Home again to the wide-open spaces

Everyone assured me that Northern Virginia was beautiful but after spending three weeks there, I am not in total agreement.
The problem is that you can’t see Virginia for the trees. The horizon, if there is one, is engulfed by them. Sure, they’re nice, but they also produce visual disorientation or, technically speaking, arboreal claustrophobia.
It was so good to get back home and see for miles under the inverted blue bowl of sky that sits atop our pancake of wide-open spaces.
However, it was awe-inspiring to be so close to the center of power in our country. From the windows of the terminal building of Reagan International, the Capitol is clearly a part of the view.
Nonchalant travelers hurried by without a glance — they might as well have been in Cleveland.
The monuments were just a stone’s throw away as we drove by, but I didn’t actually visit them up close. (I was there on another mission that I will get to shortly)
I think the presidential helicopter zipped over the neighborhood where I stayed.  It was both possible and probable, so I waved just in case.
Coverage of Sen. Robert Byrd’s death dominated the news for several days. The stories were run in the Washington Post metro section and broadcast on the local television news channel, making it seem as if he were an area citizen, just a home-town boy who did well.
“On the Wings of a Dove” was sung at his memorial services. An appropriate touch for a senator who was a mean fiddle player — and which momentarily reduced the distance between West Virginia and West Texas.
(The sweet words and melody brought back memories of long ago for me. Sitting under the oak trees at the ranch trying to catch a summer breeze, my uncle Roy twanged the same notes on his guitar and sang softly to himself, “On the wings of a snow white dove, He sends his pure sweet love … ”)
With no intention of entering the global warming debate, I can verify that the area endured a record- setting heat wave while I was there. 
Climate and weather are two different things, according to scientists, but when we’re told every day that it’s the hottest summer in a century, the old clichéd “not the heat but the humidity” becomes downright miserable.
While I fervently hope the alarmists are wrong, I am pragmatic enough to realize that my wishes have nothing to do with what is — or is not.
I heard lots of languages not familiar to my non-cosmopolitan ears. At the library, I viewed an interesting display of books marked Vietnamese fiction and non–fiction. A popular neighborhood restaurant featured Korean barbecue. Another ran specials featuring Peruvian cuisine. No Tex-Mex in sight.
We bought groceries at the two big supermarkets in the area, Giant and Harris Teeter, also a culture shock. I felt like Dorothy, decidedly not in Kansas anymore.
As all student journalists learn, good reporting includes the five w’s to ensure that the reader gets the whole story.  I’ve given the who, what, where and when but have neglected the most important “w” concerning my trip to the East Coast.
That would be the “why” I was there in the first place. The purpose of the journey was the arrival of my fifth grandchild.
And even though he’s a Virginian by birth, he assured me confidentially that he will get to Texas as soon as he can.
Chandler is a retired teacher, librarian and author. She lives in Dryden.