Manifest Destiny?

About three months ago my wife and I were flying back to D.C. from Milwaukee. My wife sat by the window, I sat in the middle, and another passenger sat to my left. After takeoff the passenger sitting next to me, an attractive middle aged woman with blonde hair, asked us if we were “going on vacation” or “back to school”. We get this a lot.

We answered that no, in fact we were going home. We live and work in D.C. She asked us where we lived, and we said “near RFK Stadium”.

This is the standard response we must give when engaged in this conversation. We actually live a number of blocks away from RFK but it’s the only landmark people will even occasionally be familiar with. It’s like telling Europeans that you live near New York City, when you’re actually from Hartford, because the truth will only confuse them.

Shockingly, she didn’t ask what an RFK Stadium was and instead asked for more details. In fact, she owned a number of fast food franchises in D.C.

We said that we owned a small rowhouse south of Benning Road, east of 15th Street, North of C Street, right in-between the Rosedale and Kingman Park neighborhoods.

She looked a little stunned and said, “Oh, so you’re pioneers.”

Years prior, our African-American real estate agent used this term when we expressed an interest in checking out Trinidad. At the time, it wasn’t so upsetting. But coming from the mouth of a well-dressed white woman it seemed distasteful.

After one too awkward seconds my wife said, “Well actually, people have been living there for about 80 years. The neighborhood was built in the 30s.” Then we uncomfortably turned back to our reading materials and tried to ignore each other for the rest of the flight.