Ahh, Starbucks. Where would I have been without you? Actually, that’s an easy answer … I’d have been wandering the streets of DC, cold and irritated. Like thousands of people actually were on the evening of inauguration day.

It was a cold bright day in January, and the clocks were striking three. In among the coffee and tea I sat at a bar along the front window, the long bathroom line running behind me. Outside the window, the long entry line moved slowly by and proved little distraction as I typed away at the computer. The Starbucks wireless was the only way I was able to send twitter updates, as AT&T cell service was wiped out in the beltway thanks to all the people sending pics from the ceremony. Everyone was in a sharing mood, if not a good mood. Tales of disappointment and frustration were many and sad. Like I pointed out in part one, hundreds, if not thousands, of people discovered their attendance at the ceremony excluded their being able to see or hear it happen. Now we were all penned in together with nowhere to go but a 15-minute line for the bathroom at Starbucks. No cabs in or out, and the all bridges closed.

Up the street from Starbucks, the L’Enfant metro station was on the verge of a riot. The station was packed to the gills, and each train to pull in was already full. People were lined up down the street to get in to the station, and those in couldn’t get out. Trapped, pressed together, disappointed and overwhelmed, the frustration was at a peak. This scene played out across the city.

As the hours wore on, and the parade continued, three of us set out from our coffee haven to see if there was yet a way to leave. As we walked the Mall in the night and artificial light, we found few people among the countless piles of trash. The throngs were clustered at the gates which kept us in, waiting to finally be set free into the land of hotel rooms and taxi cabs. Some groups pressed around the entrances of the temporarily shut down metro system, waiting for them to open once more. We three just kept wandering, hoping to find an exit.

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Heh. I have some similar video I’m still editing. I should have it up this week some time. In the meanwhile, if you’ve seen any other hilarious footage, why not drop it in the comments?

OPEN THREAD

I’m writing about the night before the ceremony as “Part II” because I didn’t really think much about it until later reflection.

On Monday, I was, like so many others, unable to get inside the beltway. The lines were long and, unlike the day itself, they moved very slowly. News reports said it was even worse trying to get back out of DC, something I experienced on the day itself, which I’ll elaborate on in Part III. After filming the lines, I headed back to where I was staying. My old Marine Corps buddy and I went out to grab a bite to eat.

Northern Virginia is cold. I don’t just mean temperature; every road we drove down was identical to the previous. Few trees, box buildings … steel, glass and concrete. The whole place has the feel of one giant business park. Somehow, we managed to find a decent Mexican restaurant for dinner. We sat at the bar so we could watch the news, which was, as might be expected, all about the pending inaugural events.

One of the stories was a human interest piece, the story of an elderly African-American woman from Georgia who was in town for the ceremony. Her white, no doubt Democratic, neighbor had arranged for the travel, the accomodations, and the ticket to the ceremony. Having already seen the white Democrats in line at the train station clamoring for approval from the black Democrats in line, and having no small amount of experience in witnessing white liberal guilt, I was annoyed at the story, at the neighbor. The way white liberals try to buy or borrow the perceived authenticity of minorities is universally annoying. The constant contest among democrats to prove who is the most sensitive, un-racist-est, best and most acceptable white person EVER is as irritating as it is sick. So while I watched this news report, I was thinking of nothing but my contempt. Well, that and the fantastic enchiladas I was stuffing in my face.

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Tuesday morning. The weather was frigid, the sky dark, as I drove my sub-sub-sub-compact rental into Vienna, Virginia, there to catch the Metro into Washington, DC, for the inauguration of Barack Obama. I hate those little cars. I’m tall and not exactly thin, so the combination of compressed spine and the lubricant necessary to squeeze in make an unpleasant experience. But hey, I saved like 11 cents on gas for the week. I’ve done my part to aid, or halt, global warming (I was too frozen to recall which we are supposed to root for on that score.) In my head I kept running down the list: video cameras, check; still camera, check; batteries, check; t-shirt depicting Obama as Jim Carrey’s character in the movie Liar Liar, check. Ready for battle.

The Vienna station was crushed with people. Parking lot so full of Obama paraphernalia, those obnoxious “Coexist” bumper stickers, and people with hair of unnatural colors that I wasn’t sure if it was the line to the inauguration or some kind of ‘-apalooza’ appended event. Silly me … it was both of course.

The line moved fast. Everyone was polite, excited to be there. There was, among those in line, some sense of being part of a singular event. Not a bunch of different groups in motion to a similar destination, but rather one big group, together. Especially the white people, who were very anxious to be approved of as part of the group by the black families in line. Eventually we all made it to the tellers and paid ten bucks for our souvenir day passes for public transportation. And so we mixed bag of riders hurried together down the steps to board the train. The emo kids, the rich guy, the earnest-faced black families, John Adams, and me.

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