Realism vs. Optimism

Mid-West meets East

So here I am writing from the fabulous "Free wireless Internet" provided by the lovely and tightly cramped Bradley International Airport in Hartford( Note to Chicago: If dinky little Hartford has FREE internet, what the hell is taking you so long?), following two weeks of visiting family and friends.

Ever since I lived in Chicago I have only been able to make short trips home, thus making me feel like I never really get to spend time with my family. So this time I decided to make this trip as excruciatingly long as possible to ensure that we would all wanted to kill each other. This way it would hold me over for a longer time away. Weird logic right?

On this particular trip I began to really start to notice all the little differences about my home state of Connecticut and my current home, Illinois.
For the first week I felt great. I saw people that I have missed greatly, revisited all my old drinking haunts, sleep till noon everday. Never a dull moment. Then it dawned on me. Was I missing out on a better life in CT?

Ha! On to week 2....

The next week, it was the old CT I remembered. All the driving, chasing friends, sitting around and watching TV reminded me that my life had evolved past the point that CT could handle. And whats worse is that nothing even seemed to change there at all.

And then I began to miss Chicago. Not so much the city, but my new life in it. I missed my cats, smelly cab drivers, sleeping till noon (ok....wishful thinking), and most of all my new friends who I have come to realize are a big part of my happiness in my life now.

Not that there weren't high points in my trips. My family, as always, was glorious in their humor, their arguing, and most of all in their creating my sense of home.

So without further ado I present a few of the highlights from my families XMAS. And yes, yes, I know we are all nuts!