Mall Rats - The Longest Day of Vacation (Part 3: We Go To War)

"Excuse Me, where did you get the shirts?"

"They were giving them out just over there."

He pointed in the general direction of the Washington Monument. I was on a mission. These were better than my collection of radio station, movie promo, volunteer worker shirts that I had collected over the years. These were souvenirs. I could avoid paying $30.00 for one shirt and get three free ones instead. I was going to get these shirts.

However, there was business to take care of on this end of the mall. I glanced longingly into the reflecting pool, or I wish I could. It was currently under repair and was just a mud pit behind chain link fence. The shirts would have to wait.

Colette was already on the phone with her parents. We were going to the Vietnam War Memorial, and she had called to see if her dad had any names that he wanted her to look up. As is the case with almost all conversations with her parents over the phone, or in person, this one was leading to more confusion than when Celine Dion opened for ICP.

The collaboration soon ended when Joseph Bruce felt Celine dissed him in her song It's For You when she said, "Quelques fois je dis des mots bizarres."

Her dad was working on the lawn so her mom had answered the phone. Somehow the message shouted over the roar of the hedge trimmers became somewhat confused as it was relayed to Colette. A call would be forthcoming that would clarify the situation. 

We decide to eat lunch and during the sandwich and chips meal we ordered at a snack shop the phone rang. Colette's mom thinks she finally got the name right so Colette takes the last few bites of her sandwich and heads back to the memorial to find the name in the directory. Meanwhile I watched Evan chase pigeons and trying to feed them his lunch. As soon as I said that we were going to find mom, his legs began to hurt again. If only the pigeons would follow my lead. 

We eventually found the name on the wall which turned out to be an old neighbor of Colette's mom, and not a war buddy as we had thought.

Nothing funny to say here.

While all of this was going on I was also on the prowl for a park ranger. I found one at an information kiosk. Though he had no information on the free t-shirts I did learn that the Junior Ranger program was happening at the Jefferson Memorial so we wanted to make sure that Evan got there. Colette kept insisting that she wanted to go to the Holocaust museum, and all I could think about was that there were now less free shirts than there were half an hour ago. 

I plotted a path on the map of the mall that would get us to all three locations, but as far as I was concerned the free t-shirt was the primary objective. Who cares about the experience if you don't have a t-shirt to commemorate it? 

This path first took us by the Korean War Memorial depicting a number of soldiers marching with heavy loads. Evan of course was fascinated with the soldiers, but the irony of their marching juxtaposed with his aching legs was lost on him. 

Honeycutt and Hawkeye never had to walk this far.

Next on the trek, once we passed the interminable fence blocking our view of the reflecting pit, was the WWII Memorial. 


The buzz of insects swarming my face formed a cacophonous melody with the plaintive whine of Evan's discomfort like a preschool marching kazoo band being followed by fire engine sirens in a parade honoring aural assault.

Not pictured, the fire engines.

For the next leg of our journey Colette set a pace faster than any Kenyan in a marathon and was quite a distance ahead of us. So much so that it would make more sense for me to call to her on a cell phone rather than disturb the other tourist with my hollerin'. I followed, frequently looking back to insure that Evan hadn't collapsed on a bench next to Bummy McNopants. I had given him a map of the mall to distract him from the torture of his calf muscles, but now he was trying to find himself on the map using a public restroom as his reference point.

We finally made it to the WWII Memorial which consists of a column for every state surrounding a shallow pool. Many people were soaking their feet, and Evan asked to do the same. Though the only thing either of us said out low was, "Well, uhhhhh," both Colette and I were debating whether is was disrespectful to soak your feet in a memorial honoring fallen soldiers. Is it acceptable or would it be like roasting marshmallows over the eternal flame at Kennedy's grave?

"Mmmmmmmmm S'mores"

They had died preserving our freedom, but Evan was working our nerves. Eventually, we decided that the soldiers would understand.

Just like a day at the beach.

I was soon ready to go. We were close to the Washington Monument, and I had still not see the free t-shirts. We could contemplate freedom later, now we needed to concentrate on free-shirts.