Bad Day in Chicago

Two years ago I had a bad day.  https://oldladywriting.com/2019/08/09/three-worst-fears/ It is not like I am commemorating it, but something got me thinking about another spectacularly bad day I had quite some years ago that had longer-lasting effects.  The peculiarity of that particular day was that the bad and odd things that happened to me were not my worst fears realized but quite the opposite—the series of unfortunate events actually generated brand new anxieties.

I was in Chicago.  I will fight my usual impulse to make a short story long, but to set the stage, I was arriving to a work conference in the Loop from a client visit in the suburbs.  As of this writing, I see that it is a distance of about 35 miles that should take just under an hour—but this writing is taking place well away from rush hour traffic.  The actual trip consisted of a series of missteps (one quite literally) that resulted in trauma both emotional and physical.  If what follows will keep just one person safer from harm, this cautionary tale will have served its purpose.

First, if you see a bunch of very tall buildings in your rearview mirror AND the lake is on your left, you are driving *away* from Chicago.  This was in the days before GPS, but even so, if the GPS dies and you have a moment of panic, just head toward the very tall buildings.  For reasons now unknowable, I did the opposite, and immediately learned a very valuable lesson—in urban rush hour traffic, getting off at the first exit and reversing your direction is a maneuver that, while technically simple, can take hours to execute.  By the time I turned around and proceeded back on the right course, I chewed off all my nails, got a sore throat from screaming in exasperation, called spouse several times to express my frustration (entirely unproductive, but somewhat therapeutic), and got cramps in my foot from keeping it on the brake and in my hands from gripping the steering wheel. 

After finally fighting my way through the Chicago gridlock, I was met with another conundrum.  I was supposed to leave the rental car in a designated spot in one of those urban garages that have one long ramp going up, one even longer coming down, and one more leading nowhere just for show (with apologies to Sheldon Harnick).  After driving in and out of the garage and explaining to the attendant that I am not staying, not parking, just trying to find the mysterious location to surrender the car, please do not charge me the minimum fee of $20 per minute, I promise I will not pass this way again, yes I know I keep taking the parking ticket, but how else can I get into the garage and find the spot to leave the car, I lost all reason and did something of which I am not proud (but not ashamed, either, if truth be told).  I left the car on the street, ran into the rental office, threw the keys on the desk and invited the attendant, in no uncertain terms, to deal with the parking debacle on their own time.  The stunned human on the receiving end of my wrath hurriedly assured me that they will handle the situation and even offered me a ride to the hotel.  Which I proudly declined.  Which was my next mistake.

In the intervening years, I have gotten to know Chicago better, but I still do not quite understand that part of it where you suddenly end up under a bridge.  I find it immensely confusing.  That day, angrily stomping to my hotel, I was so surprised to find myself walking down steps into a river that I missed them (the steps) entirely.  I landed on the pavement, and my suitcase landed on top of me.  By the time I arrived at the Omni (the one near Water Tower Place—a fair distance if you know the area), everything was hurt and I was dying.  Of course, it never crossed my mind to hail a cab, because that is the kind of ridiculous human being that I am. (In the process, I lost my cool reversible magnetic bracelet from Kohl’s, and I am still steamed about that). 

I ran into a colleague in the lobby who asked me if I wanted to go out to dinner.  I wanted nothing less, and instead proceeded to make my next mistake—take a hot bath.  Not feeling the immediate effects of that particular blunder, but starting to feel like the starving dog that is my normal state of being, I reassembled myself and reinserted myself into a dinner with a couple of my work sisters.  By the time I stood up after my meal, my entire body was throbbing with pain.  Today’s me would have immediately hailed that cab back to the hotel and ordered a tub full of ice from room service.  That day’s me, not wanting to miss anything, did her best not to limp as she followed the cool girls to the fortune teller’s. Another fatal error.

Yes, you read that right, for some reason a fortune teller was deemed to be a fun activity to kick off the work conference and/or our first night in the big city.  We took turns having our sessions and I was, of course, last, for no reason other than it took me the longest to hobble nonchalantly across the waiting room.  The psychic read me somewhat correctly—I was buzzing with stress as well as suppressed physical agony.  I was having a very bad day.  She told me, in a nutshell, that no one likes me and that I will probably be divorced very soon.

When I finally made it back to the hotel, I called my unsuspecting spouse to yell at him for plotting to leave me.  As of this writing, I am still married.  I have not visited a fortune teller since that fateful day, and I refused to drive in Chicago for over ten years.