The trip in a nutshell

We traveled to DC. It seemed to take forever because I mistakenly scheduled our flight from Paris at 9:55 am. Since we couldn’t take the train to Paris early enough on the day of the flight, we had to take the TGV the night before. So… we left our apartment around 2:00 in the afternoon on Monday and arrived in DC around 4:00 on Tuesday. I think I calculated that it was about 30 hours of travel time. We were pretty exhausted but found a second wind to have a great dinner with Jeffrey.

Wednesday was a day for visiting Jeff’s school, his dorm room, and his work lab. He took me shopping to Target to get some goodies. I bought quite a few brownie mixes and other things that I can’t find in France. I also bought myself an iPod!! They have them in France, but taxes are pretty high there, and also… I was afraid I would have to operate it in French. I had brought my laptop with me on this trip so Jeff helped me schedule podcasts and load up the iPod. Jeff got another nice meal on that night too!

More of the same on Thursday, and it was dinner with Katherine as Jeff was helping a friend move out of the dorm. On Friday, the graduation activities began. We first attended a ceremony/reception by the Architecture department for those students in the Architecture honor society. It was very nice – champagne and all! Following that event, we went to the student center for the Honors Convocation. All graduating seniors who were members of an Honor Society or had some kind of honor were invited for recognition. After that, there was a President’s reception (probably with more food, but we passed on it). Then there was a Baccalaureate Mass at the big giant basilica on campus. That was a pretty ‘wow’ deal. The sermon reviewed all that had happened in the four years that the students were at CUA. It was post 9/11 and parents were jittery about students going to DC to college. Then there were the sniper shootings in the DC area, etc. etc. The sermon was inspiring.

After the mass, students who were entering the military were recognized. Then those students who were entering a volunteer program after graduation were also recognized. Kate’s roommate was one who was recognized – she will be doing a year of service in the Bronx. After the Mass, we went to the prom. Just kidding. It was a dinner dance. Very nice but I was falling asleep in my soup. Jet lag was setting in and the activities never gave me much time for rest…. so we went home early…. but then Paul had to meet Jack at the airport at 12:30.

It was the first time all of our family was gathered together since Christmas 2005. Saturday morning was the actual graduation ceremony. Wolf Blitzer was the guest speaker and frankly, his speech sucked. He talked about the war, politics, and other really irrelevant stuff for a graduation commencement ceremony.

After the general ceremony, the Architecture school had the real deal where students get their diplomas from the dean of the school. (In theory… that is.) Kate really didn’t get her diploma because she had not paid a $130.00 library fine for losing a book back in her Freshman year. I was pretty aggravated that the school did not IN ANY WAY notify us or her before graduation day. In fact, they had never notified us in the last 3 ½ years. So, Paul had to go “purchase” her diploma at the library. I thought it was rather ‘good’ of them to be open on Graduation day.

Following the diploma/library fine ceremony, we gathered with Kate’s roommates and their parents at the trailer park where they lived. The girls were hosting a nice reception for their guests. That night, our family had dinner out.

On Sunday we went to the airport with Jack, dropped him off for his flight, and then went on to catch our flight back to France. It was a wonderful, very full week!