Framework of the day:

We left the 4-H Center at 8:33am. We returned at 9:30pm. My Fitbit has logged 20025 steps and 8 miles.

This was truly the quietest group at night that I have ever been on a PDS trip with! I’d like to say that means everyone had a good night’s sleep for today, but that may not have happened. Still, they all get maturity points for trying to get a good night’s sleep.

The group went to the White House first thing, for the iconic photo op. They also toured, a bit quickly, the White House Visitor’s Center. (I had to miss this because I needed to pick up our Gallery passes for the House at Rep. Maloney’s offices.) The interesting items at the White House Visitor’s Center: some desks, and some menus from a few administrations. One of our presidents apparently ordered squirrel for a dinner.

We had a brisk 40-minute walk to the Capitol, pausing for a photo op at the reflecting pool. The walk was good, because we had a early lunch and beat the crowds at the Capitol restaurant. We had a no-rush arrival for our Capitol tour. This year’s class got to see the fully restored Rotunda– it’s been in scaffolding and drapes for the past two years. It does look beautiful. It also looks very European– the art was working to communicate that a young nation could be taken as seriously as the old nations in Europe. (Those are young by comparison to some in Asia and the Middle East, but that was likely not crossing the minds of the Capitol’s designers…)

We were very focused on getting to the House and Senate Galleries today. Both were active. Maturity points awarded to all the students and chaperones because we had some considerable lines to stand in: First to check all bags, cameras and phones. Then to be in the elevator. Then to go through more security right outside the gallery. Finally, to have an usher open a door and let us sit down. The lines only move when seats are vacated. The number of gallery sections that are available is a complete mystery– there are many seats, but sections that are open don’t seem to correlate with the demand. Once you have a seat, you can stay as long as you want, though.

The House was voting on HR 241, we think. The text of this is: “Providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 1304) to amend the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, the Public Health Service Act, and the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to exclude from the definition of health insurance coverage certain medical stop-loss insurance obtained by certain plan sponsors of group health plans.” But, we could be wrong. We did see two votes– a vote on the rules and a vote on taking the vote. The names of every Congressperson is project while the final tally is displayed like a ticker tape. Meanwhile, the floor looks and sounds like a party (or as Karl says, “two parties…”)

After we left the house, we did the same procedure to be able to sit in the Gallery of the Senate– no skipping from one side to the other– you have to collect your checked belongings and wait in the whole series of lines for the Senate. The Senate was also busy with visitors. Several students were hoping for a Bernie sighting: he had addressed the floor in the morning. (Note: It is very cool that any senator, especially one from another state, could be hailed as a celebrity worth seeing by eighth graders. We have never seen that much enthusiasm for any member of Congress, in prior years.) We didn’t see him, but did hear: Cory Gardner (R. CO) speak in favor of Gorsuch’s confirmation. That ended the time for the Republicans and began an hour of Democrat time. We heard Mazie Horono (D, HI) and Tammy Duckworth (D., IL) and Kamala Harris (D., CA) all speak against the Gorsuch confirmation. Here is the truth, as I know it from today: Senators are good orators. I say this, in part, because we could not see them speak. Senators usually speak to a nearly empty chamber, and from their party’s side of the chamber. As the mysterious forces governing which parts of the gallery were available would have it, we were seated right over the Democratic side– meaning the three Democratic senators could be heard but not seen since we were sitting over their heads! We did get to see Tammy Duckworth’s arrival though. She has a commanding presence; she is noticeable because she uses an electric wheelchair, and also because she navigates with speed and accuracy (in a room with lots of furniture.)

The ushers are pretty eagle-eyed on their sections, so after a couple of students appeared to be dozing off and got reprimanded by an usher, we decided it was time to be on our feet again.

We exited the Capitol in full warmth, sunshine and spring! It feels like April here! After a Capitol photo op, we found a snack stand, followed by the Mall merry-go-round and a walk to the National Portrait Gallery. Portrait galleries are fun– sort of like people magazine. The National Portrait Gallery also has a collection of American art, folk and self-taught art. It’s definitely a collection– with yesterday’s museum so carefully planned out, today’s museum felt like a series of surprises. We had about 90 minutes to view the art– and there was something for everyone. Because it is a little away from the Mall, and because we arrived at 5:30pm, we also almost had the whole three floors to ourselves.

The final destination was Bolt Burgers, a PDS tradition since 2014 when the current junior class ‘discovered’ it on their 8th grade trip. On our way we stopped at a poor little park to kill a few minutes. One of the funniest moments of the day was when 4-5 students climbed up a vacant pedestal to be a “statue of young teenagers, sitting,” I guess the art has gotten to us.

Of course we made sure that everyone journaled before turning in. We were accompanied by some great acoustic guitar music– warm and soothing like a foot rub at the end of a day of walking.

Here is the poem, and the link to the Flickr album is below.