Two years ago at about this time, I was blinking in the sunshine on the White House lawn. We sipped lemonade and water from glasses with the Presidential seal and nibbled on cookies and crackers held on white paper napkins with the seal embossed in gold.
(I half-wondered how much trouble I'd get in for brining a glass home as a keepsake. I decided to play it smart and take an extra napkin. It's packed away somewhere among my other mid-Atlantic momentos.)
It was bright, hot and humid, as the district's swamp weather had begun to assert itself, but I still wore my dark skirted suit. I could deal with feeling hot for the sake of demonstrating the proper decorum this reception called for.
I remember my heels clicking against marble floors in the lower hallways and the wood panels above. Red silk covered the walls of one room (Nancy had fun decorating), green brocade covered antoher set. Lincoln's portrait caused a stir, the idea of first children rollerskating in another room elicited giggles. I was most struck, however, by Kennedy's portrait as it hung near an alcoved staircase. By far the most impressive of the presidential portraits and positioned just as I'd like it - right by the stairs depicted in "Yankee Doodle Dandy" for Cagney's final shimmy.
I had to admit that I felt pretty proud to be in the building that was at that point next-to-impossible to visit. I imagined tourists and school groups standing at the fences, snapping photographs of the building and observing the guards positioned all around.
Two years later, I realize I don't think I'd want to go back and visit it again. I enjoy looking back on the headiness of showing my ID and being escorted out onto the lawn...
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