US Botanic Gardens and Back Home

Last week we took a ride to our old neighborhood on Capitol Hill. We parked the car in front of our son’s old residence -  just a few steps from our old condo, and followed our old footsteps for a morning walk. We lived in this neighborhood for thirteen years. I worked at the library of Congress for ten, and we moved to northern Virginia over a year ago. We have driven in to town several times since March, but never got out of the car. The city was still very quiet - we felt like the only two people walking about except for work people fixing street things, renovating the house office buildings, and the air and space museum. So we walked to the Capitol, the reflecting pond, down the mall to the Smithsonian castle and back. One of our favorite places is the US Botanic Gardens. Because it was the end of the summer season, everything was so overgrown. We know every square inch of that place having passed through it so many times. It’s so pleasant! When we returned to our car we always get nostalgic about our old neighborhood. If it wasn’t for all the 1890’s ongoing and forever building problems we might have stayed. But it was becoming too inconvenient with street parking and everything else. We used to drive in to town for library programs as entertainment. That doesn’t happen anymore. So every once in a while we drive in - just for the heck of it. On the way home we stopped at McDonald’s for take out breakfast - something we haven’t done in six months. It was a delightful ending for the perfect adventure. It doesn’t take much these days.