Three beautiful things from the past week:

1. Gramma’s quilt came off the needles last night while I was at knitting group. It’s been a long time since I’ve finished something with other knitters around, who always know how to make you feel terrific about a mostly complete (still in need of end-weaving and blocking) object.

2. Rudi and I were thwarted in our efforts to go to a movie on my birthday by virtue of the fact that it was also a Saturday night and Valentine’s Day. We’ll see Coraline yet, but in the meantime we were able to rent a movie from iTunes in an attempt to salvage our evening. I downloaded A Night at the Museum to our laptop — and then promptly fell asleep before the opening credits even ran. (We spun it up again the following night so I could catch it before our rental period ended.

3. Friday I head out into downtown Chicago in search of lunch. I’d eaten at the Corner Bakery the day before, so I knew that was a fallback if I didn’t find anything quickly, but another street down and two over I came across a wine and cheese shop that also served sandwiches. I had a baguette packed with goat cheese, avocado, celery, and pesto as well as a local micro-brewed rootbeer. Delicious!

Grey Kitten had asked me to note three beautiful things from my birthday — and I did:

1. Rudi thoughtfully flew out to Chicago to spend the weekend with me. He offered backrubs and breakfast runs and moral support on a day that didn’t turn out quite the way either of us had hoped it would.

2. I work with some wonderful women who, in the middle of their own running around and long work days during our conference, bought me cards and a cake. It was above and beyond. And the cake was delicious.

3. The city of Chicago surprised me with a birthday show. Caught unawares, we rushed down the hallway when we started hearing booms around 6:30. We were in time to catch most of a Valentine’s Day fireworks show reflected in a building across the river from us. Apparently they were being launched (possibly by Donald Trump’s company?) from the bridge just down the street from our hotel.

How did it get to be quarter to four in the morning? I could have sworn it was just two… Anyway, before I load up my iPod, finish my packing, and head to bed for a few minutes to get a little shuteye pre-flight, I thought I’d better offer up three beautiful things from the past week:

1. The Dupont escalators have been particularly bad this last week, often with none of them working. (In case anyone’s forgotten, the rise-to-run ratio of the stationary escalator makes it more difficult to climb than normal stairs. Plus, it’s something like three stories straight up…) I come across an older woman who probably ought to have waited for an elevator. A 20-something man has taken her rolly bag from her already and pauses to offer her an additional hand. “Lean on me,” he urges, blocking traffic from shoving past her. “It’ll make it easier.” At the top, he hands her bag back to her and wanders off.

2. Walking back from the bank last Friday, I see snowdrops blooming by the Smithsonian. This week, bulbs are starting to push their shoots through the ground, and the corner house has forsythia blooming by their stairs.

3. The last few weeks the flower vendor at the farmers’ market has had tulips for sale. I always pick an assortment to sit in a vase atop our refrigerator. This week’s bouquet was a frilly yellow one, a restrained magenta one, and one that’s yellow with bright fiery red-orange tips.

Today would not be one of the good days, which is why it’s all the more important to think of some of the beautiful things that I saw this afternoon. Here are just three:

1. The water in one of the “bays” off the Potomac near the airport sparkles, reflecting the clear, cold blue sky and brilliant midday sun.

2. Leaving the airport, I wonder if I will end up in D.C. or on Spout Run Parkway. Rudi assures me each time I pick him up from the airport that the detour is not necessary and that roads in Virginia do NOT move about like Hogwarts staircases. I mentally pat myself on the back when I notice the sign that offers me the exit for Memorial Bridge and correctly make the turn. Self-congratulations, it turns out, is a bit early, as I fail to exit the highway and end up back on my timeworn path. A final escape is offered to me, though, and I find myself off the highway, next to my parents’ old apartment complex. A twisty jaunt through Georgetown and I’m back in Dupont Circle.

3. I circle the neighborhood hunting for a parking spot … for nearly an hour. Each time I approach the light at Florida and Phelps, it turns red. Finally, I say aloud, “I’m getting pretty sick of this. What am I missing?” Turn right, drive a block, and the final spot a block from my house is open with nary a car in sight. I hope I hadn’t driven past it twenty times.

If it’s Thursday, it’s time for Three Beautiful Things from the past week:

1. Yesterday after I found out I had to work on my Saturday birthday, I let myself indulge in bad behavior. I ate a slice of cheese pizza for lunch and followed it up with hot cocoa and M&M’s. (There isn’t much that chocolate and cheese can’t fix…) I spent several hours with the knitting group. And I came home and wrote yesterday’s list (which I’d started contemplating earlier in the afternoon). And y’know what? I really do feel better about it all today.

2. The sock I’m currently working on is being knit with yarn that changes colors as you go along (i.e., the yarn itself is dyed different colors; it’s not like a mood ring…). The colors remind me of the rainbow sherbet my brother used to order at Friendly’s when we were kids.

3. Yesterday morning I came outside to a world coated in ice. Ice storms are nasty things in general, as they make travel quite tricky and sometimes dangerous. But they also give a shiny glass-coated appearance to everything, as if a fairy has come along and touched all the trees and bushes with her magic wand.

This week has been filled with Inaugural activities, most of them positive. Sure there have been long lines, cold temperatures, delays, and tourists (lots and lots of them) wandering the city with delighted, if dazed expressions on their faces. But at the same time, there were no arrests, a visiting Metro volunteer saved the life of a woman who fell onto the tracks in front of an oncoming train, and people were generally pleasant and patient regardless of somewhat trying conditions. So I’ll offer you three beautiful things from what I’ve seen around the nation’s capital:

1. A young woman wearing fairy wings is ahead of me in the volunteer line at RFK.

2. A little girl and I converse on the Metro Wednesday morning about the Inauguration. “What was your favorite part of yesterday?” prodded her father. “The candy.”

3. At the concert on Sunday, they ask everyone to please remain in their seats while the Obamas exit the premises. A crowd of half a million share a wave of laughter because only 200 or so lucky souls have seats. I hear it again on Tuesday (but this time on CNN) when they make the same announcement to the two million people who’ve been standing on the Mall for hours.