So far I have loved my time in Chicago. It has been exactly what I needed after graduate school. The adventures I am having are just the right size for my expectations right now. Some days they involve getting drenched on a boat tour; on others they are heels that I wear and practice as a child playing dress up would. Someday I will write about wearing heels and the pain and fun of it all. I have been a lifelong flat wearer. But every once in a while I will enjoy heels. Meanwhile, I soak the bustle of a big city.
I enjoy the city, the weather, the exciting things to do, the friends I have made. I savor it all knowing that this is temporary, this life comes with an expiry date. And the date will come, whether I want it or not. Time is flying. Between work and catching up and new people and new places and naps and books. It is the exact fix for the wounds of being in grad school, which sometimes felt like quicksand and as a friend put it, wading through molasses. Right now, it is the exact opposite of it.
I enjoy the travel. I have always loved trains and buses, all the more when I can sit in them. This is the weekend of a big music festival downtown. This means barely-clad teenagers, drinking from innocuous cups and perhaps already high. This means having to witness a spitting competition as kids ran up the stairs and spat on their friends on the escalator. I was glad to be back home. I am too old for this shit.
Street harassment is a problem. Today at the train station the same man who tried to talk to me weeks ago tried to talk to me again, asking where I lived, was I just passing through, did I work here. I mostly ignored him. He went away for a while and then as I was boarding the bus, said have a nice day. I ignored him so he said it loudly again and I felt compelled to mutter thanks to him. For a while this evening, I actually felt bad for not being thankful or nice enough. And this is the problem. What I feel and should rightly feel is rage, rage against the misogyny, the patriarchy, that makes me question my own decency, niceness and my clothes. I definitely question my clothes in Chicago. Even as I enjoy the feel of summer on my limbs, I carry a protective layer, wrap a sweater around a dress. All of this is a problem. It is not my fault but it becomes my problem. It is not the worst ever but if we all used that as a measure of things, very little would change.
I have been writing. A lot. Which I like and enjoy. I know that more and more writing is the only way I will improve. It helps that this writing is targeted and content focused. It helps that I can apply a feminist lens to this writing. It is also helpful in taking me away from the usually social media black hole.
I read The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins yesterday. I will say it reminded me A LOT of Gone Girl. It was a good thriller, a quick read, a Thursday evening well spent, far better than binge-watching Netflix - this was the whole reason I started the book, I just wanted something that would be distracting, easy to finish. Sometimes the weekday evenings can be really long. That being said, it felt like an averagely written book. A good book makes me stop, pause at the sentences, read them and read them again to absorb all they mean. Sentences and paragraphs in a good book are like a punch to the gut, the kind of punch that helps you toughen up. Everyone was pretty fucked up in this book, which of course is real life, but there wasn't all that much interesting about them. I found myself far more on the edge with Gone Girl, both in the book and the movie.
I enjoy the city, the weather, the exciting things to do, the friends I have made. I savor it all knowing that this is temporary, this life comes with an expiry date. And the date will come, whether I want it or not. Time is flying. Between work and catching up and new people and new places and naps and books. It is the exact fix for the wounds of being in grad school, which sometimes felt like quicksand and as a friend put it, wading through molasses. Right now, it is the exact opposite of it.
I enjoy the travel. I have always loved trains and buses, all the more when I can sit in them. This is the weekend of a big music festival downtown. This means barely-clad teenagers, drinking from innocuous cups and perhaps already high. This means having to witness a spitting competition as kids ran up the stairs and spat on their friends on the escalator. I was glad to be back home. I am too old for this shit.
Street harassment is a problem. Today at the train station the same man who tried to talk to me weeks ago tried to talk to me again, asking where I lived, was I just passing through, did I work here. I mostly ignored him. He went away for a while and then as I was boarding the bus, said have a nice day. I ignored him so he said it loudly again and I felt compelled to mutter thanks to him. For a while this evening, I actually felt bad for not being thankful or nice enough. And this is the problem. What I feel and should rightly feel is rage, rage against the misogyny, the patriarchy, that makes me question my own decency, niceness and my clothes. I definitely question my clothes in Chicago. Even as I enjoy the feel of summer on my limbs, I carry a protective layer, wrap a sweater around a dress. All of this is a problem. It is not my fault but it becomes my problem. It is not the worst ever but if we all used that as a measure of things, very little would change.
I have been writing. A lot. Which I like and enjoy. I know that more and more writing is the only way I will improve. It helps that this writing is targeted and content focused. It helps that I can apply a feminist lens to this writing. It is also helpful in taking me away from the usually social media black hole.
I read The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins yesterday. I will say it reminded me A LOT of Gone Girl. It was a good thriller, a quick read, a Thursday evening well spent, far better than binge-watching Netflix - this was the whole reason I started the book, I just wanted something that would be distracting, easy to finish. Sometimes the weekday evenings can be really long. That being said, it felt like an averagely written book. A good book makes me stop, pause at the sentences, read them and read them again to absorb all they mean. Sentences and paragraphs in a good book are like a punch to the gut, the kind of punch that helps you toughen up. Everyone was pretty fucked up in this book, which of course is real life, but there wasn't all that much interesting about them. I found myself far more on the edge with Gone Girl, both in the book and the movie.
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