As I woke up Sunday morning with the light streaming in through the windows, slowly rubbing the sleep out of my eyes, it occurred to me that it was awfully bright and would hopefully be a nice day. That’s when it hit me that something was very very wrong.

Light coming in through the windows. Sunlight. And my alarm was set for 5:30. I literally threw myself out of bed, grabbed my phone, looked at the time and went into panic mode. I had 20 minutes to get myself caffeinated, showered, dressed, packed, and get to my girlfriend’s house about seven miles away.

Out of coffee, and with no time for a decent shower, I grab a quick hobo bath and toss on a pair of clean underroos and start throwing stuff into my backpack. Hopping up and down trying to put my jeans on, I grab the phone and call my girlfriend and let her know I’m running late.

As I’m flying down the road, praying that the cops are still getting their morning doughnuts on, I realize I’ve forgotten my bottle of water, my camera, clean jeans to change into later, and a blanket. Cursing the entire way, I made to her house about 15 minutes late, with everyone already sitting in the parking lot ready to go.

Great. New girl, and I’m late. Wonderful first impressions I’m making. Just splendid. I get out of the car, meet the guy I’m riding with and the rest of the group, and off we go.

I’ve been DC a few times to watch the bikes roll through a time or three, but I have never actually participated in Rolling Thunder. I was pretty excited about the whole deal, but being already annoyed with myself for being late, I was feeling a little bit of trepidation as well.

In previous years, on Memorial day, I would put out flags for fallen soldiers someone I once knew served with, 11 at last count. This year it felt stale to do that, as he and I are not quite on speaking terms and probably never will be again. But in years past I have done that little thing, and sat quietly and let small tears peek through when no one was looking. How was I going to react to all of this?

The only soul I know is my girlfriend, and I’ve only known her for a few scant weeks. It helped a bit that the guy I was riding with was extremely nice, but I was still a bit nervous. I saw a good friend of mine at the Harley dealership we were leaving from, and knowing he was going to be in the same group put my mind at ease a bit.

It’s been probably a decade since my delicate hiney has been planted on the back of a bike, and having my back still jacked up from last week was not helping. With my mind going in 27 different directions we head out of the Harley dealership and make our way towards DC.

As we pass through every intersection, go under every overpass, there are people everywhere. Signs, flags, waves, and little kids grinning from ear to ear. And with that, it was all fine. I’m simple, all it takes is a bright beaming smile from a child and everything else just fades away. Yeah, yeah, I hear the peanut gallery out there giggling about the thought of one of the most complicated and complex women on the planet being simple, but there you have it. The secret is out. I snarl about little children and make jokes about eating them for breakfast, but when I see those big bright smiles and eyes full of wonder, my icy black heart melts a little.

At the Pentagon, we wait for what seems like forever to go. I was staring at a sea of bikes, no longer feeling out of place, no longer worried that the inner girly girl was going to come out and blow it by requesting a venti half-skinny half-1 percent extra hot split quad shot latte with whip and a blueberry scone for breakfast. We wandered around, got a bite to eat (okay, girly girl did come out at that point and make a face at her bbq sandwich and decide it was too gross to eat), and wandered around some more.

Standing in the hot sun, pouring ice water down my cleavage every opportunity I got (hey, it gets hot in there, okay?), we watched as row by row bikes slowly started pulling out. At 40 rows away, the joke became that it might be 40 rows, but it’s right there! At 30 rows away, it’s right there! At 20, oooh, it’s right there! Maybe it got a little stale, but we were doing our best to entertain ourselves as we waited.

And then finally it was on. And here’s Princess Sabre (who did manage to get some pink in with the laces on my black chucks thank you very much) climbing on the back of a Harley and riding out with thousands upon thousands of bikers.

I moved to this area several years ago with a desire to get away from a bad life and bad memories. This is not my city of birth, but it has become the city of my heart. Yeah, there’s plenty of bullshit inside the beltway, but there have been occasions where I felt as if there was finally somewhere I belonged.

I keep my politics to myself with new people, and am aware of the fact that I’m probably far more left and liberal than anyone I associate with. I’ve been accused of not being patriotic because I very loudly disagreed with a lot of the previous administration’s choices, much to my dismay. I still get all choked up when I see the flag waving. I just tend to keep my patriotic side somewhat tucked away. The last time I felt this much love in the city was during the inauguration when we were all crammed like sardines in the Metro playing getting to know you as we all flew high on the promise of hope and change.

Riding through the city, my city, I felt that same moment of awe as I saw thousands of my fellow district dwellers out with signs and cheering. Veterans in wheel chairs, small children waving flags, signs everywhere thanking the vets coming through for their freedom, honoring the lost and missing. The little kids standing as close as they can hoping someone will ride by and give them a hand slap. One of them was so cute I wanted to snatch him up and let him ride with us. So many small children, knowing nothing more than what their parents have told them, waving their flags, with the hope and promise of America in their little eyes.

Let’s just say it’s a good thing my sunglasses are black, so no one could see my eyes. I’m not crying here, there was a bug in my eye! A bug, I tell you!

Afterwards we went out to Jimmy’s in Herdon for some much needed food and adult beverages. There was a small ceremony, a moment of silence, and a beautiful rendition of The Star Spangled Banner that made me all teary eyed all over again. *sigh* I’m such a girl.

After some much needed showers and a hot date with a hair dryer, we wandered out to Wolf Trap and watched the fireworks. We laid on the blankets and ooh and awed like children. And then we were off again, back to Jimmy’s for a bit more nightlife. All in all, quite possibly one of the best days I’ve had in a very long time. No worries, no drama, just new friends and a really good time.

There are days when I fall in love with DC all over again. Yesterday was one of those days.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 25th, 2009 at 11:57 am and is filed under Friends, Holidays, Just Another Day in the Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.