Mall Rats - The Longest Day of Vacation (Part 1)

For the benefit of the readers this next essay will be broken into chapters. What follows is part 1 of an interminable series of events culminating in 4th of July fireworks on the National Mall.

"My legs hurt. I can't go on," exclaimed the pathetic little voice clung to my back slowing our progress. Evan had collapsed on a bench incapable of, or at least unwilling to move.

Ironically we hoofed it more in our five days in the nation's capitol than we did in our two weeks in Colorado and Utah. Perhaps the density of hiking and severity of foot boo-boos just made it seem as if that was the case. Evan's sandals had rubbed an eraser size red spot on the back of his foot. However, the howling for a band-aid would have led any casual observer to believe that we were the meanest parents on the face of the planet. They would have been certain of it after Evan's proclamation at  Lincoln Memorial. A passing priest immediately began performing an exorcism. Clara Barton rose from the dead to attend to the battle wound. A passing lawyer offered his card and told Evan he could sue for emotional distress. Former President Clinton jogged by and said, "I feel your pain." Even Colette and I began to empathize it had been a long day and we still had about nine hours until the fireworks.

Evan's Boo-Boo under only moderate magnification.

We had again bought a day pass for the Metro with the intention of hopping on the train periodically throughout the day. Unfortunately, this is not practical. By the time you walk to the train station you might as well have walked to your destination. We did make one transfer to the blue-line and arrived at Arlington station, our first stop of the day. Upon reaching the surface we asked a local family which way to go to get to the cemetery. Our main goal was to visit Arlington House, Robert E. Lee's residence before he became a traitor and current NPS site. We were pointed in the right direction but before we headed off she suggested that we take the walk across the Potomac to the Lincoln Memorial.

"It's just  lovely. It's a little hike but worth it, " she coerced.

Of course when on vacation you should always take the suggestions of locals. And if George Washington could through a silver dollar across the thing, then we could walk it.

Washington had one hell of an arm.

We walked to the cemetery visitor center and realized that Arlington House was at the top of a hill overlooking the cemetery. The entire property at one time belong to Lee. Built by his father-in-law George Washington Parke Custis, Lee and his wife Mary Custis lived there until Virginia's secession. Lee was often gone due to military obligations in the Mexican war, however he was in residence to deal with the estate after the death of his father-in-law, and thus was available to deal with the disturbance at Harper's Ferry and capture John Brown.

This of course was while he was a Colonel in the federal army. After succession and Lee's resignation the property was seized by federal troops under Brig. Gen. Irvin McDowell and several military  fortifications were built.


Later in order to prevent the Lee family from ever taking possession of the home againBrig. Gen. Montgomery C. Meigs appropriated the grounds for a cemetery. 

"If we can't kill his confederate ass at least we can haunt the heck out of it." ~Brig. Gen. Montgomery C. Meigs

We began the march up hill and it was evident that it would be a long day when Evan asked if there was going to be a shuttle. There was not. The path to the top is a who's who of dead people. We stopped at the eternal flame commemorating John F. Kennedy where it became evident that Evan was not in the mood to be respectful.

We continued on to Arlington house only to find that it is currently under renovation. You can still tour it and look at placards of what the rooms should look like, but the actual rooms had been stripped of any wallpaper, paint and furniture. Finishing the junior ranger book was a struggle. Evan couldn't sit still and the bugs were beginning to dine on our sweat salted shins. He did finally get his badge.

Pictured: The calm before the storm.

A glance at the map revealed that the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier sat just a short distance away. On the map it appeared to be less than an inch. The sight of the guard ameliorated Evan's disposition and the stairs offered a brief respite from our stroll as we watch the sentry.

The return trip though equidistant was significantly more pleasant owing to the fact that we were now going down hill, and soon we were at the bridge across the Potomac. Perhaps it was the humidity or maybe the warm front of over-stimulation colliding with a cold front of exhaustion that had moved in this morning formed the squall of foul temper in Evan. Whatever the meteorological explanation may be the thunderclap of attitude would flare up as we crossed the river.

Crazy Dinosaur Bones

Okay this isn't really a National Park, but it is on the National Mall so we are going to count it.

Crammed butt to belly with other patrons, I gazed upon the fossils of creatures extinct for nearly 250 million years at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. That was until I was reminded by a bit of overheard conversation that these were just plain old lizards that had lived long enough to get really, really big.

"What I want to know is were these things in the Garden of Eden," said Random Citizen #1.

This, of course pinged my sonar, blipped my radar, and snapped, crackled, and popped my Geiger counter. Red alert, all hands to battle stations we are on a collision course with crazy.

"What you have to remember is that reptiles never stop growing. These are just lizards that lived for a very long time and never stopped. That is why alligators get so big." Random Citizen #2 explained.

"Oh," replied #1.

"Adam I told you not to flush that thing down the toilet."

"Woman stop naggin' me and bring me some that knowledge fruit."

This must be true. Several people on yahoo answers said so. It actually involves some tricky Old Math. (As opposed to the New Math that Jesus taught to the money lenders in the temple.) If you take the same numbers that allow Noah to live to be, I don't know, like a 1000 years old, then you can easily see how Adam's pet iguana would eventually become an iguanadon. 

I began to wonder though, how does that explain the Giant Ground Sloth in the next room.

Off Screen Discussion: "You see it was right after 'Let There Be Light' or maybe later, I don't know, but God said unto the creatures great 'Let's Get Small.'"

God



Goin' On A Bear Hunt or What Am I, Stupid?

The look in her eye telegraphed a very clear message. There was no dots or dashes, interference or downed lines. It screamed, "What is that idiot doing?"

I know because I often shoot that same look at driver's that cut me off (Or the lady at Whitehaven that scraped the side of my car and then denied it happened. Luckily National Park Rangers came to our rescue again and convinced her that this is indeed what had happened.), the man at Quik Trip writing a check to buy a pack of cigarettes and a Pick 3, the guy running across the highway holding up his pants, and anyone that voluntarily jumps from high places.

Most recently that same look came to my face when she had come to a stop in the middle of  Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park. As power vacationers (20 National Parks, 4 major museums, fireworks on the National Mall, a Washington Nationals baseball game, and pool time at the hotel) once the wheels start rolling we do not have time for construction, RVs going up hill or random stops on scenic drives with no pull-out.

We might occasionally stop for this.

We had just finished a ranger program about bears and filling out the Jr. Ranger booklet. Rain had been falling periodically throughout the morning, and fog moved in, not on little cat feet, but more like a sentient energy alien on Star Trek. (Suck it Carl Sandburg.) By the time this random traffic stop occurred the rain had ended and the clouds were nestled in the bosom of the Blue Ridge Mountains creating alternating bands of dark forest (I considered using the word corbeau, a Frenchy word meaning blackish-green.) layered with streaks of clouds creating the soft blue that is the range's namesake. A beautiful day, but one that still held the promise of a thirteen hour drive back home to St. Louis, so I was just a tad irritated that we had stopped, not at a scenic overlook, but a portion of the road that was forested on both sides. That was until . . .

"Bear"

"Where?"

"There"

A black bear stood watch at the side of the road. We were actually the third in a row of cars so it was probably 15-20 feet ahead of us. She eyed us for about 15 seconds and turned to go. That is when I saw movement up in the tree. My caveman see-what-I-can-hunt vision is always keenest in the car.

"There's babies in the tree," I squealed.

The second car in the parade pulled out and continued on its way so we inched closer. Colette spent several clicks of the shutter coming to the realization that the fraction of black  bear cub butt visible in the foliage to the naked eye was not so evident to the telephoto lens.

I'll give you a minute.

"Here, you try," she said thrusting the camera into my hand. Colette often does this assuming I am a Dumbledore level wizard

I was seated on the opposite side of the car so I determined that the best plan would be to exit the vehicle. In retrospect I am amazed that Colette, my usual source of reason and sanity, chose this moment to dry up and say nothing as I stepped onto the blacktop. Slowly opening the door and leaving it open so as to not startle the cubs, I crept around the front of our Ford Flex and trained the camera on the tree sheltering the diminutive ursine.

I had time to adjust the lens and snap one picture (see above) of what turned out to be a bunch of leaves when I heard the snap of a branch. Years of movie watching had trained me to know that snapping branches are always harbingers of doom.

I glanced at the car in front of me and saw a woman's face framed in the side view mirror saying, "What is that idiot doing?"

The physics of light rays dictated that my eyes were visible to her and my Pokeman eyes of surprise could not have possible be bigger than they appeared.

Now the door that I had left open to avoid loud noises looked like a brilliant moment of foresight as I leaped back into the driver's seat. As I closed the door Mama Bear, minus the cute apron of fairy tales, bounded out of the tree line. She proceeded to cross the street looking back and imploring her cubs to follow.

 Just so we are clear, we have 30X optical on our camera.

I was so busy focusing the camera that I was only vaguely aware of the echoing noise emanating from the woods.

"What's that noise?" Colette asked.

"I don't know. I got to get this picture."

It was so unbearlike that my mind actually convinced me that it was a couple of hikers shouting at each other across a valley. Stirred from my photographic reverie I realized that I had heard the cry several times before as we had traipsed about the National Mall. If I had the Universal Translator App, I would have recognized Mama Bear's call and the cub's reply.

"Come on Dude. Catch up."

"I caaaaaan't"

Mama Bear was just worried about a little stranger danger and wanted to make sure that the cub looked both ways before he crossed the street.

Disneyburg

We had come to expect a certain subtlety from ranger stations and visitor centers. I like to think it is because of the well thought out plan to blend into the environment. They are always a welcome sight. Whether they use existing buildings like in Harper's Ferry or Cuyahoga, a low dark wooden structure blending into the forest as in Shenandoah, the barn like structure on the battlefield of Monocacy or the doorway into the hillside beneath the Frederick Douglas home, the rangers within have always been helpful.

The exception was Gettysburg. The monolith that rose before us seemed as out of place as those discovered by early man in 2002: A Space Odyssey and had nearly the same effect on our mood. The sign declaring a ban on backpacks was situated like a Wal-mart greeter at the start of the concrete path from the parking lot to the Cracker Barrel building perched at the end of a slight rise. So while I took our belongings to the car Colette and Evan went on in.

"I really wish I had a white slat-seat rocking chair instead of this concrete bench"

Colette confronted me when I walked in after placing our bags in the car and tells me to deal with the tickets. It is then that I realize that the massive room is dominated by a ticket counter protected by a labyrinth of retractable nylon straps extending so far from the cashiers that I was sure that my 20/20 vision had failed me.

You should know that Colette and I often play the "Craigslist Game" in which she flashes a picture of some piece-of-crap Spanish influenced sofa or an onyx figurine and I have to guess the price. I know she wouldn't show it to me unless the price was extravagant, but I invariably guess over a hundred dollars below the asking price. From the tone of her voice I could tell that I was going to lose the game again. When I saw the prices for the museum, movie, bus tour and something called a Cyclorama, I just assumed I saw it wrong, but no, in order to enjoy any one of the activities offered I would have to pitchfork over $100.00.

House payment, $700 early 90's entertainment center, hmm I just don't know."

The only thing comparable is the ride to the top of the Arch, which our family has never done. The NPS often partners with other agencies. In the case of the ride in the Arch it is Metro, the public transportation system in St. Louis. And in the case of Gettysburg it is the Gettysburg Foundation whose objective it is:

• To preserve, honor and protect the natural and cultural resources associated with the Gettysburg National Military Park, the Gettysburg Campaign, and the Eisenhower National Historic Site.
• To excite visitors about the past, inspire them to want to learn more about the events that have shaped America and prepare them to become better citizens.
• To make sure that lower middle class families can't learn anything. (This last one is kind of implied.)
• To provide the world with a Cyclorama (Big Picture - Wikipedia) of Pickett's Charge.

We did manage to finally find the park rangers tucked away in the corner. We signed Evan up to be enlisted in the UNION army primarily because it was a requirement for the junior ranger badge.

This is not the first time Evan has enlisted in the UNION army. He marched and drilled at Whitehaven for Junior Ranger Day, came under fire at a Civil War reenactment in Mississippi, and shot a musket at the Battle of Booneville. He has visited battlefields at Shiloh, Vicksburg, Wilson's Creek, Pea Ridge, Antietam, Manassas, and Monocacy. If it wasn't for his tendency to confuse The Clone Wars with The Civil War, I would say he was, for an eight-year-old, and expert. (General Grant's brilliant victory at Geonosis is legendary.)

At least we had found the rangers, a respite from the tour-bus friendly commercial cavalcade of cyclorama. At every other battlefield or national park there has always been a free film or a fiber optic map detailing troop movements. Now all we had was a ranger program and the $30.00 driving tour CDROM we purchased at the gift store. Before I go on I should mention that if you ever encounter the TravelBrains CDROMs at any of our national battlefields, you should buy it.

So the enlistment starts with the basic physical requirements. If there is a Civil War school, then there must be an entire class devoted to the delivery of the two-teeth joke. Basically the only requirement for a Civil War soldier is that they have two teeth, one top and one bottom. Though it is never mentioned, these two also need to be within close proximity. Without this rather mundane physical attribute soldiers would not be able to tear open the paper cartridge and load their muskets.

Next came a question and answer session. Evan excitedly announces his favorite fact about bayonets, that they are frequently planted in the ground and used as candle holders. The topic soon turned to food. Since Colette and I are both teachers it was intuitively obvious that the ranger was trying to steer the musket volley of responses so that she could talk about hard tack. (Apparently it is hard.)

Unfortunately, before she could order a cease fire, Evan said, "Goober peas!"

The ranger looked confused, stunned, and to be honest a little shell-shocked.

The pause in the presentation was long than Sarah Palin trying to answer a policy question. I wasn't sure what was going on. Burl Ives had consistently informed us that the Georgia Militia enjoyed, "peas, peas, peas, peas, eating goober peas."

Along with "The Battle of New Orleans," "Goober Peas" is Evan's favorite song on our ipod. I doubt, however, that the ranger had the same play list so she asked Evan to repeat his answer. Still stunned, she then said, "no," and rephrased the question.

"Did the soldiers eat pizza and nachos and stuff?"

It is at this point that Colette and I diverge in our analysis of the situation. Colette insists that the young lady mistakenly thought that Evan had said pizza.

I had a hard time ascribing that level of ignorance to a human being and assumed that the near homophones of "peas" and "pizza" were a coincidence. However, as of this writing I am beginning to doubt myself.

The presentation continued running the new recruits through drills until a cry of charge. Quite to the ranger's surprise, many of the soldiers, including Evan, charged into the head high weeds. Upon returning to the ranks, Evan followed the ranger around assisting that the weeds would have been good cover.

"Come on boys I smell a double pepperoni."

Colette and i had quietly decided that we would talk to the ranger to let her know about goober peas. Historical accuracy is extremely important in our family. I was still making excuses for her. Maybe since we enlisted in the Union (our army of choice) and boiled peanuts were more a staple of the rebels, she was trying to be hyper-accurate as well. Unfortunately, this was not the case. We explained it to her as Evan sang the tune in the background.

She responded nicely enough, "I'm always glad to learn something new."

Colette has since decided that she will only listen to over-weight, gray-bearded guys when it comes to the Civil War. I understand because these are the same guys I look for in the hardware store. Rangers and hardware-store-guys should be teaching me something new and not the other way around.

At least we had the well-reviewed TravelBrains CD. It did an excellent job of creating the action, a cyclorama if you will, at the various locations along the driving tour. Though I should mention that they gave General Grant a fictitious middle name to go with the "S". This phantom initial came about because of a clerical error and stuck with Grant standing for everything from Uncle Sam to Unconditional Surrender.

In another dubious comment Abner Doubleday is referred to as the "legendary creator of baseball." The may or may not be yet another error. It depends on the conotation of legendary. If by legendary the narrator means a fictitious story unsubstantiated by historical data, then he was correct. If, however, legendary means famous, then this would be another error. I'm always willing to give them the benfit of the doubt.

Great Sand Dunes

If there is one thing that I have learned in our visits to our nation’s parks is that I am not nearly insane enough to be pioneer. It first occurred to me when we were in the Badlands as a passing thought, “Can you imagine stumbling upon this for the first time?”

It became more coherent in the Tall Grass Prairie Preserve. “Seriously, half a day’s wagon travel from Kansas City and you hit this?” Imagine the ocean. Now imagine that it is made out of tall grass. Now start walking.

That night at the campfire would have been like, “Um, I think I forgot my wallet. I’m like one punch away from a free wheel rotation at Willy’s Wagon Shop. I’ll probably head back, but don’t worry I’ll catch up.”

Finally this summer these nagging thoughts and humorous asides coalesced into a fully formed thesis.

The pioneers of westward expansion were flippin’ insane.

We were in the Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve, which with some skillful camera work could easily have been used for the location shots in Lawrence of Arabia. We were surrounded by mountains, and though it was shorts weather, the temperature was moderate. Yet before us stood monolithic mounds of sand. We were at the base of God’s hour glass. If Paul Bunyan had a big blue cat instead of Babe, then this would be its litter box. No cactus or tumbleweeds, no rattlesnake whipping a wave across the desolation, no variation in color, just the monotony of the ocean, writ not in water or grass, but the muted yellow of sand. Yet at the highest point I could see of people marching like ants on a pheromone trail creating a dotted line between unending sky and interminable sea of sand.

Those tiny specks of humanity represented a challenge; if they could make it, then so could I. There would be no turning back. No defeat, no surrender. I can conquer the sand and I will drag my wife and seven-year-old son with me. So I packed our earthly belongings, or in this case water bottles, a couple of apples, and some sunscreen, into my backpack and struck out to seek our fortune.

The initial part of the sojourn was over level, relatively compacted terrain, but the distance alone inspired the first bubbling of complaint from Evan. It would be a theme for much of the vacation. There must be a part of child brain that demands parameters on any trip. It is what leads to the ubiquitous whine, “Are we there yet?” Without a concrete end in sight the only alternative is infinity, and to be honest looking at the unbroken horizon of sand I can begin to understand.

With a little pleading, manipulation and lies Colette and I were able to get Evan to reach the peak of the first dune. Walking in sand is the classic two steps forward one step back scenario. I had to consciously lift my foot out of the sand and plant it perpendicular to the direction of the miniature sand slides each movement would make. Sand crept into my boots and added weight so that I was soon lifting an additional five pounds per foot.

We had scaled several dunes and though our destination looked no closer the path back to the car had expanded as if the camera of my eye had suddenly zoomed up and out to reveal that we had become the ants. The appropriate Ennio Morricone score blending a scream of terror and the distant call of a vulture played in the background. It was becoming clear that we were not going to make it. In fact as some of the ants had crossed our path on their return I had noticed that they were all part of a high school cross country team. I group of humans bred to endure the lack of oxygen and water as well has the monotony of running in perpetuity. We were going to turn back.

Sitting at the top of the dune, sand creeping into every crevice, I inspected the sandbags laced to my feet. Grains had worked their way between the rubber sole and leather body of my shoe. The front end was flapping up and down like a bizarrely deformed duck. This would make a good excuse. I couldn’t make it. My shoe fell apart.

With clearly defined parameters the whining had settled down. Evan had surpassed me in exuberance, and I had to frequently tell him to stay close to us. The sole of my left boot began to flap as well. My longer strides had allowed me to pass Evan on the upward slope of the last dune. Following close behind, he called out to me. I told him I would stop at the top. As I removed my backpack and plopped on the sand Evan handed me a foot-shaped piece of blue rubber. For the last ten minutes I had been hiking in what amounted to a moccasin.

I placed the mocking shoe rubber into a zipper pocket of my backpack and continued with my soleless right boot. The grasping hands of sand kept pulling at the sole of my left boot necessitating that I lift my leg higher than normal in order to extricate it. We eventually made it to the car, and I disposed of my hiking boots. Luckily, I had a pair of Keens that would protect my feet for the next twelve days of vacation. Our hikes were all of the out and back variety always ending with a collapse into air conditioned car and familiar sounds of an iPod playlist. I get the solitary explorers, the mountain men, the trappers. They were solitary. Loners with nothing better to do and nothing to tie them down. But the pioneers that packed up their families, their homes, their lives and just started walking? They were flippin’ insane.

Capitol Reef

My only experience with ravens had been literary in nature; seeing them in nature itself was quite extraordinary. The crow was, of course, familiar as a regular consumer of road kill along Missouri highways, but it paled in comparison of size and ingenuity to its cousin. The eponymous Raven that taunted Edgar Allan Poe and his melancholic loss of Lenore, the creator of the Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, Bella Bella, and Kwakiutl plucked my eyes with its ebony beak and would not let them go as it perched with three others on the twisted tree and picnic table of the campground.

Capitol Reef is one of nearly a thousand national parks in Utah, and we were preparing to have a lunch of Spaghettios after a morning of hiking and picking apricots from the groves that remained from historic Mormon orchards. My table of choice had earned that distinction due to its proximity to the car. Hauling the food, stove, drinks, utensils, and propane canisters was not strenuous, but I saw no reason to walk farther than necessary. Colette, however, had other priorities. She decided that our lunch would be better enjoyed in the shade. I am not at this point, or any other, going to say that what was to transpire was her fault, but this particular decision does seem to have a direct causal relationship.

I also can’t blame the birds. They were merely following the food as the adjective form of their species name demands. You can’t blame a wolf for wolfing down his food, a wasp for being waspish, or a raven for its ravenous behavior. So it must have been fate that brought forth the foul (fowl?) fecal rain.

As the reddish-orange sauce sizzled at the edges of the aluminum pan, the avian sentries squawked and cawed in the branches above. I passed the first serving of Chef Boyardee’s cuisine to Evan, and quickly turned to the rest of the family sized can that was rapidly burning around the edges. What happened next is a little unclear, but suffice it to say that there was now an additional ingredient that Chef B had never intended to include. A soupcon of green and white raven poo was swirly through Evan’s dish like oil in a rain puddle, beautiful to look at, but horrifying in it implications.

Ravens, as is their nature, are not precise animals, and the seasoning was not entirely accurate in its application. In addition to being in Evan’s food it was also liberally ladled on to his hair and shoulders. During the cleaning process splatter was discovered on the oven mitt, grocery bag, and the box for our new propane stove.

Thanks to the raven and its trickery, for nearly half an hour, instead enjoying a meal amongst the glorious iron tinged rock formations and the bountiful groves of Capitol Reef, I was suppressing my gag reflex while expunging poo from Evan’s hair. The raven, along with eastern gray squirrel (It’s a long story), is the focus of a blood feud, and as such is subject to equal justice. The problem is that I don’t have the time or resources to find a tree overhanging a raven eating its lunch.