What's the First Thing Empty Nesters Do? Visit the Kids!!

Even though we don't have anyone in school in Bloomfield Hills any more, we hadn't really experienced empty nester life because Leah and Danny were home all summer while Steven was in Alaska; then Leah went to D.C., Danny went to University of Michigan, but Steven came home for a short visit between his gigs in Alaska and D.C.  Once he left for D.C., we became empty nesters! The first thing we decided to do was to visit the kids.

So first it was to Ann Arbor, to visit Danny, who is off to a great start in College.  He is involved in several organizations and activities, including being fortunate enough to have been asked to join one of the Acappela groups on campus. Danny is a member of Gimble now, and we are excited to hear them perform.

Good luck Danny; we hope the four years in college are as happy and successful for you as they were for your brother and sister.

Right after Rosh Hashana, we flew to Washington, D.C., to visit Steven, his fiance Tammy, and Leah. Leah is interning for Congressman Gary Peters; Tammy is in the MBA program at George Washington, and Steven will start with his law firm the last day of October; until then he is working with Senator Mark Begich from Alaska on education and health care policies. We stayed with Steven and Tammy in their Foggy Bottom coop; it was beautiful and a great location.

We flew into Baltimore Washington International and then had several hours to kill before we could ride into D.C. (a long story), so we grabbed a train and went to Baltimore's Inner Harbor for a few hours.  The Inner Harbor is a great example of urban planning that went well; an old warehouse area has been converted into shops, restaurants, bars, and a lot of night life.

There was also a very touching Holocaust monument:

The structure behind the statue represents two box cars; there are train tracks with grass growing between the ties and the ability to peer into the structure and see grass on the outside but no hope on the inside. Very moving.

The Inner Harbor also has several different vintage ships on display that can be toured (for the right price) including the last surviving ship from the Pearl Harbor attack and a mid 19th Century Vessel, the U.S.S. Constellation:

We eventually took a cab into D.C. and had a nice dinner Saturday night with Steven, Tammy and Leah.


Leah lives with several other congressional interns and employees in a house on "The Hill", almost directly across a parking lot from the Congressional Office Buildings.  Many areas in D.C. have open air farmer's markets weekly during the good weather; the one in Leah's neighborhood is on Sunday, and is one of the best ones; it is coincidentally named "Eastern Market".  We went there Sunday morning to look around. There was a real festival atmosphere, and fun things to look at:

Mostly though it was fun to hang out with the family on a crisp D.C. Sunday morning.

The weather wasn't particularly great Sunday afternoon, so we spent most of the day in the Newseum, a new museum in D.C. dedicated to news reporting.  It is a top rated attraction and well worth the time spent going through it. It has some very impressive exhibits including:

An area dedicated to 9/11

Wreckage of Communications Satelite on top of one of the Twin Towers 

An area dedicated to the Berlin Wall and the destruction of the Wall:

Actual portion of the Wall that the Newseum acquired from Germany. The Wall was completely located on the East German side; graffiti artists from the West risked their lives to decorate the Western side of the Wall at night. 

 An Area showing the work of Presidential photographers:

Obama's response when this young boy asked if the President's hair felt like the boy's hair 

LBJ at his Texas Ranch

There was also an area showing Pultizer Prize photos; two dealing with Soldiers moved us greatly:

Anthony Suau, Memorial Day 1984 

Sal Vadar, Returning POW 1974

A temporary exhibit had all of the "First Dogs" since Lincoln (it appears that only three presidents didn't have dogs; also no mention of Socks or other cats in the exhibit)

A whole gallery was dedicated to FBI stories, and the exhibit included things like the Unibomber's Cabin, and the electric chair used on the Lindberg baby kidnapper, and so forth; one of our favorites was elegant in its simplicity: 

Finally, the Newseum had a floor dedicated to newspapers going back as far as the 16th Century; this is an example from a South Carolina newspaper in 1861:

The newspapers demonstrated that they can't always get it right; one of the most famous examples was held up by Truman when he won the 1948 election:

Similarly, two consecutive days of headlines from the D.C. papers during the First Battle of Bull Run show the danger of reporting war results before a battle is over:

Early reporting shows Union Victory 

Next Day's headline reports Union Loss 

On Monday we went to the Holocaust Museum which was very, very, moving, but no pictures are allowed, although there are two images that should be shared, and we grabbed them from the internet: 

shoes taken from victims 

photos of people from one shtetl destroyed by Nazis 

After we toured the Holocaust Museum, Steven joined us (Leah had to work) and we went to the new Martin Luther King Memorial; it is controversial for a number of reasons but will be well visited and seems generally well received by the people visiting: 

Entrance- King said "With this faith we will be able to hew out of the  mountain of despair a stone of hope". The entrance is the mountain of despair; the stone of hope is within the memorial, shown below. 

Since Monday was Steven's birthday, we went out to a nice dinner with Leah, Steven, Danny, and nephew/cousin Michael, who is also an attorney in D.C. 

Our last day in D.C. was the best, because we had a personal, VIP tour of the Capitol given by our Congressman's eloquent, intelligent, articulate, and knowledgeable intern.  If she were our daughter our buttons would be bursting....oh, wait... she does look familiar..........

Leah explaining that the Helen Keller Statue is the only one that tourists can touch 

Leah discussing the Lady Liberty Statue

Sterotypical Rotunda shot, but still cool 

Posing before one of two Michigan's statues, the newest one, of Gerald Ford 

Leah showing Michigan's other Statue of Lewis Cass 

Leah also took us into the Gallery, both the House and the Senate side; and we also got to meet and greet  Congressman Peters.  Thanks, Leah, for taking us on this terrific tour (and also getting us into the White House and Library of Congress tours).

Steven and Tammy were terrific hosts; Leah was a great tour guide; and we had a great time in D.C. visiting the kids.  Now we are home, and by the time this is posted, we'll be on our next adventure to Tucson, the Grand Canyon, and, (drum roll please) the Concrete Wigwam!!!!