Puff the Magic Dragon

Today we leave for Galveston. I'm up early and rather than waking the girlz, I'm sitting in the "breakfast" room drinking a cup of coffee and listening to the newezette (Paris Hilton, etc). I had to provide my own cup for coffee. Seems they are out of cups. Sometimes I wonder how these places stay in business. But don't get me started on the amenityless hotels!

I've never been to a presidential library, so I wasn't entirely sure what to expect when we arrived at the LBJ library yesterday afternoon. We were immediately greeted by a Lady Bird-like woman who gave us a very proper wlecome complete with a map and directions to the restrooms. After that, I entered an earlier era--the early 1900's when LBJ and Lady Bird (who's real first name is Claudia) were born. The historians and librarians have done a wonderful job mixing his personal history, interest in poverty and concern over racial issues with the national and international buzz of the day. As I read and walked through the exhibit, I was suddenly transported back in time to the 1960's--talk of the Vietnam war, race riots--and Puff the Magic Dragon playing overhead. I remember listening to the radio every night when I went to bed hoping to hear Puff. It was my favorite song and somehow helped me deal with missing my brother. My brother Mike had been drafted and I missed him so much. I must've been around 11 or so, maybe a bit younger. Then my brother Denny was drafted. I remember him walking out the front door of our house and I wondered if I'd ever see him again.

I continued making my way through the exhibit that was now part of my own personal history--not just a history I'd read about in books, but one that I lived. I hated the war (who didn't), but my mom forbid me to go into Berkeley to join the protests because Denny was in Vietnam. I think what surprised me the most about the exhibit was my own emotional response to it. I cried for who we were and what we lost then; for our lack of progress, and what we continue to lose. LBJ's administration passed terrific legislation and instituted programs like Head Start, the Clean Water Act, Medicaid, set aside great amounts of land for parks and recreation, anti-discrimination acts, voting rights for blacks. You'd think we were, as a society, on the edge of greatness. Yet here we are today mired in a senseless war, social programs gutted, poverty on the rise. I'd go back to the LBJ library. The library closed before we finished our tour.

I've found it hard to shake off the experience, which I don't think is a bad thing. We moved along with our day--Peggy to yoga, Rosemary and I scoping out the river and the bat scene, and after we retrieved Peggy fron the yoga studio and watched the bats, we had dinner at one of Marc's favorite haunts, Ruby's BBQ. Yummy!

I think I saw Rosemary come down for coffee, so that's my que to get back to the room and pack up. I've enjoyed Austin although I feel like I've missed much of it. We'll be back in a few days, though, when I've made a promise to myself to hit 6th Street night life. That is, afterall, one of the main reasons I've come here!