Downtown Chicago, like most major cities, is populated by an intimidating forest of gigantic metal trees, each staring down imposingly upon the small, fleshy inhabitants who wend their way in between the massive trunks with their reddened faces set grimly into the biting wind.
Wind can be comforting - a mother's caress on smooth baby skin, a lover's hand run intimately through your hair – but in Chicago the wind is hostile and venomous. The long corridors of skyscrapers perfectly funnel the cold air from off Lake Michigan and throw it with expert precision, like a ninja chucking metal stars, right into your face. It's not fast; it doesn't want to knock you over in one sudden gust. It prefers instead to chill you slowly, grinding down your spirit until you lose the will to live. It's murderous, that wind; it wants to kill you. You can feel it.
The denizens of the windy city seem accustomed to this malevolent force in their midst, and, in defiance of its power, go about their way, adamantly continuing to exist – millions of them. Yet even they, upon ducking inside through a revolving door, seem to shudder with a relief that comes from knowing that you've escaped some inexplicable danger and lived to tell the tale.
If all this seems pessimistic and dismal, its because I'm tired. I've just returned from our third largest city, where I spent the last five days on what was called a “vacation” but wasn't really. I don't mean to imply that I didn't enjoy myself, or that I would have rather stayed here at work; quite the contrary, it was a refreshing change of pace from the day to day monotony of the nine to five trap. Chicago is a great city, filled with museums and theaters and delicious restaurants, but that wind! I was totally unprepared for it.
I arrived in Chicago Sunday afternoon full of hope and expectation and anxiety: energy! I had trouble sleeping, my mind was alert and calculating. Now I am empty, out of gas, ready to sleep for days. My mind is a muddled mass, a fat man wheezing at the top of the stairs. I had first attributed this change to the rather stressful process I put myself through this week, but now I'm not so sure. Perhaps I'm merely paranoid, or just extremely tired, but I could almost swear that it was the wind that wore me down, the sapped my vitality and youthfulness away. Maybe if I'd have stayed another week I would not have survived.
You have to be strong to stand in the face of the wind. I thought I was strong enough, once, but now I know better.
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