Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Stirring my oatmeal, the smells hit my nostrils and suddenly I am not here, but there, living on the south side, downtown, the South Loop. It is 2005. I am new. I am not at home, yet I feel more comfortable than I have in... years? Months? Ever?

I always get sentimental this time of year. Kids are graduating, others are closing another year, gearing up for the next. Some people are moving. Lots of people are getting married. Summer promises a lot, it seems. And I can't help but think about the promise of summer 2005, for me. Eighteen years old, headstrong, stubborn. I left Indianapolis, the only home I could remember, and the friends and streets and mochas and rebellions that made up my teenage years. In my head I had created a life for myself in Chicago. it was going to be fabulous.

Four years later... and it seems so much longer. And, finally, I feel fabulous. My life is completely different than I thought it would be. For the better, I will add. I would be miserable leading the life that eighteen year old had planned. But tonight, I am sentimental. For a late night snack, I chose a packet of instant oatmeal, Cinnamon Bun flavor. As I stirred the hot oats and water, I remembered eating the stuff every morning before walking uptown to my retail job off Michigan Avenue. In an instant I saw that first apartment, too expensive but too cute, a great first Chicago apartment, with its sideways view of the Sears Tower, its walking distance to both the Art Institute and the largest homeless shelter in the city. A far cry from the suburb I had been raised in. I heard the creaking utility closet door, the cat running past it to use the litter box. I heard the calm quiet of downtown weekend morning, all of the business suits slung over backs of chairs until Monday.

All that from some hot cereal.