I have always loved the Washington DC Metro system, from the first time that I saw it when I was twelve years old. My grandparents had a tradition, that they took each grandchild for a trip to the capital when they turned twelve, to see the government and various national museums. We stayed in a hotel out along the Metro red line near the zoo, went there and to the FBI and to see the Constitution, the Smithsonian National Air and Space museum, and Congress, but the thing that made the biggest impression on me of all was the subway. All of the stations are these beautiful futuristic tunnels, and the trains whoosh-sigh into them on cushioned tires, so different than the rattling clanking bangs of most subways. I felt like I had entered the future, and even now, when I travel the DC Metro professionally as a working scientist, I am reminded of that boyhood memory and feel an echo of its joy.
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