Washington ? For once-powerful Republicans, there were two ways to get through Tuesday’s inauguration — and neither was entirely without pain.

Some, like former White House aide Suhail Khan, opted to stay in town and witness first-hand the historic transition, even though it meant hearing rebukes from the incoming president and sometimes worse from the inaugural crowd.

“The one sorry note were the boos for President Bush, Vice President (Dick) Cheney and Justice Roberts,” said Khan, who was among a group of former Bush aides standing just a short distance from Obama as he was sworn in by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.

“And singing the goodbye song,” Khan said. “That was uncalled for.”

Other GOP stalwarts, such as Ralph Reed, former head of the Christian Coalition, made the conscious decision to stay away. But that offered only so much protection.

“Even on television, it was a lot more emotional to watch George W. Bush depart the capital than I thought it would be,” Reed said. “It’s been more than 12 years that I have been involved with the Bush family political team, and it was difficult to watch it come to an end.”

Inaugurations tend to be dominated by celebratory imagery, and Tuesday’s event was a spectacle of historic dimensions.

But there is another side to the quadrennial ritual, an undercurrent of disappointment among those who are being replaced or watching their influence wane.

One of the city’s most influential Republican lobbyists, Dirk Van Dongen, left Washington for New York and watched the speech on television, glad to have left the traffic jams and sidewalks filled with Democrats.

“This is their party,” Van Dongen said. “And they should have an open and clean playing field to celebrate their victory.”

Other Republicans fled their homes in Washington for extra-long weekends in Aspen, Colo., or Palm Beach, Fla. Some who stayed found drink and sustenance at lobbyist-sponsored parties along the parade route, such as one hosted by the Carmen Group, a bipartisan Washingtonlobbying business, which took over the upper floors of National Council of Negro Women on Pennsylvania Avenue.

Some staunch Republicans said their frustration with the outcome of last November’s election was tempered this time by the historic nature of the transition. Khan, for instance, said he found much to like about Obama’s speech, noting that it sounded “conservative themes, like the need for individual responsibility and not depending solely on government.”