Mustard shirt: Target * Maxi skirt: Target * Belt: Akira * Flats: GC, thrifted * Military jacket (unworn): thrifted * Bag: thrifted * Necklace: Tree & Kimball (Serpentine necklace)
It was hot this weekend. Hot for the first time this year, and all of a sudden the city just turned on. Chicagoans come out of hiding in the summer, and as the temperatures rise, people emerge from their seasonal cocoons and head to the lake (granted, I think there were just as many people out and about during the snowpocalypse, but that was different). Sunday was the first day when we felt as though that cocoon was worth leaving, and there were people, in droves, just being outside.
Someone asked me recently if Chicago is a friendly city. I paused, and said "no". People don't make eye contact much here, or greet you on the street, and there's not a big sense of friendliness among the population. I have to qualify my answer now, though, because what Chicago may lack in bubbly effervescence, it more than makes up for in communal identity. There's a sense of sticking things out, together, that Chicagoans embrace. We (I guess I'm a part of it now) are unified in some way, connected and bonded, together against (or with) the world. That was especially clear to me on Sunday. People were suddenly making eye contact with each other, and quietly, calmly, nodding in agreement about the beauty of the much-needed, and long-awaited, warm weather. We owned the day, as residents of the city, and enjoyed it together.
I spent most of the day wandering through the humidity, out to the lake, and along the lakeshore path. I noticed, as I walked, how different the lake shore looks this year than it has before. This winter has absolutely ravaged the shore of Lake Michigan, leaving giant slabs of concrete cracked and akimbo, and debris from the shore scattered along the coast. It's beautiful, in a way, and feels remote and abandoned, but it's also sad and a bit scary. Every time I've been out there since the weather turned, I think about what it must have been like to be right there on the shore when those winter storms rolled in. It's a poignant reminder of the power of nature. Chicago may be a huge city, with resources, and people, and a unified sense of self. But when the storms roll in, it's just a place, as vulnerable as any.
Parts of the lake shore are totally exposed to the city. You can see the buildings, hear the cars, and smell the exhaust from Lake Shore Drive. But parts are separated, isolated, protected (in part by the cracked concrete slabs, which, jutting up out of the lake just so create a man-made and nature-created barrier from the city). I found one of those spots on my Sunday walk. A little cove of rocks and algae and driftwood that, although I was literally throwing distance from the hundreds of bikers, runners, and families that were out that day, was completely removed from the noise and motion of the day. I explored my little area, took my shoes off and stuck my feet in the (freezing) cold water, and took a nap on a particularly welcoming rock. Laying there, I felt like I was adrift at the end of the world. All I could see was water, stretching out forever, and I forgot, for a moment, where I really was.
The day was beautiful. In all of the weekends in the past few months, I've felt that I needed a true break, a moment of relaxation and some time to recover from the speed and stress of my life. Each Monday I've felt a bit more tired, and each Friday I've been more ready for a few days off. All I needed, apparently, was an hour or two away from it all, lying on my perfect napping rock, and watching the gentle turquoise water roll through the rocks and nooks of the lake shore.
Title song: Prince, "The Max"
