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.

Folks, it’s sunny here! Sun! Blue skies! Sun!

(Okay, as anyone from New England knows, a clear bright day in the middle of winter means cold weather is impending. But, really, it’s only just around freezing right now, so I don’t think it’s that bad out. This weekend might be another story, when I plan to stand outside for hours at a free concert, but for today, it just adds to my general giddiness.)

And on that note, I offer you three beautiful things from the past week:

1. Monday mornings are tough normally and this week was even harder than usual. I am feeling glum as I hurry from the metro station to my office, when I pass an older woman on the sidewalk. Our eyes meet and I smile reflexively. She smiles back and the day feels more possible.

2. A possum skirts the window well on her way out into the neighborhood just about 8 every night. None of the cats have noticed until this week when Della is on my lap when it happens. She was also there last night when a raccoon waddled past. If it weren’t so cold by the window, I suspect she’d set up camp to watch for intruders…

3. I win the December raffle of free cookies from AlbuqCookie, a company I learned about from the knitblogger who did their photography back this summer. The owner contacted me to find out where he should send my prize and I told him he’d brightened my sick day. When the cookies arrived, he’d included a note hoping the cookies would help me feel better. (The cookies, you ask: Chocolate piñon biscotti. Delicious. Solid without being hard. Definitely fresh. High quality chocolate and tasty pine nuts… From a previous purchase I can also recommend their pistachio chocolate chip biscotti (which have cranberries in them) and their green chile pecan sandia cookies, which have more kick than the chocolate pepper chile shortbread.)

Three beautiful things from the week past:

1. The long-haired guy who sings and plays his guitar at various D.C. Metro stops is at mine for my return to work on Friday. I smile as I pass and I hear him over the speaker as I continue down the street saying he hopes his music makes our days cheerier and to remember that God loves us. I feel like I’ve had a benediction from Mr. Rogers.

2. Not taking Friday off meant that I got a work blog post up (I learned about albatross), which, in turn, meant that Monday wasn’t nearly as painful as it might otherwise have been.

3. I have puttered away the day before Rudi finally coaxes me out into the world. The day is waning as we walk to the grocery store, so we decide to divert to Georgetown for a hot drink to sip as the sun sets.