my father’s illness, our family had not traveled much out of state, and then only by car. I had been on a plane once, a tiny two-seater that a friend of my grandfather flew me around in several years before.
The presidents and U.S. history had been a subject of fascination since I was in third grade, so seeing D.C. close up (literally and figuratively) was exciting. I distinctly remember visiting the Monet exhibit at the National Gallery of Art — my dad, a visual artist and history teacher, was jealous — and my first walk down into the Vietnam Memorial while listening to Billy Joel’s new song “Goodnight Saigon” on my yellow Sony Walkman.
Close Up, which was founded in 1971, is designed to give students a deeper understanding of history, the federal government, and the role of citizens in a democracy. What it gave me, in a series of day and night tours, was a deeper appreciation of the city itself. It also opened my eyes, at least a little, to the complicated history of our democracy.
Ironically, I did not return to D.C. until I was in my mid-30s, when I flew into National Airport to interview for a job. Twenty-five years ago last month, I started that job, which moved our family from North Carolina to the Northern Virginia suburbs. For 17 years, we lived in Lorton, almost 20 miles from downtown D.C.; in 2018, after our kids were grown and had left, we downsized and moved closer in, to Old Town Alexandria.
Neither Jill nor I work in Washington, D.C., although we often go in for meetings and events. Over the years, I have taken thousands of photos in the city, feeling so fortunate to have access to a place I worshipped from afar as a child.
D.C. is a more complicated place these days, as the pillars of our democracy are targeted by the anger and tantrum-prone whims of a person who was divisive and destructive in his first term and has only gotten worse in his second. Congress and the Supreme Court, the other parts of the Executive Branch that are supposed to serve as a form of checks and balances, have done us no favors.
Saturday’s “Another 52 Weeks” post, which in a departure featured photos taken last week solely in Old Town, discussed the creative burnout I had felt after shooting so much in Alexandria during the first year of the pandemic. I realized while writing the post that the same could be said about D.C., where I covered and participated with my family in a series of protests in 2020.
Over the years, I’ve worked hard to develop what could be described as a healthy self-preservation instinct. I still follow the news regularly, but I work hard to get it from legitimate sources instead of social media, which I’ve tried to wean myself from as much as possible. I also found myself stepping back from the protests, disappointed by the failure of our nation’s leaders and skeptical that they will ever respond to their constituents’ concerns in a positive, bipartisan manner.
Mental health — individual as it is for each of us — matters, folks. And for me, that meant stepping back from taking photos in D.C. as well. I didn’t want every visit to the city to represent politics, protest, and spin.
But, as I discovered in Alexandria last week, I’m also willing to look at old places with new eyes.
Nicholas, my oldest son, ran the Cherry Blossom 10 miler on Sunday morning and I went along so we could get some one-on-one time. I also brought my camera, knowing how peaceful and quiet D.C. can be in the early weekend hours despite the presence of 20,000 runners and their closest friends.
We parted at sunrise and I took the opposite path from the race, walking the National Mall between the Washington Monument and the Capitol. I tried not to focus on the iconic images everyone sees, but the random things that caught and interested my eye.
It was a relaxing and peaceful morning, and a reminder of how beautiful this representation of our fragile democracy remains despite the perpetual black cloud that seems to be hanging overhead. I hope you enjoy some of what I managed to get in the two hours I was there. I’m pretty sure I’ll go back some time.
Gorgeous. It is a beautiful city, and you capture images hiding in plain sight. Dazzling!
Beautiful photos! And a wonderful story. I just flat out avoid the news. I hear it, of course. My mental health just can’t take it.