On vacation. A sorely needed time away. I was willing to drive about six hours. My wife preferred half that, so we opted for a bedroom town of DC Metro, Leesburg. The nearest public destination seems to be Dulles Airport, where the Metro seems to end. Leesburg, as we pursue Day 2, has shown its multiple faces. It seems a bit far for people to commute to the core of DC, though people probably do. Many large and small employers ring the district. No doubt, the airport employs thousands. We found some history, a central old downtown which offers formal and self-guided historical tours. There are Civil War sites, including a minor battle nearby. I was surprised that the Potomac, which separates Virginia from Maryland, was the resource for the defeated Union soldiers to escape. Since this battle, known mostly to locals and some Civil War buffs, was too small to appear in textbooks, it did spur the creation of the now very large military cemetery system.
Surprisingly close, we find some agricultural land, much of it quite large. There are vineyards, open mostly on weekends to those seeking their periodic respites from DC. Some microbreweries have emerged. There is a large Factory Outlet Complex. But mostly, Leesburg has become a bedroom city. Small malls with places to eat, bank, get prescriptions filled, and serve as tasting room outlets for wineries, one that I visited today quite distant. There are chain motels like the one we chose. Supermarkets. Medical care.
I suspect the population has some economic diversity. Loudon County is one of the highest income counties in America. We drove past a few real mansions, a fair number of McMansions, prosperous housing developments where the engineers of aerospace not too far away probably live. And a lot of more dense housing, townhouses and apartment complexes of a few stories. No skyscrapers. But no slums either.
And as something of a bottom line, vacation for me. No appointment obligations other than those I self-impose. The hotel's breakfast buffet shifts its times a little earlier than I would have chosen, the pool and hot tub opening's a little later. There is an exercise room with a treadmill that I've not successfully operated and a recumbent cycle which I used as a surrogate, as exercise is more reliable when scheduled as an appointment with myself. Same with pills. I have two Torah portions to learn, one reasonably secure though not yet fluent, the other first beginning. Those are performed irrespective of where I am or whether OLLI is in session. Since food preparation is my daily task, one that I like doing, I still appreciate a few days of paying somebody else to do it.
And new experiences. While not much for Shopping Outlet Complexes, the one here far outstrips what we have at home. I suspect this place also employs hundreds. We have vineyards, though not on the scale that distributes through Loudon County. And our microbreweries and boutique independent coffee shops don't approach what we have sampled here.
Leesburg, whether as resident or visitor from DC, seems a good place to hang out, especially as a young, prosperous professional. As newlyweds, we lived in a place with abundant places to eat and visit. To some extent we did. Now we do what we usually do pretty much daily, but for a couple of breaks a year, it's good to seek out a place like this, a place where people of imagination create unique blends of things to eat and drink, while recognizing which parts of their historical heritage needs preservation and display.
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