Two weeks...

Wow-We've been here for two weeks and the city still takes my breath away.

It's beautiful! We're here... we're where it all really happens. We're in the hub. As our professor Susan mentioned the other day, it wasn't always a hub, but now and it's truly inspiring to be here.

Although, it feels like time is slipping through our fingers.

We're all so busy with work and projects, it feels like there's no time to go see monuments and museums. I have a list of things I want to see before I leave: the Constitution, the Lincoln and Jefferson memorials, the Ghost Clock (for my sister's sake), and I'm really excited for the Smithsonian Folklife Festival next weekend on the Mall.

Then there's also the incidental stuff: the events and dinners that just tend to happen when a bunch of 20-somethings spend any time together.

But the city...

As I go to bed some nights, I think about the fact that the leader of the free world (love him or hate him- you have to acknowledge and respect the power) is sleeping- or not sleeping- just a few blocks away. Every day, as we walk by those big, nondescript office buildings, decisions are made. These could be large and important, or so small and trivial you don't know how they will affect you personally. Every person working in those federal office buildings is, either directly or indirectly, beholden to me.

I recently saw an old interview between Bill O'Reilly and Jon Stewart where Bill made some disparaging comments about the 18 to 25-year-olds who watch Jon's show and their voice in the election. He said it like he felt that it was a right that should only be reserved for adults... like him. I think that's a prevailing misconception held by much of the federal workforce: twenty-somethings (the interns who make them coffee and run their errands) are not members of the voting public.

I fear I grow political, which is not my aim, but I'm simply awestruck that this. My first year to vote in the general election (I voted in the midterms, but everyone I voted for was an incumbent) is the same year I spend two months in the nation's capital!

It started off great and I belive it's going to be an inspiring summer!