just a quick moment for a post

A ranking of things going on in my life:

Work: about an 8. Lots of phone call making, which I hate, but everything else is good.

Apt: about a 7. I like everyone here, but sometimes I miss the peace and quiet. And by sometimes I mean a lot.

Public Transportation: about a 2. Good: saving the earth, I don't have to drive. Bad: if I have one more late bus/train episode, I'm probably going to freak out. Seriously, closing the downtown red line at NINE PM is the stupidest thing I've ever heard of, short of that Boogeyman movie I saw a couple years ago.

School: about a 4. Lots of homework that I am not getting done.

Adulthood: about a 7. Made a budget yesterday and I felt old, but turns out I'll probably be able to survive this semester. On the other hand, I HATE waking up in the morning.

Future: about an 8. I still don't know what I am going to do, but it appears I have plenty of options.

God: about a 9. Relating to the peace and quiet, it's hard to find, but when I find it, it's phenomenal. I'm really learning how to depend on God this semester, mostly because He's always around for me to depend on.

Mmk, I think that's about it.
Miss you and love you all.

deep thoughts on a gray Tuesday

Ugh, I felt like such an adult today. I went to meetings, worked my required hours, rode the bus home, went to the post office, went to the library, came home, made dinner, etc.

Lame.

Not gonna lie, I really miss the days of goofing off until two in the morning. Right now, it's not even 9:30 and I'm tired.

Lame sauce.

Not really much new to report. I am really ready to see my friends from back home when they come up in a couple weeks, but I am enjoying the friendships that I have and am making now. I am learning a lot, and I feel like I am being trusted with a lot, which is good. God and I are getting quite a bit of a talk time in... I spend two hours on the bus a day, and sometimes there is nothing to do but pray because I can't handle doing anything else when I am on the bus (believe me, I'm taking advantage of it). Overall, I know this is where I am supposed to be, but at the same time, it's still hard to be here.

I've been checking out Paul a lot recently, and I feel like he and I relate really well on this subject in Philippians. He talks about how he knows he is where he is supposed to be, but he also knows that he wants to be with Christ. I pretty much feel the same... I'm supposed to be here, but it's not easy, and I sometimes wish I was elsewhere.

Anyway, I don't want to be a mood killer, this is just what is on my mind. I hope to update everyone with pictures and such soon... sorry I suck at taking pictures! Going to the aquarium tomorrow, should be good!

an odd sense of stability

So this is just a quick catch-you-up before I go to bed. I have this silly thing called "work" tomorrow morning. Bah.

I just realized today that this is the longest I have ever been in a single place. Sound strange? Let me explain.

Everywhere else that I've ever lived, I eventually had to leave to get groceries, see a movie, whatever. I have stayed IN the city of Chicago for three weeks now. I have not traveled to the burbs even... I have been in the same place for three weeks, and yet every day when I ride the bus it feels like I am passing through a dozen different countries. It's a strange sense of stability.

In other news, I spent the majority of my weekend exploring some of the things that just sound glorious to me. I went to the Chicago History Museum and learned about the El, the Great Fire, the World's Fair, and the Stockyards... it was really interesting, mostly because I'm a nerd, but also because history is cool. I also went to the Art Institute and spent hours looking at VanGogh, Renoir, Monet, Seraut, El Greco, O'Keefe, and other artists. I spent about an hour looking for American Gothic, and then I found a plaque about the size of a dollar bill that said it was on loan to some place in Iowa. I was mildly irritated and also slightly glad to find out that I was not going blind/crazy.

I also got a library card. Make fun of me if you will, but the downtown library is probably the most miraculous thing I've seen in years. It's so... pretty....

(again, I'm a nerd)

On Saturday I ran around town with my friend Autumn who goes to Moody. It was pretty excellent... we went to a photography exhibit at Colombia College about women in the Congo; it was incredibly moving. Then we wandered around and saw ice sculptures and the Cultural Center. There was some crazy art there and beautiful domed ceilings made of Tiffany glass. After we left, I tried Argo Tea for the first time (yum) and found out about a coffee place that will give you free coffee on Friday if you wear an orange shirt.

After that I hung out with the lovely Erin and we had ourselves a Valentine's Day date at a Chicago pizza place downtown. While we waited for our table (over an hour!) we went to Trader Joe's and explored. Very cool place, I must say. Then we enjoyed delicious deep dish... if that's not love, I don't know what is!

Today I did homework pretty much all day, but that's what I get for procrastinating... whoopsie.

More eventually, assuming my internet holds out! Happy Valentine's Day!

the economy... it's so depressing...

I hope you all caught the humor of my title. If not, you're in too deep.

I know the economy has been something that has been plastered all over the news, but I feel like I've seen the effects of the economy all over everything lately. My internship is with a housing agency, and over the past year in our part of the city, foreclosures have increased by over 1,000. That doesn't include the people who have missed just a couple payments, people who have lost their jobs, etc. You can literally walk up and down the streets and see for sale signs and vacant, boarded up houses.

Not only that, but you can see massive amounts of homeless people. My heart wrenches every time I see a homeless person, and I want to buy them coffee, talk with them, and then invite them home so they have a dry place to sleep. I know that this is not feasible for a variety of reasons, but I feel so helpless because I don't even know what resources to point someone to. I know that many of these people struggle with mental illness, or they have families, or whatever, and I have no clue what is even in the area to help them. Curse my social work instinct; it kind of makes me want to be back in Jackson so that I know how to help people. My worst fear is that I will become apathetic towards these people. I can't imagine how awful it would be to beg, first of all, and then to have people ignore you on top of that is even worse. It's dehumanizing. I don't want to be that dehumanizer, and I'm pretty certain that is not what Christ wants either.

Seeing all of this, though, does make me long for Christ more in my heart. I want to be more like him, and living here in the city makes me wonder even more how I can do that. I've been stuck in James, which tells me that if I ask for wisdom from God, He will grant it if I do not doubt. It's so easy to be distracted by any number of things here in the city, and sitting down and listening for wisdom from God is not easy. As my friend Erin reminded me the other day, the waves are still there even when the ice seems to be covering them up... you just have to listen closely.

More soon... until then, peace.

week three begins...

Bits of knowledge to pass on about the Windy City:

1. Mostly English speaking people ride the El. Mostly non-English speaking people ride the bus.
2. Politics here are split: you either love your alderman or you hate him (Chicago is split up into "wards"... aldermans are their representatives). Slightly more people tend to love their alderman, it seems, because I don't remember the last alderman I heard about who had been in office for less than twenty years.
3. Being aware of your surroundings is key. Otherwise, you go south three blocks when you were supposed to go north, and you end up walking nine blocks instead of three.
4. No, your waiter is not always sober.
5. Yes, your bus driver is yelling out the stops because the thing that tells you the stops is broken.
6. Yes, this is a problem if you are deaf.
7. If you see shoes tied together and thrown over a telephone line, run the other direction... you are in gang territory.
8. There are tunnels under Lakeshore Drive that will take you to the beach. They are creepy.
9. Navy Pier is beautiful at sunset.
10. Visit the Crystal Gardens at Navy Pier and watch the crazy water fountains... they're fun.

Things have been good... it's been a full week since I've posted, so sorry about the wait (all two adoring fans that read this, haha). I have been adventuring a lot, and by adventuring, I mean working at my internship and commuting ridiculus amounts. Taking 18 credits was probably a poor life choice, but I'm sure that I'll learn plenty from it (like don't overbook, and don't give the elderly your cell phone number). Overall, I'm having a great time.

And no, I have not been mugged/beaten/raped/swindled/paid to make this statement.

Missing you from Chicago - Love, Katie

On culture and ice cream

There's a new experience every day here in Chicago! Yesterday (Sunday) I went with some CS friends to the Chinese New Year celebration in Chinatown. I must say, it is a bit of a culture shock, going from my small town parade to a big city parade. Normally, the parade in my home town is done in less than half an hour. People stand and walk along the main street from the old firehouse to about the funeral home (probably less than a quarter mile), and watch kids on bikes and tractors go by. This parade had three high school marching bands, dozens of floats, people dressed in dragon costumes, dignitaries and politicians, and even dancers. We stood outside for about two hours - one while we were waiting for the parade to happen and another while the parade actually happened. There were hundreds of people there (probably more than that, but it's hard for me to tell), bunched into a couple of city blocks. And despite the fact that we ended up like popsicles, frozen in the city streets, a good time was had by all.

In one of my classes today, we talked a little bit about Chinatown culture. Apparently, the original Chicago Chinatown was located more north on VanBuren. Chinatown has mostly been inhabited by poor Chinese from a certain area of China, and became famous for its chop suey, which was Americanized to make it more marketable to the Chicago people. I also found out that many of the people who moved to Chinatown later were unable to speak to the original inhabitants - they came from a different part of China and didn't speak the same language. In fact, many of them could only communicate using English!

I just had to throw this picture in... Yes, there were Irish men in kilts with bagpipes playing at the Chinese New Year celebration. Why? I have yet to figure it out.

In other news, I think I'm starting to finally grasp the idea that I am living in Chicago. I'm starting to meet people who live in the city - we went to a Superbowl party at a friend of a friend's apartment, which was a lot of fun (except for the part where the Cardinals lost, sad day), and today one of my roommates and I went out on an ice cream run. We walked all through Uptown after dark without getting mugged... go us! Sadly, we had to walk half a mile for good ice cream, but that's because we were picky and the stores were crowded. Meh.