Saturday was the first time I cried in Chicago. I guess I should be proud of making it more than a week, but I'm not. Where do I begin? On Friday, I started to feel an ear infection coming on, so after a painful night of sleep, I put on a sweatshirt, some leggings and ventured to the nearest urgent care facility. This place was almost 2 miles away, but I didn't think the walk would be that bad, being that it was a straight shot. So, it takes me about an hour to walk to this place and I'm dripping with sweat, my Elon sweatshirt clinging to my back because I'm so hot and my feet are killing me from being suffocated in rain boots for so long, but I made it, so I check in and everything goes great because I was right: I did/do have an ear infection. I tell my really cute doctor to just send the prescription to the pharmacy down the street, I'll pick it up, hop on the train and ride all the way back home. I go to this fancy Walgreens: 3 floors, escalators, really clean - the whole deal. And I'm amazed that a Walgreens can look like this, but since I've walked 2 neighborhoods away and found myself in Wicker Park, where a lot of things seem to be fancy and its overcrowded with salons, I can only assume this is normal in Chicago. This pharmacist tells me that he has given me more than I was prescribed, which he thought wouldn't be a big deal, but it has bumped my prescription for ear drops to $110 - ear drops! So we go back and forth, me shocked at the price, him trying to figure out where to send it, so finally I tell him I'll call him, avoiding his eye at the misfortune of my life of getting sick and having to pay over $100 for a tiny bottle of ear drops, and I run out of the obnoxious store before I end up crying in public.
I see the blue line sign, so I walk towards it, frustrated and in pain, and I see a sign: BEST DONUTS IN CHICAGO. Keep walking, you can't afford a donut, but still, I turn around and dig in my purse for the little bit of cash I have somehow managed to hold onto and flirt with the donut guy, talking about Columbus (he was just there) and what foods to eat there, and I leave with 3 glamorous donuts. I Blue Line it home, thinking that the only way this could get worse would be if someone was going to rob me for my donuts, my phone, my change purse, etc and imagining the breakdown that would ensue, the swearing, the violent attack on the imagined criminal with my umbrella, and the eventual sobbing of losing my possessions. Fortunately, my donuts and I made it home, beating the rain, and in my empty apartment (my roommate gone for the weekend) the pitiful sobbing began.
Overwhelmed, frustrated, broke and in pain, all I could ask myself was: should I have come to Chicago or should I have just stayed in Ohio?
I like to pride myself on my spontaneity and trusting that fate/life/God will guide me in the right direction when it comes down to it, but Chicago was a last minute decision. A non-refundable deposit I put down because I wanted to get an MFA and further my learning and career. So far, there have been a lot of things that should have made me back out and not move here, but I did it anyway, trusting that this is the right move - the only move that would make sense, and yet still, Chicago has shown me very little reception. Sure, I've done a few things and met a few people and gone a few places, but there is a nagging girl with relaxed hair smoking a cigarette in the back of my brain and she crushes the butt with her dirty Sperry before telling me that I did the wrong thing. I hate that girl, it's okay, it's a mutual feeling. And I want to prove her wrong. I didn't come to a city where I knew no one to go to a school I knew very little about to end up feeling bad about myself and unworthy of the artists this city has nurtured. I came here to learn and make art, so I will suffer these awkward beginning months and hopefully by the brutal winter, this city will have learned that I'm here to stay for the next three years (at least), so they better get used to it.
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