take another piece of my heart

After leaving Dearborn & LaSalle, the only thing I could think of doing was going to a 7-11 and cleaning out the liquor cooler and passing out in the alley behind the hotel, but opted for something slightly less detrimental to my overall wellbeing.

I decided to try to catch some of the Cubs/Reds game I didn't think I'd be able to go to. I headed to State to catch the Red Line to Addison, popped to the ticket window, and got the cheapest seat I could ($24). The seat was pretty decent, considering, but I was wholly unprepared to be sitting outside in 4 degree Celcius weather for 5 innings. (I got there in the bottom of the third.) The Reds had just scored a run before I got into the stadium and nothing much happened until they scored another 2 runs in the 5th or 6th. It was a bit of a blur, faster than baseball generally seems on TV. For the 7th inning stretch, everyone got up and sang, swaying with friends, and I decided I should probably get the hell out of there before the end of the game. I imagine the train is hard to navigate with 38,784 people trying to ride it. At the end of the 8th when nothing happened I headed to the train and back to Harrison. There was a young robust femmey black man who started singing around Grand; he had a lovely voice and his friend kept egging him on, telling him to bring it if he was going to bring it. It made me smile even more when he sang a song for me. I think it might have been popular from American Idol. Whatever, I'll take it.

In the morning I got up stupidly early and took the #6 to Jackson Park. The walk around the Museum of Science & Industry was quite nice, but the farther away from the building I went, the more wooded the Wooded Island got. I can't imagine Olmsted had this in mind when he designed the park; it's much more unkempt than any landscape architect would allow. Still, excepting the rambunctious Canada geese that tried to dive bomb me, it was a pleasant walk. The Osaka Garden was serene, though I found it odd there weren't any cherry trees. (Actually, I saw just one cherry tree the entire time, which seems so strange since I've seen them yearly for the last decade. All cities don't have cherry blossoms? So sad.) I finally found the replica of the Statue of The Republic, an enormous golden overseer at the end of the grounds. I headed back to the bus, passing the old Midway, amazed that all that remains is the roadways, though I'm not sure what I expected more than 100 years after the fact.

After grabbing breakfast, I checked out and wandered around getting last glimpses of some of my favourite buildings for a while before dragging my suitcase over to Millennium Park for the requisite Cloud Gate photos. It's so hard not to take a bunch of pictures of that thing; it's so pretty! There were a few new public art pieces getting secured in the park, possibly in relation to the Modern Wing of the Art Institute that will be opening in a few weeks. I lined up for the AIC just before opening and wandered around the regular exhibits while waiting for my time in the Edvard Munch exhibit. I was more enamoured with the Yousuf Karsh exhibit, full of amazing photographs of the most notable faces in the 20th century. The Mrs. James Ward Thorne mini rooms are AMAZING, but I was starting to fade from waking at sunrise. A quick walk up Michigan to take a picture of public art, one last purchase of Cherry Coke, and I headed to the Blue Line to take me to O'Hare.

I hate leaving Chicago. When the plane touches down wherever I'm living at the time, it feels a little bit more like dread each time. This time my heart actually sank when I walked through the terminal. Maybe it's time to think about moving.