May 2006, Trip to Chicago, Part 1. Arrival.

DIARY

First installment.

The night before we left Jess and I had called Tom and Michael, my godfather and his partner, to ask if we might be able to meet them for a visit. It was a mixed result: they were in town for the day, but only just barely since they're in the final stages of a very complicated move to Wisconsin Dells, WI. When Tom had mentioned "putting me to work," I initially thought it was a joke.

The alarm went off at four thirty AM and Jess and I set it back an hour. At five thirty, we got up and finished packing. I turned on the coffee maker and downed a couple cups and we were down to the Citibank to get some money and flag down a cab. Twenty minutes later, we arrived at La Guardia and boarded without incident. Jess slept off-and-on. I read through the flight and looked out her window. On the way up, we caught a view of all of Manhattan splayed out below us. Though we were only a mile or so high at that point, the effect was to seem very small, the distance from Central Park to the Battery not insurmountable and from the Hudson to Turtle Bay was negligible.

Sometimes my ears react very badly to flight, and I was in constant pain through the descent that didn't completely go away for several days.

After collecting out luggage, we went through a very familiar routine: following the yellow arrows out through the parking garage and down long corridors, boardind the 55, and watching the bungalows roll by. Some new buildings have been constructed along the way. The Garfield Red Line stop is essentially unchanged however. We got off the bus at Kimbark and walked a block south to Tom's.

As it turns out the furniture-loading suggestion was quite literal, but moving stuff is only wretched when you're short on time, when objects are poor quality and weigh a ton, basically when you're unprepared. Compared to myself and most of my friends, Tom and Michael had their shit together. We made several trips to the old house on Harper, which is a gorgeous old street (I think of Mary Poppins meeting the Addams Family). They took Jess and I out to lunch at Salonica which was more than enough (though the coffee was much needed) and then offered to let us stay at their place for the rest of the week, since they'd be gone.

This was a wonderful offer and very helpful; even though we spent most nights elsewhere, we had a considerable amount of luggage and being able to leave it in Hyde Park made the whole trip less stressful.

After Tom and Michael had left at about three, Jess and I took a nap. She set off to get a haircut, and I went down to Berston's playlot (?) for the incepting event of the 06 Scavhunt season.

END OF POST.