tales

The past week has been pretty interesting. On Wednesday, I had lunch with the friend from high school--the one who I mentioned a little while back. It was really nice to catch up with her. We have the type of friendship where you pick up right where you left off and it never really feels as though there has been a gap in seeing each other. Of course, we would like to see each other more often, but you know what I mean.

On Thursday, I went to the gym after work and then decided to sit outside and read in order to kill some time before meeting some people for dinner. Well, my nice read in the sun, on the grass, by the river quickly turned sour when someone tried to steal my purse. This teenage kid came up behind me and tried to grab my purse, which was sitting beside me. Unfortunately for him, I had the purse straps around my wrist; I assume that he couldn't see that because my book may have been covering that area. So he caught the purse on my arm, realized that his plan wasn't so simple anymore, and dropped the purse. He proceeded to make his getaway. I yelled, but another guy sitting in the same area had already seen what happened and went running after the kid. I didn't know quite what to do, but I felt like I needed to follow too. I ran up the steps to the street level and started crossing the bridge. By the time I made it there in my heels, the guy was already walking back. He hadn't caught the kid. He told me that he had seen this kid and his thief-mates watching me. That unnerved me more than anything. I mean, I guess I looked nice; I was wearing a dress and was ready to go out to a nice dinner, but to think that I was being targeted was not exactly a warm fuzzy feeling.

I left the area where I was. I felt completely shaken and had a sudden desire to go inside somewhere. As though a coffee shop would provide a security blanket or something. That night I had trouble sleeping. I kept replaying the whole incident in my head.

Friday was much better. I went to the Second Friday in Pilsen with Jared, which was really fun...and appetizing. Most of the galleries and studios had some food and wine out. At one house/gallery, we found these really yummy ham sandwiches on spiced rolls. I still don't know what was in that roll, but it made my stomach happy. In the gallery next to that one, we ran into my brother in his girlfriend, which was really nice. I hadn't seen my brother in a couple of months and in that time, he had grown a full beard. With that run-in being probably the best part of the evening, the second best thing--tied with those sandwiches--would have to be the amazing, private gardens that were behind some of these houses. You can't see them normally, since they're fenced in, so it was quite a treat. In one area, the backs of two rows of houses faced each other and they shared this lovely, large garden in between, which was complete with a fountain and lots of seating.

Saturday got busy fast, but it was good busy. We went to the gym pretty early, then cleaned up and went to the Cultural Center to get tickets for the loop train tour. The tour was really fun and educational. We went around the loop three times. The first time, the guide spoke about Chicago history. The second time, she spoke about the buildings/architecture on the inner side of the loop. The third and final time around, she spoke about the buildings/architecture on the outer side of the loop. When the tour was over, we stayed on the train to go to the Garfield Park Conservatory. I had been wanting to see the Niki in the Garden exhibit. I'm not quite sure what I was expecting, but I felt a little disappointed in the sculptures. A few of my favorites were the guardian lions, the giant skull (but really only the inside) and the cat with the bench inside.

On the way back, we decided to look around the art fair that was taking place outside of the NBC tower and Tribune building. Jared ended up having a lengthy conversation with a glass artist, Scott Hartley. I looked at every single piece while listening in to all of the interesting things being said.

I went to bed early that night and it's a good thing I did because I needed my strength to stand up to the sun and the heat on Sunday. Monika and I went out to Rosemont to Wolff's Flea Market. There were so many vendors and we saw maybe half of them. My buys for the day included a shirt, three old spools of fun-colored thread, some old photographs and nectarines. I came home happy, but exhausted and somewhat sunburned. I think Monika felt the same way. Good times.

[Photo credit to H. Anderson, copyright the Field Museum, "Street scene in the community of Pilsen"]