Via Chicago

I was wandering through a street fair on a residential street on the North Side of Chicago, somewhere in Wrigleyville or close by. There were lots of good food stands, people having yard sales, and kids and dogs playing in the street.

I had less than a day in town on a layover, and I decided to try to give a friend a call to meet up but my cell phone wouldn’t work. Since it was a newer model with a Qwerty-style keyboard, I tried to text and found that the damn thing wouldn’t turn on. Instead, I decided to head for the roundhouse that I’d be bunking in for part of the 18 hours I’d be in town. It was getting cloudy anyway and I didn’t feel like getting caught in the rain.

I got to the roundhouse and walked in without knocking. Down a long flight of wooden stairs in a giant, domed room filled with furniture covered in sheets there were six beds, a couple occupied. One of the occupants greeted me and I felt like I knew who it was though I couldn’t see the face. Someone else came up and greeted me and offered to take me in the elevator up to the roof to show me the view. And what a view it was! Lake Michigan gleamed green only a two blocks away, though the sky was a very dark greenish gray. The sun (it was too bright to be the moon, wasn't it?) was smaller than usual and hung over the upper right hand corner of the horizon.

The view was so beautiful I decided to sleep on the cot up there. As I dozed I heard waves crashing on the shore. Big waves. I sat up to see water crashing through the residential streets and up against our building which, oddly enough was now a six story brownstone. My host told me this was perfectly normal. I called my Chicago friend on my cell phone (which was now my old model again) and he seemed annoyed that I was calling him at 11:50pm on a workday. 11:50pm? That's what the clock on my phone said too. But the sun (I think it was the sun) was still out! Was Chicago now so far north that they had midnight sun in the summer time? Or was it night time and the moon was ten times brighter than it had ever been?

My host pointed toward the lake as a wave broke over the top of the building, soaking me. I looked out toward the lake again and now the sky was fully green, and the water was reaching the top of the building not by flooding everything below but by flowing like a thin stream through the streets and up the walls. I wanted to get a picture of this, but I didn’t have my camera. I ran back down into the big round room with the furniture and searched my luggage (which had arrived of its own accord) to no avail.

And then I woke up. That’s what I get for falling asleep after watching Top Chef based in Chicago, I guess.