Destinie’s DC Green Festival Trip

As a 24 year old who has never been out of the vicinity of South Bend, Indiana (aside from Chicago, Illinois and Niles, Michigan, lame I know), I was pretty excited to hear that I had won the extra ticket to the Washington, DC Green Festival. I was pretty nervous, having never been on a plane or so far from home, so my anxiety was running a bit high. I spent literally 2 weeks packing for a 4 day trip… very OCD. Then the day to leave finally arrived.

All the way to the airport I was about to pass out from nerves. But as soon as I got on the plane (which was very tiny) I felt a little bit better. Then it started to move. It kind of felt like being in a car, so I got more comfortable. It moved around the airport to get lined up for take off, then super shot to like a million miles an hour! (Needless to say, the seat I was sitting in has permanent indentations on the arm rests from my hands). After that the rest of the ride was actually quite fun. I popped in my headphones and turned on some super awesome music and parked my face looking out of the window. The clouds were so pretty so I took a ton of pictures. I’m actually excited to get back on a plane someday. I think that’s why I’ve never really gone anywhere, I pictured a horrible Richard Matheson scene on planes where would be something on the wing trying to take out the propellers. My imagination is one of a 5 year old.
The first day we were there we went to see all of the tourist sites. It was very cool. Everything was really beautiful, you really can’t tell how big something is just by seeing a picture of it. The Lincoln Memorial was HUGE! I felt kind of dumb when I saw it because I was telling everyone that I was going to try to sit on Abe Lincoln’s lap. Yeah, that wasn’t happening. We walked everywhere while we were there so my feet were very sore, but I was happy we did. It was really neat to see all of the buildings, they were so detailed and really cool. They were so eye-catching that I almost fell on my face looking up at them (luckily Kelly was beside me to catch me).

The Green Festival was amazing. It was cool talking to people about Better World Books, and seeing their reactions. It gave me a chance to see BWB through other people’s eyes. Everyone that I talked to was blown away by what we do at BWB. It was also funny how some people that were there already knew about Better World. One person told me that he had been buying his books from us for the past year or so. I also heard someone saying ‘Better World Books? Wasn’t that business created by those Notre Dame kids?’

So, that’s pretty much how my trip went. I also got to meet some really awesome people from the San Francisco and Atlanta offices. Cory, Eddie, Geoff, Christian, and Dana (you guys rock!) My eyes were totally opened to what else is out there besides this little town. And it will definitely not be another 24 years before I travel again.

–Destinie