The Nats

Strangely, I probably know more about the Washington Nationals than I do about any other baseball team, because the Washington Post is my very favorite newspaper of all time, and I read it each and every day. I can't help but read the headlines, even the ones in the sports section, and it is my understanding from carefully poring over the Lifestyle section that Ryan Zimmerman is both hot and a very nice guy.


I lived in DC twice -- once right after college (technically, I lived in Arlington [right across the street from this] and then in the barrio Alexandria), and then again after law school. I was graduating from law and grad school, and my husband and I both needed jobs, and what better place for lawyers who have public policy degrees than Washington, D.C.? My husband's first trip to DC was when we went out there, on tax day, to find an apartment with a lease that started on June 1st. He loved it, like I knew he would, and 6 weeks later we moved into the teeniest-tiniest apartment ever. It was right by Dupont Circle, and it was two stories with a beautiful wrought iron spiral staircase separating the living room from the bedroom. The staircase was fabulous, unless a) you fell up it and almost broke your knees (Matthew), b) you chose not to wear shoes and it left painful patterns on the soles of your feet (Bethany), or c) you were hungry or thirsty or had to use the bathroom and climbing or descending it was simply too much to bear (Bethany and the cats). The apartment would have been perfect for 1 person, or 2 people with not that much stuff.


I have lots of stuff.


Plus, two cats. It was pretty cramped. Luckily, we spent a lot of time taking late-night walks around Dupont, Kalorama ("If you don't know where it is, you can't afford to live there"), Georgetown, Woodley Park, Cleveland Park, and Embassy Row. We'd stop at Starbucks around 10 and then head on out, and not get home until 2-ish. Sometimes we'd stop for water or a Popsicle, just to liven things up a bit. We'd wander around and look at the embassies and talk about everything and nothing. This was pre-kids, btw, if you haven't figured that out yet. I liked to say I was going to faire l'exercice Français, because I would drink dark roast coffee and smoke cigarettes while I "worked out". If only I wore high heels while doing it, the look really would have been complete.


I have lots of fun stories about living in DC, and more memories than I can count. I would absolutely move back there because that's where every job that I really want resides, and there are many many people that I love who live there (or in the surrounding burbs -- yes, you, Jill).


Ok, here's the baseball part - the Nats came to DC while we were there. When we lived on Capitol Hill (after the Dupont apartment, this was a townhouse near Eastern Market and it felt like a mansion in comparison) we walked to the games at RFK Stadium, and it was awesome. 


Even the part where we kind of ran home in the dark so we wouldn't get mugged.