To Stay or Go? Being Sick & Away

This is my kind of town, Chicago is

My kind of town, Chicago is

My kind of people, too

People who smile at you.

A few months back, my friends invited me to join them for a winter weekend trip to Chicago, IL. I was excited, I had only been to Chicago once before and was under the legal drinking age at the time so my girl friends and I had found other, more touristy things to do. We went to the Shedd Aquarium and saw penguins and dolphins. We visited the Sears Tower a-la-Ferris Bueller, and took goofy pictures. We were young, though, and limited to activities that our minuscule budget would allow. We had a great time and I still look back on that Road-Trip as one of the better vacations I’ve had.

Penguin at the Shedd

Now though, I was really looking forward to experiencing Chi-Town as an adult. In the weeks leading up to the trip, enough planning was done to ensure an exciting weekend plus enough time left free to explore and relax. We were staying at the FourPoints Hotel, booked through Hotels.com. The hotel was 2 blocks from The Miracle Mile shopping area, walking distance from the L (the subway/elevated train system in Chicago) and minutes from great restaurants, bars and museums. An escape from the proverbial hustle and bustle of the Holiday Season was exactly what I needed, the trip was timed for a week before Christmas, and I could not have been more ready.

Except for one little thing: I was beyond sick. I don’t mean “sniffles, gee I should have brought more tissues” sick. I mean hacking cough, can’t breathe with out feeling like I’m having a minor heart attack, sinuses completely clogged, dizzy, no appetite, nauseous, ‘was that a small piece of my lung I just coughed up?!’ sick. It was awful and it had started about 4 days before the trip. It was now Thursday night, three of my friends were coming in the morning to pick me up at 9 am for the 7 hour drive to Chicago. I was packed. I was exhausted. I was convinced, as every sick person is who as something exciting planned for the next day, that if I just drank one more glass of orange juice and took just two more vitamin C pills… that I would be good as new before they arrived.

I was not good as new, I was a wreck. I woke up just as miserable, if not worse, that morning. I took a long, hot shower convinced (wrongly, yet again) that the steam would help me and my sad cough. I drank another giant bottle of Minute-Maid. I moved slowly through the house gathering last minute items for the 4 day would-be adventure, and when my friends arrived, I hobbled out to the car.

The Chicago Theater

Now, I slept almost the entire way there. I slept in every morning of that weekend, waving off offers for breakfast. I moved like molasses in June and had a maximum of 4 drinks the entire vacation. I made a crucial decision that Thursday night before we left: I decided not to skip the trip, despite feeling more sick than I had in years. The thing is, I don’t remember weighing pro-vs-con. I remember only thinking, very clearly: “OK Melissa… now, you’ve been sick since at least Sunday. The doctor in the clinic {we have a clinic at work, I went Wednesday afternoon to make sure it was just a bad chest cold and not pneumonia. I am terrified of developing pneumonia again… but more on that some other time} …said that while it’s probably bronchitis, you’re not contagious any more. So you can go. You wont infect The Friends.” (To answer you question: Yes, when I’m sick, I think/speak to my self in the third-person.    …Wait, you don’t?)

Scrumptious deep dish peperoni from Giordano's

I chose to go even though I could have easily stayed home and slept for three days. I chose to see and to do. I chose deep-dish, REAL Chicago style pizza over my couch at home. I chose to NOT miss out. The truth is, I have missed out too much in the past. This same group of friends went to Chicago 2 Christmas’ ago and I didn’t go. I was broke. I was tired. I ‘had’ to work. At the time, I thought that I didn’t have the choice but I know now that I did then just as much as I do now. The one commonality of all the blogs written by those who have “escaped” the doldrums of the cube-life is just that: they realized that they did have a choice and chose, very much on purpose, to venture out into the world and experience life instead of only reading about it and making lists of what-ifs.

Sure, I could have stayed home and maybe 20 years from now I wont remember going or not going. But despite feeling like death, I had an amazing time. My friends are wonderful and we had a great adventures that weekend. I don’t regret going and I am certain that I would have been more miserable at home, missing out. Yes, I believe that the risks one takes should be calculated risks. (That’s why I went to the doctor before the trip). But I don’t believe that a life spent risk-less is any more safe than one full of potentially questionable actions or decisions.

They say that as you grow older, the stuff your parents told you when you were young will start to sound true… I’m not sure if that’s true for everything, but then again I’m still in my twenty’s. There is one thing however, that I firmly believe and have even adopted as a mantra from time to time: You never know until you try. This is true, I am certain of that, and there is no way around it. I don’t know when I’ll get back to Chicago but I know now, because I was there, that it is my kind of town. I am so happy that in all honesty, I probably wont remember the coughing and the drowsiness in 20 years. I’ll remember the pizza, the laughter and the epic karaoke. I’ll remember the bad-ass bartender chick who chased down the dude who tried to stiff her with nothing but a bar-key. I’ll remember that when she got back in the hole-in-the-wall bar a few minutes later and we asked “did you catch him?!” she replied ” *pfff*  yea, but mother-f***er only had 4 dollars on him.”

I will remember that I chose to go, and that it was worth it. And next time, I’ll choose to go again.

~Melissa