Recent talk about the “deep state,” with its suggestion of machinations being carried out by stealthy federal administrators, brings to mind my life in a Washington suburb in the late 1980s.
From 1986 until we moved to Pennsylvania in 1990, my family and I resided in a part of Bethesda bordering on Rockville (or was it a part of Rockville bordering on Bethesda?).
From there I commuted every day to work as senior editor of The World and I, a gargantuan monthly put out by the Washington Times Corporation that eventually folded. Being in Washington was not an entirely negative experience. Most of my colleagues and the authors whom we paid to write for us were decent sorts. And I made some friendships that have survived until the present day. But there were other things that I found intolerable about living near our nation’s capital, for example, the commute each way through twenty miles of traffic and the generally sterile Washington environment. I was certainly not exaggerating when in the autobiographical part of my recent anthology of essays, Revisions and Dissents, I stated that for me, living in a Washington suburb was “a foretaste of Hell.” After being there for a few weeks, I came to the conclusion that someone who enjoyed life in Washington “must be either a political junkie or someone who is being paid huge wads of money for stress-laden time.”
Most of the restaurants I frequented or agreed to meet people at were appallingly overpriced and usually served mediocre food. They reminded me of Woody Allen’s quip about two disgruntled, elderly Jewish ladies at a Catskill hotel. One complained, “This food is terrible.” The other observed: “I know and such small portions!” There may be exceptions to this general impression, but during my years in Washington, I rarely dined in a pleasant, moderately priced restaurant. And let me express another gripe: In New York, Boston, San Francisco, and even Chicago and Philadelphia, one encounters lots of artsy types or at least interesting eccentrics, but in D.C., most of those who filled the Metro and other places where Washingtonians (assuming such humans exist) congregate, were depressingly uninteresting. They worked mostly in public administration, or were lobbyists.
Each time I plunged into a Metro train, I found myself surrounded by administrators on their way to work in their “official clothing,” which consisted of dull-looking sports jackets and equally faded trousers. These commuters were usually self-importantly preoccupied with their briefcases. While on the train, I welcomed the tourists who dropped in from the American hinterlands. These visitors brought if nothing else sartorial variation and inquisitive faces. The District closed down after work hours, and although there were some signs of nocturnal life around Dupont Circle on weekends, what there was of urban activity, seemed mostly correlated to the operation of Congress and the myriad government offices. The observation that I heard repeatedly that “Washington is a company town, and the company is the federal government” was unfortunately all too true.
From all reports, the “company town” has developed a more interesting nightlife, particularly for the under-thirty crowd, than what I found there in the 1980s. But from my travels to Washington since I moved away in the late 1980s, it seems that its social and cultural appeal is much less than what is available in other major American cities and certainly in at least a half dozen European capitals.
It is entirely possible that some of my readers may have a much more positive impression of Washington and its environs. They may find that what for me amounted to a human desert to be a warm, charming society featuring excellent cuisine and perpetually stimulating company. I won’t deny that human tastes and experiences differ, but on the basis of living in the Washington burbs for five years, I can honestly say that I’ve never experienced a less congenial living space. And that’s even without factoring in the summer humidity and the Monsoon season, which started sometime in August and which left the ground floor of our ridiculously overpriced split-level flooded with dirty, fetid water.
