its not windy here (have we been jipped?)

[bellecauchemar]

Next stop: Chicago. i must say, driving cross country is a very gradual way to shift your watch, your mentality, your expectations, and your life style from west coast to east coast. after montana, wyoming, and south dakota, minneapolis really seemed like a big city. it had a downtown and lots of vegetarian food options, we were excited. but then again, we had to worry about if the car was safe to park outside my friend's house with all of our belongings in it. and just after being very delicately introduced to the idea of a city again, we hit Chicago. the first thing Candra said was, "this feels east coast to me." It took me about fifteen more minutes to understand what she said. but then again, she has always been quicker than I was at cunning observations. it's hard to put into words what chicago seemed like when we first entered it, and then what it turned into when we were leaving it. i don't know if chicago changed or if we did. i tend to think that since it's one of the oldest cities (i made that up but it seems right so i'll go with it) it's probably us that became more acclimated to it's east(ish) city charms. my friends lived in an area called uptown. at first i felt unsafe there, but then i realized, it was just a city, that's all. during the day, we went to the art institute of chicago, a big beautiful museum which was having a toulouse-latrec exhibit (the guy who did the famous french posters from the famous debaucherous moulin rouge and montmartre, paris days of the late 1800s. i found out that he died young, had lots of health problems, and stunted growth because his parents were first cousins. or perhaps it was also his alcoholism, or both). anyway, it was an amazing exhibit. then we had lunch in millennium park, walked along lake michigan, went on a ferris wheel on navy pier, and saw a bad comedic version of romeo and juliet. chicago was great because we didn't drive the car once while we were there. and the buildings were all pretty brownstones in my friend's neighborhood and the city on the lake makes it really picturesque. just when you feel like the buildings have too many floors or there's too many cars, you can take a few steps to the water's edge and look out towards the horizon, or you can take a few steps to one of the numerous patches or grass and sit down and look at the sky. either way, it turned out to be a pretty city. and now, we are off to new york, 13 hours of driving in one day. can we do it.....well, i should probably go and keep candra company while she drives.....

candra's fun-filled list of sightings during the last few days:

-raccoons in the park in chicago
-a pile of unidentified poop on the side of the road
-a very ugly kid in the mini-van next to us at a rest stop in an unknown town
-a man with a frizzy feathered pompadour haircut in a truck next to us giving us a thumbs up while maintaining a huge gaping grin on his face for quite a large stretch of highway. we think he was excited to see that our plates were from california, but really, who the heck knows......
-the most bugs ever seen in one precise location - splattered on the front of our car
-the moon changing shapes/sizes/colors in the sky throughout this entire trip
-a dirty diaper that alyssa parked on (twice) in minneapolis
-a 13yr old boy staring (mouth wide open) at 2 girls holding hands (didn't his mom teach him that it's rude to stare?)
-a cute brown city bunny chewing on some grass and flowers in a chicago park by navy pier

**as we almost arrive in new york, we are almost ready to count the pieces of gum we have chewed on this trip which we have been collecting onto the same neatly folded piece of paper for the past four thousand miles... drum roll please...