Woman in Plexiglass

This is not really "a woman" but a mannequin and in this case (hah!) it is the clothes on the dummy that make the difference.  In the Navy Yard Museum in S.W. Washington is an actual uniform and shoes from the Women's Army Corps. (WAC) in World War II. It's a very tailored dark grey-green dress with a big pleat, a belt and blouse type top with huge lapels and long sleeves cuffed and buttoned. In fact, there's a lot of buttons to the whole outfit and one wonders if the phrase "all buttoned up" originates with this one particular dress. You don't hear much about those ladies who broke that particular non-plexiglass ceiling, but their motto, or responsibility as spelled out in their training manual,  is pretty interesting:-- "Your Job: To Replace Men. Be Ready To Take Over." That must have been pretty scary for some fellas at the time to hear! In fact, I can practically hear my former father-in-law, who fought at Pearl Harbor and other Pacific sites, muttering something about how "the women are always wanting to take over" when my then mother-in-law shooed him out of the house while she was cooking.  From Wikipedia I have learned that there were 150,000 WACs and some of them landed at Normandy too!  Apparently, they were disbanded in 1978 when recruitment into the armed forces seems to have become de-linked from gender. It goes without saying but must always be said, that women have always been given parts to play in all of history.

Light at Cannon

We paused in the corridor of the Cannon House Office Building the other day after a visit to Majority Leader Steny Hoyer's office, and I happened to glance up and see this amazingly ornate lamp hanging from an amazingly ornate decorated ceiling. Since the two people I was with were blind, when I told them what I saw, they asked me to describe it and agreed with me how unique and unusual this was. In fact, the whole corridor ceiling was covered in decorative plaster work painted in white, french blue and embellished with ribbons of gold foil in some places.  The lamp itself was frosted glass held in a basket of lacy brass that included arrowhead designs and some other shapes that I could barely discern from the floor below. The floor below was nothing to sneeze at neither, of shiny black and white marble squares, gleaming gently due to the muted lamp light. On reflection I wondered who designed this lamp and ceiling and by what inspiration? And, who keeps this in good repair, who gets to change the light bulbs on such wondrous work that we own, how many notice this incredible wealth of the nation?

Inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building

There's something about being inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building that makes me think that I've stepped into the story of American history being made. After all, such meetings are not every day occurrences and I don't get invited that often. But it's the high ceilings, painted walls and columns, mouldings and lighting fixtures that are so elegant and ornate and old and I always get the sense that I'm walking where other really important people have  walked before. I like the highly polished waxed marble floor of diagonal black and white squares that you think are going to be slippery but they're not. Shoes always clickety-clack when you walk to the room where you are to meet the President's staff and there's been more than one occasion when I've got lost on the wrong floor or down the wrong corridor before finding out from a passing friendly staffer where I am supposed to be. I've probably been in this building a couple of dozen times over the past 20 years, but each time I am impressed with its grandeur. I don't always remember what the meetings are about or what happened, but I do remember the place. Is that mysterious or what?