I got a free trip to Washington DC last week, and it was pretty sweet!! I was sent to the Women’s Leadership Symposium for women in the Sea Services (Coast Guard, Navy, Marine Corps). I headed out of Seattle pretty early on Wednesday morning. It didn’t start out so well. The travel itinerary that I had printed out was apparently the old version. We have to make our travel arrangements through another company for the government, so I didn’t make the official reservations. I showed up to check into my flight (luckily really early) only to find that the reservations hadn’t actually been paid for. So I started calling around trying to find the people who had made my reservations. By this time it was about 7am so people were just barely getting into their offices. Many phone calls later, I finally found out that I was actually booked for a different flight that left in about 45 minutes and was with a different airline. So I booked it over to the other airline and checked in just in time. Then of course the security line was backed up. So by the time I got to the gate, they were almost done boarding. I barely made it in time to run onto the plane and get settled it. Whew. After one layover in Chicago, I made it to DC Wednesday night. I checked into my fabulous hotel room and decided to walk around the city for a while until my dearest friend, Evelyn, was done at a lecture so we could go play. It really only took about an hour to walk around the area and see pretty much everything that I would want to see. I was really glad it wasn’t raining like the forecast implied it would be all week. I met up with Evelyn a few blocks away from my hotel for dinner, drinks, and a little frozen yogurt. Already a fabulous start to my all expense paid work trip/vacation!
The symposium was also in the hotel, which made waking up bright and early a little more bearable. The first day we got all checked in, and got some sweet little goodie bags. One of the lecturers that day was Dee Dee Myers, the author of Why Women Should Rule the World, so one of the gifts in our bags was that book which we later had an opportunity to get it signed by the author. There were about 600 women there and about 5 guys sprinkled in the mix. Being in the military and especially a field that is dominated by men, it was really refreshing to be with so many women who were in the same situation. When I was doing my training in California last fall, there were two other girls in my class, and they were both at the symposium as well, so it was really fun to catch up. When we got out in the evening, I walked around the monuments again with one of the girls that I went to training with, and another girl that I had just met earlier that day who works at Camp David. We kind of walked around the same places that I had gone the day before, just a little more in depth. After a little while, I left them to head out to meet up with Evelyn and a friend of hers for dinner and drinks in Georgetown. It was nice knowing a local who could show me around to more than just the touristy things, and in more of the residential area. Friday was another day of the symposium, but this time we met with just the attendees in the Navy. In the afternoon, we broke down even further to meet with just the Civil Engineer Corps members of the Navy. There were about 80 women from the CEC there. Again it was really neat to network with other women who had been in my shoes, and even several much higher ranked officers who had been in my shoes but in a time were it was still not terribly encouraged to be a Civil Engineer Corps Officer in the Navy for a female.
We finished with our final session a little early, so I took a little time to catch up on my sleepy time before heading out again to meet up with Evelyn and friends. We went out to the sculpture garden to watch/listen to their jazz in the park, which I guess they have every Friday night. It was really packed, so we had snagged a little area of grass to lay out our blankets and snacks and drinks. I’m pretty sure I barely actually heard any music over the people, but it was a beautiful evening and it was fun meeting some new people and just hanging out. After that about half of us headed out to the new hip tapas bar/restaurant. It just opened recently, and was interestingly decorated with all kinds of graffiti inside, and was very poshly furnished. We just passed around a few dishes which were very delicious. As our dinner came to an end, the place started transitioning into a bit of a dance club. After enjoying the tunes for a few, we headed home.
Saturday was sleep in day!! That was my last night at the hotel, so I checked out and headed over to Evelyn’s for breakfast. The rest of the day was quite an adventure. We were planning on going to a BBQ, Bourbon, and Beer festival on the shore. It took so long to get there, however, that we got there when it was kind of winding down and decided to just head to another restaurant to enjoy some margaritas. After that, we had another long commute back into town. Apparently the new hip beverage in town is Firefly Sweet Tea Vodka mixed with lemonade. We picked some up and spent the rest of the night on Evelyn’s roof deck. After all the talk about it raining all week, it ended up being perfect…at least at the times that I was wanting to be outside! Oddly enough, that night ended up being all Auburn people as Evelyn’s boyfriend from Auburn had shown up the night before, two of her other friends from auburn were there, and at the end of the night, another auburn architecture grad just got into town for a visit as well. I was really good to see everyone! Unfortunately the evening ended on a bit of a bad note. As one of the guys was headed to the metro on his way home, he was robbed at gunpoint. They took everything he had which included his phone and keys and wallet so he couldn’t really go anywhere except back to Evelyn’s place. Luckily he wasn’t hurt, but it definitely shook us all up a good bit. The police were called and took him around trying to find any of his stuff or the robbers, but were unsuccessful. Hopefully he can replace most of the things that were stolen, but I am sure it’s going to be a huge hassle.
Sunday afternoon I headed back home to Seattle. It was a busy and eventful week/weekend, and it was great to come home!
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