Coast hopping

So I'm in the 2nd to last week of this internship and while I can't wait to get back to LA, move in, see everyone again, get all my stuff unpacked and get ready for band camp (woo?/!), I'm gonna miss the time in DC. It wasn't one of those self-discovery journeys that inspire Oscar-winning films, but it gave me the chance to do things I wouldn't normally do elsewhere. Like get up at the crack of dawn to go to Gettysburg. Or camp out at 5pm to watch 9pm fireworks while being serenaded by the US Army band. Other things:

I still can't answer where exactly I come from (up to 3 different answers now), my hair is now a strange shade of brown/burgundy/orange, and I think my accent has taken on tones of the Mason-Dixon states as well as picking up certain military/nautical terms. I survived 2 months without murdering (or getting murdered by) the Notre Dame tuba or the UCLA alum officer. (Should I have? Most likely yes. But I'd rather not get in trouble with the US Navy, thank you very much.) I avoided getting questioned by the NCIS over classification issues. On a whim, I took the 6 hour Amtrak up to Providence, bruised my arse and killed my lower back on an hour of polo, watched a polo game, stayed up till 5 to go and have breakfast at a diner, and loved every moment because I did it with a friend. LA transportation seems even crappier than before after the lovely DC metro (minus the Red line crash). Shellbacking makes frat initiations seem like a welcome tea party. It's way easier to travel on the East coast than I realised. Thanks to the good ol' grid layout of DC, I visited most of the Smithsonian museums in a week by walking. There are people whom I would never have hung out with had we not ended up in the same internship, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to miss them. And while the reference letter is nice, I'm just glad I got to work with the people in the archives and hope I will see at least some of them again after all this.

Not a bad summer, by all accounts.