freaking out on the inside since 1981

can i tell you how awesome the national arboretum is?  its best quality is certainly its solitude, which is code for the fact that the assholes who live in adams morgan don’t bother missing their mimosa brunches to check out this leafy happy enclave.  this is sincerely the only place in DC you can travel to and feel rejuvenated and vaguely naturey.  it is fantastic.

the arboretum has got this koi pond that has mutated into a freakshow over the past year.  they’ve allowed the fish to be fed way past their need/prime and now you’ve got true mutants literally falling over themselves for some pellets.  it’s a sick sick happening but i can’t resist snapping photos each and every time.

there’s a bonsai section, as well as a slow-growing conifers lair, but my heart happens to be committed to the particular section that we nearly died in just ten short weeks ago.  we wandered the azaleas section even as the thunder threathened and rumbled and, sure enough, we became trapped refugees beneath the hostile pine.  i don’t know exactly what impulse compelled me to seek shelter beneath a tree in a lightening storm but i survived even as i didn’t deserve to.  i’m glad i’m alive!  the national arboretum taught me a lesson.

here is a vaguely scary butterfly, in drier days.

they (admittedly) dye their water and the result is this eerie, reflective narcissistic trek.  not that matt’s bein’ narcissistic in that photo.  he is a very modest man.

there’s a pond in the azalea section full of finicky amphibians who take these really graceful dives into the murky water.  it is without a doubt our favorite part.  this particular amphibian was a victim of the fight/flight/freeze conundrum.  he was so spooked that we couldn’t get him to move for anything.

we love the arboretum!  and hope it stays its vaguely-lonely, koi-inhabiting, tree-happy self.  it’s sort of a pain to get to, but totally lovely to frolic in.  i think it’s probably our favorite dc place.  go.  but only if you’re great.