When I moved to DC back in the late 90s, I wanted to live in Dupont Circle. Nothing really shocking about that. You ask any young white person back then where was somewhere cool to live, and you can be sure that would be the first place off their lips. Possibly the only place, depending on how much they knew the city. Even Adams Morgan was still a bit questionable back then. (I remember them moving the Adams Morgan Day festival to the Mall one year to avoid gangs in the actual neighborhood).
And for the whole time I was trying to get settled in the city, Dupont Circle did glow as this ideal place to go. It’s always filled with people. It’s as safe as a big city gets. It had nothing to do with the tourist-DC. It has food, and entertainment, and people yelling strange things on the street.
I didn’t actually end up there, but wasn’t too far away. But everything that glows, fades. The circle itself isn’t much different, but the way I looked at it did. I’m not going to bore you to death by examining why my perceptions changed, but they did. The circle was still a decent place to be, but it didn’t feel magical anymore.
In the last year or two, I’ve spent a lot of times at various places around the circle. I’m not drunk enough to claim that it’s in any way magical again. But I think it’s one of the closest things DC has now to the big city image you see in melodramatic movies. In particular, I love sitting in the coffee shop, facing out the giant, old windows. They’re the biggest, highest-def, brightest movie screen you’ve ever seen. Sit there long enough and everything will walk, roll, or shamble past, eventually.
You have no idea how hard it is to not pull out my camera and spend all day taking pictures of the people passing by.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
I fell in love, last week.
I was sitting in Starbucks over in Dupont on Tuesday afternoon, waiting for a client. I sat at the only space available, at a table across from a girl writing a paper on her laptop. She was cute in a geeky kind of way, with the glasses and the hair pulled back and all. She had this really great grin, when I first sat down. A half-grin that is just waiting to say something.
But she never stopped grinning. I must have sat there at least an hour and a half. It wasn’t a grin. That was just her look. I dunno if I could handle a woman who’s everyday look was enough to make me weak.
Thankfully I’m a huge wuss, and never really said anything to her.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
The birthday picnic was wonderful. They weather was perfect all day, the location was a great retreat from the city, and everything went off without a hitch. It was a fairly small group, but I think everyone had fun.
Got a call this afternoon from Drew, saying he had overslept and was going to be a little late to the picnic. Indeed.
After the rapping park police kicked us out of the Arboretum, a couple of us headed over to Dupont Circle to watch the Pride Parade.
I always enjoy the parade. It’s one of the only major events in the city based on something positive and cheerful, rather than disagreement and dispute. And the event gets bigger every year. It’s overwhelming, with so many people, and streamers, and colors, and outfits…
After watching the men with the leafblowers follow up the parade, and sitting through a free fight and show at the fountain in the circle, Kier went off to shake his groove thing, and Stephanie and I went to Fuddruckers for the next 6 hours.
Can I just say… drunk people are fun! But… I don’t know which club we were hearing from, but OH MAH GAWD, did the music suck. I mean… it was all fun music from when I was growing up. But I so don’t go to a club to hear 1980s and 90s top 40.
Stephanie was quite disappointed that I wouldn’t approach this amazon of a woman who came into Fuddruckers. But when we, and everyone else in the place, realized that she and her friend were in fact WNBA players, they never really got any privacy anyway. And by that time, I couldn’t have seriously approached her and pretended I didn’t know who she was, regardless of whether I initially cared. *shrug*
Very long day. Lots of fun. Lots of friends.
(Note: After checking out the Mystics’ website, it looks like the WNBA players were maybe Stacey Lovelace-Tolbert and Coco Miller.)
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
