It's
not New York, despite the cavernous avenues and the rushing throngs. It's not
DC, despite the large number of black workers in uniforms and white folks in
sweaters and peacoats. It feels somewhere in between.
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Keep
seeing bridges that arch up beautifully into the nothing, arch up over the
horizon, arch up into the wind rushing back down and onto my face.
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Almost
fainted on the way down, the wind buffeting the wing had my stomach and my
blood convinced that the little bent up end of the wing was about to snap off.
Let everyone else exit off the plane, then asked for a Coke. Drank it as the
cold wind rushed into the plane and two older Latinas worked row by row picking
up people's trash they'd left behind.
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Everywhere,
people yell "The weather's so nice!" and "It's so warm!" as
I bundle up against the forty degree wind roaring off the lake.
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Todavía
me siento mareado, casi listo para desmayarme. Pero voy a resistir el deseo de dejarme
vencer.
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In line
at registration for the conference, I hear an earnest young woman say to a
friend as they beelined across the regal patterned hotel carpet: "I don't
just want to write for the sake of writing, I want to write for my
project." Lots of bridges that arch up into nowhere.
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Welcome
to Chicago.