When I woke up this morning, I had one thing on my mind. Fear. I was so afraid to leave the comfort of my bed, knowing that it would be the beginning of a journey unlike anything I had ever experienced before. Before today, I had never flown on an airplane or traveled without my family. Before today, I hadn’t done a lot of things…
First, we went to Arlington National Cemetery, which was not what I had expected at all. For starters, it is absolutely massive and even more breathtaking in person. Any pictures I have seen simply do not do it justice. Sure, the pictures may show a person what the cemetery looks like, but a picture can never explain to you how it feels to actually be standing in the middle of Arlington, surrounding by seemingly endless lines of headstone after headstone amidst the rolling hills. Maybe I’m a bit morbid for finding beauty in something so tragic, but Arlington National Cemetery is awe-inspiring. The thing that really struck me was that each head stone had a number on the back, and at first, I couldn’t understand what they were for. As I continued to walk around, I realized that the answer was simple. The number on the back was counting, up and up and up as I walked. Before today, the losses we as a country have suffered were inconceivable to me. I was a bystander, looking at it from the outside in, reading statistics in a history book. Now, I think of pretty white rows of clean, stark head stones, all equal in beauty and importance to the head stone next to it. I think of the vastness of over 30
0,000 pristine white head stones shooting off in every direction. I felt so small and inconsequential, standing in the middle of something that goes on as far as the eye can see in every direction. It can be such a surreal experience for someone who hasn’t seen it.
We explored a lot of different places in Washington DC as the trip continued, but the Newseum is by far one of my favorite places. Because I am a Communication major, this museum really stuck out to me and made me think hard about media, both the positive and negative. I spent a lot of time in the exhibit with classic newspapers, books, and news-related artifacts. For me, it was fascinating to be so close to something so old and fragile, but the people around me seemed all too eager to rush through the exhibit to the next one, where you could play games on iPads and other devices. I even heard a 12-year-old boy say to his friend “This room is stupid, let’s go play with the iPads again.” As much as I wanted to smack him upside the head, I refrained. He was missing out on such amazing pieces of history! Thomas Paine’s writing kit, the suit that OJ Simpson wore to trial, and countless other things. They had the door that helped to hide the Watergate scandal, and an original newspaper print of the day that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr gave his famous “I have a dream…” speech. Most people visiting the museum walked by these priceless artifacts as if they meant nothing, and to me that is truly disheartening. While not every artifact is attached to a positive story, it is undeniable that those artifacts and those events helped to shape who we are as a society. It frightens me that the generation growing up now has no sense of appreciation for what defines who our country is. Hopefully, they eventually realize and come to appreciate these items and the stories behind them. As George Santayana so wisely said, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
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