Back to DC

   

   DC, as always, evokes.  I fly into Dulles, thinking I haven't been here in many years.  But then the people mover reminds me I was here just last summer, connecting on my way to meet the family in Japan.  Just outside the arrival gate is Chipotle, where I had some sort of southwestern salad that time.  Not a great meal, not by a long shot, but memorable for the happy feeling I had that evening about being on the way to an adventure, and on the way to see my girls.  

   I get to the Fairmont at 24th and M, check in, and wheel right back out for a nighttime stroll up M street, across the bridge into Georgetown, past the familiar gas station on the corner and the old Vietnam Georgetown across the street.  Another place not memorable for the food, but for the warm memories I associate with it.  I came here in the two college summers I lived in DC; then again years later on a business trip with Ralph Gants; then again a few years ago on our family trip to DC, after our long, hot ride up and down the canal in a barge that was pulled by a mule.  Along with our spring rolls and noodles, we drank ice water as fast as the waiter could bring it.

       Tonight it's just a bit too late to stop for a meal and a Vietnamese beer.  But next time.  I'll be back.