The past week of my life has by far been the best ever. I'm pretty sure. I have been wanting to move to Chicago since I visited in the eighth grade. My band class took a trip here to visit random areas throughout the city, and get a chance to see the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. That trip in eighth grade helped me decide that this was where I wanted to live, and I've worked very hard to get here.
Last Sunday (August 30th) I moved into my new apartment which is amazing! Top floor, two bedrooms, one bathroom, kitchen (with a dishwasher!) and a huge living room with high ceilings. Saying good bye to my parents was difficult, but I have yet to feel really homesick. I've been keeping myself busy, so I haven't had much time to think about missing home - though I do miss my family.
Some high lights of my week include:
• Visiting the Art Institute and Museum of Contemporary Art. At the Art Institute, we got to see a bunch of classic paintings. Ones that I had only seen before in art books and on TV. The Museum of Contemporary Art was much more interesting to me. I liked a lot of the work there, even though I didn't understand some of it. A fan tied to a string and attached to the ceiling so it spins around in circles...? I'm sure it's symbolic in one way or another, but I don't get it.
• Attending the Chicago Jazz Fest. I'm not the world's hugest jazz fan, but I can appreciate it, and it's hard to turn down free music around here. There was loads of people crowded into Grant Park with lots of cool vendors, delicious smelling food that I couldn't afford, and some really great performances. It was beautiful to sit in the grass and watch the sun setting paint the sky hues of purple and pink against the lit up skyline.
• Going to the Bean in Millennium Park. Millions of pictures have been taken of the large mirrored sculpture in Millennium Park. Even though it was very dirty (my friends and I decided that we were going to take a day to Windex that thing down), it was cool to hang around inside of it for a little while. Also, looking into the far end of it gives the illuminated skyline a great spotlight. And let me tell you, as pretty as the skyline is during the day time, it is way better at night.
• Meeting random people in the Park. When my friends and I are bored here in Chicago, we usually just end up walking around aimlessly. Back in Alpena (where I'm from) walking around would take us to a place called NoWhere. Here, we end up in Millennium Park and meet random people. This time it happened to be three older women who also lived in the city. We ended up playing Duck Duck Goose, Concentration, and singing random songs from random Disney movies. Meeting people here has proven to be very easy, and I've enjoyed it tons.
• Pet Lions, Lightning Love, Window Theater concert. The Student Programming Board around here puts on various shows throughout the year, and the first one was Pet Lions, Lightning Love, and Window Theater. Window Theater is a band here around campus, and they were alright. A three piece band made up of Columbia students with a sound of Dashboard Confessional meets Simple Plan. Lightning Love was my far my favorite band of the night though. I had never heard such snarky and playful lyrics that related to me so much in a long time. The lead vocalist had a voice that reminded me of Zooey Deschanel and she sang of misfits, love that doesn't work out, and drinking alone. Pet Lions was also okay. They were the 'headliner' so to speak, and I enjoyed their music. After all, I did feature them in an episode of OddTV (hahaha anyone remember that?)
&bull: Corresponding with the people across the street. Before I came here, I bought an art model doll off of my aunt during her garage sale. When I moved into my new apartment, I was tickled to discover that the people in the apartment across the street from me also had one, so I taped a big sign that said "HELLO!" on it, and hoped for a response. Even though the people with the art model doll didn't write anything back to me, the people in the window above them did. We write notes back and forth, taping each largely written response to our windows. Turns out, the people across the street are in a magazine office....which really...it's an amazing coincidence since I am going to school here at Columbia College for magazine writing...I'm hoping for an internship ;)
That is about all of the noteworthy things I have to bring up. Soon, I should be getting more on track with introducing more musicians and artists to the blog. It's been an exciting week, and I'm sure it's only about to get better!
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