The martini miracle

This past week I was fortunate enough to able to experience Chicago as Chicago experienced it's highest temperatures in five years. Talk about luck! I had been to Chicago on a Minneapolis School District trip 15 years ago for a day and always wanted to return.

I was able to spend the first two days of my Chicago trip with my dear friends, Dick and Cindy. I met the Atkinsons back in my mid-twenties. Dick and Cindy love Chicago and visit every year in July. We were able to meet up this year in the Windy City. Dick and Cindy lived in downtown Chicago for several years before they married and moved to Minneapolis. I said it must have been quite a shock to move to Minneapolis after having lived in Chicago. Cindy said she feels she never recovered fully from the move and she looks forward to a Chicago fix every year.

On our first day of sightseeing, we walked along the street where Cindy and Dick had side-by- side apartments back in the 70s. The street they lived on reminded me of my favorite part of Manhattan, Chelsea, where, if I had millions of dollars, I would buy myself a little brownstone. Dick's and Cindy's Chicago address was a few blocks from the North Beach and a short hike to the river and downtown area. Their old Chicago neighborhood continues to be a nice combination of old and newer buildings. The apartment building is now condominiums and you would undoubtedly need a bundle of money to live on this lovely street today. Cindy and I spotted a for rent sign in one of the lovely old historic buildings. We joked we should rent it together so we could escape from our husbands once in a while.

We took a Chicago River tour boat ride together. Our young tour guide with the microphone had just completed a master's degree in history at Loyola University. He instructed us in Chicago history as we gazed at the amazing skyscraper architecture along the river. Back in my high school days I had a boyfriend who wanted to study architecture at the U of M. This boyfriend's favorite architect was Mies van der Rohe, and he used to show me pictures of the work of this iconic figure. Our tour guide pointed out three van der Rohe scrapers as we cruised down the river. The most recent Chicago skyscraper is the Trump Tower. The Donald, of course, had visions of building the highest skyscraper in Chicago, but Chicago said no to the man who is used to getting what he wants. Nice job on that one, Chicago. I guess money can't buy everything. Trump has enough ego for several people and doesn't need to have the tallest Chicago building on his list of "great" accomplishments. The boat took us out onto Lake Michigan where we could see the complete Chicago skyline. Beautiful!!!

The downtown parts of Chicago I saw seemed much younger and much cleaner than Manhattan. The mix of people didn't seem as melting-pot diverse as what you see in Times Square and I did not hear the variety of languages you hear on the Manhattan streets. The parks along the Lake Michigan waterfront are very imaginative, with sculpture and falling water. The above-ground "subway" in Chicago, known as the L, that races through the heart of the city is unique: noisy, but unique.

Day two, we went to the bar atop the famous Hancock building. Heights have never been my favorite thing and Dick feels the same way, hence the photo taken by Cindy of Dick and me on the 41st floor of the Hancock. Cindy, a former flight attendant, relishes heights . In the bar, she easily stepped over to lean against windows and look down for a better view. Contrarily, [Editor's note: I'm editing from Minneapolis, and I think she means "I, on the other hand;" but since she is quite capable of doing things from sheer contrariness, as we all know, I've left it in there!] I found myself immediately queasy as I stepped out of the high-speed elevator and saw the panoramic view. My friends informed me that I would feel much better after a martini, and sure enough, I did. (Don't we all feel better after a martini?) I swigged a cosmopolitan, stepped over to the windows and looked down: briefly, but I did it! Cindy thought we should top off the evening with a horse-and-buggy ride around the city, something I have always wanted to do in Central Park and have never done. Our horse, Pickles, pulled us in a carriage that had just been refurbished with blue velvet.

Seeing Chicago again after all these years was indeed fun but, the real treat was not Chicago. The real treat was being able to have my friends of 35 years all to myself for two days. We had to stop often in our sightseeing trek to get out of the heat and humidity. The stops gave us time to really talk and listen to one another. We talked about the old days, the present days and hopefully about the days to come. We stayed away from politics and that was good because it has never been a topic in which we find much common ground. Political discussions went better when I was married to a Republican. (I'm still not sure how that one happened.)

I think during these two fun days, each of us learned things about each other that we never knew: new details of the challenging childhoods we experienced and new details of the unexpected challenges we have confronted as adults. What a blessing and comfort it is to have cherished friends who love and support you through the years. I know Dick and Cindy love me even though I prefer CNN to Fox News. I know they will always be there for me with the support I may need facing the next challenges that life never fails to deliver. I will be there for them, too. Best of all we have not forgotten how much fun we have when we get together.



*of special note: I just discovered a "new" martini called the margarita martini. Dick and I tried them in a Chicago bar and they are delicious.