Sunday was equally amazing. As it became our tradition, when Lena comes in summer, we do Loop activities on Saturday and Rogers Park activities on Sunday. And once again, it’s great that she enjoys the same activities as me.
We started the day with a bike ride. In the past, Lena was way slower than me, and she said she didn’t do much biking this season either, but somehow, this time she kept pace with me without any issues. If I only knew, I would suggest her to wake up earlier, and we could bike all the way to the Field Museum. But even a relatively short (15 miles) ride was great!
This week, I didn’t take any time off, and moreover, I had something after work almost every day, so my guests were mostly on their own. I am glad that they finally realized that biking is a way to get around, that they were at the beach pretty much every day, and that they could explore the city on their own.
Today, the interested parties went to the Grant Park Music Festival concert. The highlight of today’s show was Rachmaninov’s “Rapsody on a Theme of Paganini,” with Clayton Stephenson as a piano soloist. That was an outstanding performance, and the audience was ecstatic. I bet my friends never heard Rachmaninov that way! Clayton Stephenson said that he thinks of this piece as American music (and he has good reasons for that if you ask me). And the way this piece was performed today – OMG, it was something! And definitely American 🙂
Before the concert, I took my friend to the Riverwalk, and then they finally had a chance to taste Chicago Hot Dog, so two more boxes were checked!
I am sitting in Terminal 5 of ORD, waiting for my friends from Helsinki to arrive. I know that the aircraft landed more than twenty minutes ago, but nobody can tell how long is the security line.
I have a full fridge and places for five people to sleep, and that’s exciting – I didn’t have any international guests since pre-pandemic, and that will be the first time I have international guests since I moved to Rogers Park.
The first line from today’s WBEZ newsletter says:
It’s a fact we Chicagoans hold dear: No city summers better than ours.
May 15 Reset (WBEZ newsletter) started with the following paragraph:
As a Chicagoan, taking a summer vacation is risky. You might enjoy yourself in Michigan or California or somewhere else, but is it worth missing a time when Chicago shines?Â
I can do long bike rides on weekdays before work!Blooming peonies by the train stationSweet Home Gelato is open!The fountains on the River Walk are operatingNothing to do with summer I just wanted to brag. We had Chef’s avocado toasts last Wednesday, and we could choose as many toppings as we wanted (yes, including caviar)
Of course, I mean going to the beach for the first time!
It was beach weather last weekend, but I didn’t have time to go, and today, although I had many different things on my list, I found an hour to spend lying down on the beach and listening to the waves.
The water was still cold, and although I walked into it, I did not want to immerse myself in it. It was after 6 PM, and the warmest part of the day was already over. Still, I was at the beach, by the lake. And as it always happens when I am at the beach, I was doing absolutely nothing. I didn’t bring anything to read with me. I didn’t even look at my phone. I was there at that moment, and that was the best thing.
On the way home, I looked at the weather forecast on my phone. I already knew that Sunday’s weather was going to be cooler, but I saw that it would be in the eighties again on Monday. I thought that if I went to work a little bit earlier and returned a little bit earlier, I would be able to spend an hour on the beach (and still visit Mom and do yoga). OMG, how blessed I am to live ten minutes from the Lake! And I have the whole summer ahead of me!
I returned home and smelled the smell of warm weather on my body, the smell of skin touched by the sun. The sweet fatigue of being out in the warm weather and finally coming back inside. The cool floor under my bare feet. All of it distinctly and unmistakably joined in one happy cord: it’s summer! Summer! Summer!
I know it’s not summer yet, and no matter what your views on that subject are, the earliest you can think about the start of summer is the Memorial Day weekend. Still, I tend to think that Mother’s Day marks the turn of the seasons. Before Mother’s Day, the 50s feel “warm,” and after Mother’s Day, the 50s feel “cold.”
It was beach weather on Mother’s Day, and after that, a couple of days of cooler weather felt like “give me my summer back!”
The problem with the past weekend was that it was soooo good! This was a God-given September, and the last weekend was the biggest gift, with the sunny sky, almost no wind, and the upper 70s.
I could not have it waster! Besides, I had some activities planned a while ago, and I didn’t want to skip them. And I am very happy with how it went:).
A long bike ride:
I saw Jupiter – more than once!And a supermoon!Long bike ideI saw maples turning redThe bees were on my balconyI was on the Historic Houses tourAnd I closed the season at the beach!Although it was almost 80F, the water was cold! I got into the water just out of principle – I had to close the season! And I said “Thank you” to the Lake!
There was also clinic escorting, and Georgia Apple Cake, and visiting with mom, and lots of other things, and talking with people, and many things which I wanted to do and didn’t have time to, but I still think I had my priorities straight.
My friend Lena, who used to live in Palatine, and now lives in Ann Arbor, is in Chicago again!
She is my only friend who moved away a while ago, but still,l we not only keep in touch but visit each other regularly. Moreover, through the years, we came up with the annual visit schedule: she visits me for Christmas cookies baking, for the Chicago Botanic Garden Orchid Show in spring, and for one summer weekend, and I visit her at the end of summer.
This time, in spite of completely unpredictable weather, we had an almost perfect weekend. The only item on our agenda that we didn’t check was a Millennium Park concert, and that’s because of the rain – again! Actually, I am sort of proud of us because we waited for the first rain to stop, still went to the Riverwalk, had a nice dinner facing the Chicago River, and then looked at the forecast and saw that the rain was about to start again, and when back home instead of tempting our good fortune :).
We visited the Art Institute, saw the Van Gough exhibit and Japanese drawings, had lunch there, went to the Lurie Garden, then – to the Field Museum for the Kings of Europe exhibit and 3D dinosaurs movies, and then to the beat the rain and still made it to the Riverwalk 🙂
Today, we went for an early morning bike ride, then, after breakfast, went to the Glenwood market and then – to the beach.
Finally, it’s that time of summer when the lake is warm, even in the morning. I think it was the first time this summer that I could lay on the sand and do nothing for an hour!
(I am still three chapters behind in the book, and still have piles of work, but I am glad I am not giving up on my summer :))
Hettie's Reflections 