stop

This week in Washington DC, the city where I was born and raised, we lived through an earthquake and a hurricane, two types of natural disaster that are Extremely Rare and Still Really Quite Rare, respectively. It was strange, upsetting, unsure, sometimes slightly panicky; my apartment flooded because the earthquake broke a pipe, and some of my storm windows refused to close yesterday morning before Irene made it here.

But this morning, even though awnings are askew and sometimes down, even though the streets are littered with branches and leaves and some of the trees lean sickeningly to the side, even though power isn’t on everywhere (but on more places it has a right to be… Pepco did something right??), 8th street, the street right around the corner that is filled with bars and restaurants and the Marine Barracks, is filled with people out for brunch. DC carries on the only way it can — with mimosas and bloody marys and eggs and pancakes.

So to my kind of battered, certainly worn out city: I love you, DC. I really, really do.

Seriously. An earthquake. In Washignton DC.