Inauguration

Well we are chaperoning the high school band to its music competition at the Inauguration.

On the day of the Inauguration, we got up early and our chartered bus took us from Chantilly to The Mall - a distance of 26 miles, but because of the bus traffic and street closures, it took us well over an hour to get in.

We didn't get quite close enough to our pre-designated parking area, although we think that was thrown out anyways...so we were able to get close enough (12th Street and D Street) to walk onto The Mall.

Which we did - little security - I guess because we far enough away from the Capitol? But we situated ourselves at 7:30 in the morning in front of a Jumbotron and waited in the freezing weather for the inauguration to start.

The Jumbotron was showing the HBO Inaugration concert from the Lincoln Memorial two days earlier. People were reacting as if was live.

We were able to see all the dignitaries enter through the Capitol and onto the steps on the Mall side to their seats. Members of Congress, the governors of all the states, the members of the Senate, the members of the Supreme Court, all living Presidents, all living Vice Presidents.

A short program when President-elect Obama arrived with his family. The Oath was administered in error by the Chief Justice, and then it was over. People were cheering and tearing - in tears at the moment. In an instant we were all part of history. Or at least a witness to it.

Immediately, people dispersed to warmer quarters, namely the museums of the Smithsonian Institution and it got real cold on the Mall. The Mall becams one dustbowl litered with newspapers and trash from 1.7 million bodies.

It didn't matter to use if the music combo of Itzhak Perlman and Yo-yo Ma was recorded or not...you couldn't tell the difference on the Jumbotron. It didn't matter if Chief Justice flubbed up his lines and caused him to be an asterisk in history. We were all part of the day - in that moment.

When Obama took office of the most important person in the world, at least, I know where I was at that time - huddled in a mass between the Capitol and the Washington Monument, the Smithsonian and the Natural History Museum.