We Finally Went

For the past 9 months we have driven weekly past the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum on SMU campus. We often commented, we need to go visit that museum sometime while we are here in Dallas.  Well yesterday after class, we finally did it; and we are sure glad we did!  We spent 2 hours roaming from display to display and reliving the presidency of George W. Bush and his wife Laura. We saw artifacts, documents, and audiovisual presentations.  In addition, we reviewed guiding principles and remembered events such as 9/11, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and other major events and initiatives of this administration. A favorite exhibit was the replica of the Bush era Oval Office and a similar but smaller version of the Rose Garden. While in this part of the museum as we admired the desk and items on it, a photographer asked Dad if he would like to be president and sit in the chair behind the  desk to have a picture taken.  Dad quickly said he had no desire to be president! Still, it was fun to learn a little bit about life in the White House. Bush's two daughters, Jenna and Barbara, presented on video in one of the theaters some of the lighter moments of their dad's time as president and gave us a taste of his sense of humor.

A special exhibit that is currently in the Bush Center for a few months is called, "Presidential Retreats Away from the White House." Here we learned about Camp David, Walker's Point, and several other ranches (like the LBJ Ranch and Prairie Chapel Ranch) where recent presidents often visited in order to be privately with family, celebrate holidays, entertain dignitaries  and escape the bubble of Washington D.C. Seeing these display almost inspired us to come home and buy a ranch where our family could gather on holidays and summer vacations. The presidents made some great memories spending time together with friends and loved ones at these retreats.

I case it appears from our blog that we seldom work and only have fun on our mission, you might be interested in knowing that we just finished one of our busier weeks as we taught our regular classes, and in addition to ours, we taught our S/I coordinator's classes, too.  He has been in training with other CES personnel all week. 

Because our campus classes are ending this month due to the end of the semester (UTD Institute class ended Wednesday), and because the high school year is quickly approaching graduation, we are nearing the end of our 12-month mission. With less than two weeks to go, we have only 2 more institute classes to teach - a relief but also accompanied by a touch of sadness.

We'll end this post with a favorite quote: