Went with her to Washington DC again
DC was nice, as always.
Went there and back via train. Neither my life nor the trains I ride run on (or close to) schedule.
The weather was amazing on Sunday so we took a walk to Lincoln and Vietnam Memorial. Turns out the reflecting pool does actually reflect – it’s a mobile phone shot but y’can still see it.
Nuthin like it on a nice sunny day with the blue sky.
Went to the Vietnam Memorial for the first time. Quite something. Dunno if y’know this but Ross Perot sponsored a design competition for it and when Maya Lin, a 21 year-old Asian nobody – a gook – won it with a black slab, he and a tona others were pissed. Onea them shouldn’t be building a Vietnam Memorial.
The New York Times, headlined, Insulting Vietnam Vets. Where were the statues, the flags? Looked like a tombstone.
Kinda reminds me of all of the political ruckus over everything these days. Everyone’s so sure they’re right; all this sound and fury signifying nuthin.
So a few meters away from the memorial that was actually built, Perot had a statue put up.
A teenage girl was talking on her cell phone when I went to visit and about a third of the way in, think she finally realized what she was reading, hung up her phone, and quietly walked the resta the way.
Ross Perot, Pat Buchanan, all the critics did similar things when the actually saw the thing. Every organization that attacked Maya later apologized.
Cause Maya knew that when you put up names, a lista people kids that got themselves killed for a country that hated them, it’s hard to ignore that they existed.
It’s quite something.
Location: 20:00 yest, stuck outside Penn Station
Mood: grateful
Music: I’m down to a whisper In a daydream on a hill
