Thursday Night Lights

Monday night I left Peoria for LaGrange (which is a Chicago suburb) with a friend of mine to visit a friend (Nate) up there. We've done some big fun thing each day.

Tuesday: Brookfield Zoo
Nate works there this summer as a tour guide, so we got the scoop on all the animals. Zoos are pretty fly anyway, but Brookfield is one of the top zoos of the nation, so it was cool. I hadn't been to a zoo in quite some time. We have one back in Peoria, but on a scale of 1-10, it kind of blows.

Wednesday: Shed Aquarium
There were fish and other aquatic animals. Nothing too terribly awesome because we would have had to pay extra for really cool stuff, which we didn't want to do. We were spoiled by Nate because him working at the zoo got us into other things for free.

Thursday: Field Museum
Way awesome. One exhibit they have right now is about mythical creatures and their potential origins in different cultures. I found out that in China, the phoenix is a symbol for peace and good times. Not the reason I got it (since I didn't know that last year), but I thought it was very fitting and have chosen to take it as a sign.

Thursday night was the main point of this post. My friend who I drove up to Chicago with left, and after he did, Nate had me go on a jog with him. (I rode a bike while he jogged.) What the prick didn't tell me before we began was that it would be 10 miles. I wasn't really mad at him because you can't really be mad at Nate for anything, but I was slightly perturbed. Then we turned onto this path out of his neighborhood and were in the woods by a large creek, and I could see literally hundreds of lights, flashing like paparazzi. They were lightening bugs. I don't know how it is where you all are staying, but there has been a noticeable decline in the lightening bug population in Peoria throughout my childhood years, so this was a very special sight for me. It was so peaceful in the woods and it was so beautiful. All there was to see was the long reaching shadows of the trees, the flashes of the lightening bugs, and the occasional ray of moonlight through the leaves, but it was beautiful.

Right now I'm in Boston for Oxfam CHANGE Leader training. I just arrived this morning and will be here until July 25th. This is my last planned adventure for the summer, and I am glad for it. I don't mind being away from home or being home for long periods at a time, but it's hard for me to keep adjusting when I'm gone for one week, home for two, gone a few days, etc. Not that I'm complaining; I've had quite a good time on the trips I've taken this summer. I just like to feel grounded somewhere.

I pray that life continues to treat you all well!
~cocoa_goddess



how's that, david?