whatever

The gruff, rather demanding man grabbed my hands and marked them with large black Xs. I was then thrust into a darkened room to wait. As I took in my new surroundings I noticed that black was the dominant color in this room’s motif. There were lights, but they were dimmed and tended towards the darker side of the spectrum. There appeared to be only one other door (besides the one I had entered through), a dirty, black door marked with the words “NOT AN EXIT.”

I did not have a very clear concept of why I had been brought here, or what was to be expected.

Then it started.

The first sound was that of loud beatings, if one tried, a rhythm could be ascribed to them. In and of themselves these beatings might have been tolerable, what followed the beatings was not.

Joining the growing cacophony of the room were the loud, drawn-out, agonizing screams of a man.

***

At least that is one way to describe the experience I had.

I was encountering Chicago’s indie music scene for the first time, and I felt overwhelmed and out of touch. As I sat there listening, soaking in the first few melodic notes of the band on stage, I knew I faced a choice: Depression or Expansion. There was no third option, no middle ground. I knew myself well enough to acknowledge that I needed to fully embrace the situation or I would walk away defeated.

***

My brother and I were attending a show in the north-side neighborhood of Belmont; a completely different slice of life than I am used to on the south-side or downtown. One of my brother’s friends is in a band that was playing at this small bar/music venue known as the ‘beat kitchen,’ and I had tagged along for the experience.

I had no idea what kind of music was going to be played, and I’m still not sure what it was (especially since classifying musical styles is nigh impossible these days). The first two acts were characterized by loud music, accompanied by indistinguishable lyrics screamed into the mic. Standing there, I could feel the pulsating bass flow through my body like the tremors of an earthquake. The combination of the other instruments presented a harsh sound like the thrashing of a violent thunderstorm. I tried so hard to find something that I could cling to, surely there had to be some sense in this thing that I did not understand. I strained to hear the lyrics, but I could not. I felt like the songs were pointless because the words were being lost in this inharmonious mess.

I gave up.

That was when I heard something beautiful.

I stopped striving to apply something that was not there, and accepted what was being offered. These men were presenting real art. Once I let myself be affected by the music itself I was transported, albeit for a short time, to a different world where it made sense. What had been nonsensical became so real to me that I had to close my eyes and listen.

After my brother’s friend performed we started talking to his wife, and I was quickly deposed from my place of understanding.
— “How did you guys like it?” she asked.
–“It was good,” we dutifully responded.
–“This was much better than the last time I saw them,” another friend interjected.
–“Yeah, for once you were actually able to hear the words,” said his wife. Oh well, I felt like I got it for a moment there.

***

The night concluded with an act that was entirely different: one guy on an acoustic guitar. It was a gentle, easy-to-understand conclusion to the night. One of his lines in particular really resonated with me:

“You can’t go on like this forever, saying, “Hey man, it’s like whatever” for the rest of your life”

Why? Because, newsflash, it’s not whatever; choices have consequences and people have feelings. As C.S. Lewis put it, “Each day we are becoming a creature of splendid glory or one of unthinkable horror.” There is no magical land or magical time where we can live outside of consequences. There is a mountain in front of you right now, are you going to get depressed or are you going to expand?

I’ve tried the depression route before, I recommend expansion.

turn off the dark

He rolled around in the hotel bed, unable to rest. Part of this was due to the incessant sunlight pouring through the window, part of it was the ceaseless prodding of his conscience. It was a strange dichotomy between too much light and too much dark.

A few minutes after the conclusion of the above movie, I went to bed myself.

The yellow glow of the streetlight defied the darkness of the room as it made its way through the wooden slat shades with ease. I tossed and turned for a while, the light was not so much of a problem as was the constant churning of thoughts in my head.

The main thing on my mind was this: “don’t lose your way.”

The next night the situation repeated itself, minus the movie.

The next morning when I roused I glanced up at the clock on the dresser: 7:35 AM. I was late; I had lost a half-hour of preparation time. Still, it was hard to convince myself that I needed to get out of bed that is until I looked at my cell phone which recorded the time as 8:35 AM. It was then that I remembered that the dresser clock had not been adjusted for daylight savings time, and I was 20 minutes late for leaving the house. I didn’t have time to shower; let alone make coffee, eat breakfast or make lunch.

Day’s like that are hard to rectify. Seemingly nothing can go your way when you start your day late.

I felt this fact compounded as I commuted to work. Naturally, it was raining, drizzling more like. I felt a deep coldness, unsatisfied with myself and yet unwilling to change my mind. It was a strange dichotomy: light all around me, yet darkness within.

Paul Cézanne, the French impressionistic painter, once said, “Genius is the ability to renew one’s emotions in daily experience.”

A change was needed. And that change could not manifest itself in the form of wishing away another morrow; tomorrow would come just the same, yet hopefully be different.

I awoke very early the next morning to the sound of the alarm on my phone going off. I got out of bed, it was still dark outside. I stumbled, as one does early in the morning when our dormant legs are not fully ready to handle our weight. I made my way into the living room; the street lights were not as effective in this part of the house so the room was much darker. I took a seat on the la-z-boy. For a moment or two I just sat there, in the dark, at 4:45 AM.

Eventually, I reached over and clicked on the lamp.

Light flooded the room.

For roughly the next hour I sat and read. I then got back into bed, to sleep until I needed to start getting ready for work.

Something was inexpressibly different when I awoke to face this new day.

Proverbs 19:23 – The fear of the LORD leads to life; then one rests content, untouched by trouble.

Proverbs 4:18-19 – The path of the righteous is like the morning sun, shining ever brighter till the full light of day. But the way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know what makes them stumble.

We lose are way when we live in the night. We stumble and know not why.

I needed to reset, refocus and restart – I needed to walk in the light.

And turn off the dark.

As I commuted to work I saw people all around me. At work my colleagues were real again. And, coincidentally the sun was shining like “the full light of day.”

little big world

As our little boat rounded the bend, we came upon an idyllic old-west town scene. Peering ahead we could see a group of people on horseback, dressed as cowboys. They were swinging lassos, smiling broadly, and singing a quaint little song. I recognized one of these cowboys from his peculiar yellow-checked shirt and cow-print, black and white vest: Sheriff Woody from Toy Story.

Moments earlier our little cruise had taken us to the Hawaiian Islands. While there, we had been surrounded by an array of colorful islanders smiling and singing. On one giant wave I caught a glimpse of tandem surfers, it was a little girl and a little monster: Lilo and Stitch the titular characters from the movie Lilo & Stitch, to be more exact.

As our water journey came to a conclusion a giant advertisement for Sylvania – the light bulb and Consumer Electronics Company – bid us farewell.

Something has changed in the last decade at Disneyland, as this example of the ride “it’s a small world” illustrates.

If anything, the magic has increased. There is wonder and imagination at every turn. The rides are more spectacular than I had remembered; the shows are nothing short of incredible in their use of technology and lighting. The entire experience is a sensory overload of magnificent proportions.

And yet, despite all this, there is also cheapness in the experience. Disney has felt the pressure to pander to popular culture, albeit a culture they are helping to create. There is an emptiness that comes from seeing a bunch of movie characters infiltrate the confines of “it’s a small world.” It becomes less of a journey into a different world, and more of a reminder of things all around us.

This emptiness was most profound inside Innoventions – the house of the future. Tom Orrow, a humanoid robot, does an excellent job of drumming up excitement as one enters this magical futuristic house. Unfortunately, the best glimpse of the future that Disney offers is a bunch of broken, pre-programmed touch screens, cupboards and drawers that are bolted shut, and 20 x-boxes that are nothing more than that. Far from being the eye-popping place it once was, tomorrowland is now a cheap, sell-out, product placement bog. Which, rather than make one imagine the course of the future, makes one see the chintzy state of modern American entertainment.

It’s not so much that seeing Disney characters littered throughout a classic ride is inevitably bad; it just serves a stark reminder that it’s a small world. The increase in product placement throughout the park is likewise more annoying than evil. The problem with these things is what they represent: cultural connectivity, objectivity, and uniformity. They remind park-goers, although subconsciously, about the power of culture over against individuality. “It’s a small world “has shifted from a cute realization of certain universal human traits, into a reminder of the constricting nature of technology and globalization in the world today.

Two days after going to Disneyland, I flew back to Chicago, and got an overwhelming taste of constricting culture. The following day, this past Saturday, I spent entirely indoors, and yet I was decidedly & disturbingly not alone. Through the mediums of books, movies, TV and the internet I was unavoidably surrounded by the noise of culture. I was given a chance at real solitude and I wasted it away.

However, if one is able to hear the message through the extra noise, there is still truth to be found:

it’s a world of laughter, a world of tears
it’s a world of hopes, it’s a world of fear
there’s so much that we share
that it’s time we’re aware
it’s a small world after all

are you uncomfortable yet?

The knock of the pins hitting the floor was drowned out by the sound of the music blaring through the speakers. Our conversation was limited as we strained to hear each other over the cacophonous background. I was speaking with the owner of the company, for the first time ever. Though it was hard to communicate due to our settings, I had the opportunity to honestly share my life with her.

The above happened three weeks ago at my companies quarterly outing, which happened to be at a bowling ‘lounge’.

The place was very dimly lit, on top of this, most of the lights were black-lights which gave our clothes an eery glow. The lanes were painted with these distracting squiggles, which heavily detracted from the bowling. Everyone around me was drinking, I held a disposable plastic water cup. My co-workers were all dropping expletives, I fought (successfully) the urge to let my tongue slip. Finally, the place was packed, our group alone represented 35 people on just three lanes.

Fast forward to this last Friday night. We walked out into the rain, it was cold and windy. Moments earlier I had been fighting going out at all, my brother had urged me to join this late-night expedition. We were headed to a fraternity party (?!?!).

It was much brighter than the bowling alley, and there was no bowling, but otherwise it had a pretty similar feel. Everyone was drinking and using language. The whole apartment was packed, we had to literally squeeze our way into the crowded room, only to find ourselves backed up against the hallway wall trying to make conversation with those who were directly next to us. I had only one partial conversation while in the confines of those walls, and even that was a chore of straining to hear the others voice. But even in that limited context, I was able to be open about my life.

Needless to say, my view of a ‘party’ does not mesh with these modern incarnations of such. Why show up at all then? I don’t participate in the signature activities available at these parties, never have, have no desire to do so. I did not go to these parties in order to divulge in debauchery, that is really not my cup-of-tea. No, I went to a) see, and b) speak.

I have heard a lot of people defend attending college parties in order to “You know, try it. How can you say its wrong if you’ve never been there.” I assure you this was not my line of reasoning, I had no intention of ‘trying’ anything. (On a side note: I missed the part that said you need to try something before you can know that it is wrong.) I simply wanted to be there, to see what the experience was like.

Secondly, I was given an opportunity at both parties to speak. Even though it was strained, short, and staccato, it was still genuine and honest.

It would be a lie to say that I was comfortable for any real amount of time at either party, nor should I have been. However, if we are not going into places that make us uneasy, I would argue that we are either not living in the world enough or that we are too being much of the world. It is not enough to simply be in places that we do not belong and attempt to fit in, we must waltz into these parties and consciously be distinctly different.

t.G.i.f.

When my friend and I were told that school went 6 days a week, it was all we could do to keep our mouths closed in the presence of the schoolmaster; but as soon as we were alone we vocalized our shock and frustration. We had just arrived at what would be our home for the next three months, Two Worlds Public School in Vishakhapatnam, India, and had been informed that, unlike American schools, theirs ran all week long.

The irony of the above situation, as my friend can attest, is that throughout our time there we only taught 6 days of one week due to holidays and unexpected excursions.  But why did it matter so much to us? Simply put, we are Americans and we valued our weekends.

At least, I thought I valued the weekend at the time. Truth be told, I didn’t. Nothing about the way I was raised, educated, or the way I lived actually placed emphasis on the weekend. In fact, in high school, weekends were usually exponentially busier than the week.

Obviously what I am driving at is that I now feel like I truly anticipate the weekend.

Take this week for example, although it is not entirely exemplary it does give a decent representation of my life.

I get up at 7 everyday, out of necessity, and this week was no exception. I spend an hour getting ready – read a psalm, prepare the coffee, take a shower, do some dishes (this is always needed), brew the coffee, make a sandwich (for lunch), make and/or eat breakfast, pour the coffee, get dressed, wake up my brother, drink coffee, talk, pray and leave.

Then there is the commute. With a combination of bus, train and foot I make it to work in a little less than an hour.

Then I work. Full-time. Forty(+) hours a week. Work can be fun. But, when you do the same thing, in the same office, at the same desk, everyday, it begins to wear you down a little. I had a breakthrough a few weeks ago: I have responsibilities. There is a fraction of this company, however small it may be, that is resting on my shoulders and the work I do. As exciting as it is to be 20 years old and have that kind of responsibility, it changed my interaction with the workplace – it is more than just a fun place, it is a place of duty.

This week I had something every evening after work: Monday, watched the school play; Tuesday, class; Wednesday, debate society; Thursday, class; Friday, Intervarsity. I got home by 10 at the earliest, every night, which means 14 hours straight of being out of my apartment.

My week is both long and arduous. I am not living in la-la fun land. I am also not complaining. Life is good, but I am living for the weekend.

The weekend brings three things that I cherish: rest, friends, and church. I overdose on these three. And you know what? That makes the week even harder because I know the joy that awaits me at the end, and I want it so badly that it drags on me all week.

But I must press on – we must press on – because the whole point is to long for the greater, to see the things of this world become a drag on us as we fight for eternity. And we are given the little, momentary rests to encourage us on to greater depths.

See, the week is endurable because I know that the weekend is coming.

quit stereotyping yourself

I walked into a restaurant called “Mr. J’s Dawg N’ Burger.” Seriously.

After we get past the absolutely ridiculous/awesome (ridiculously awesome?) name of this place I will continue.

There is this fear of judging or stereotyping people that we all have. We don’t want to put people into an unfair box based on things they have no control over. But this begs the question, how do we respond when people put themselves in the box?

Behind the counter, making the food, were two people who you’d expect to be making food in a local fast-food restaurant. They didn’t speak perfect English, and they were trying to maintain control over the environment.

The disturbance was sitting in one corner of the room– now here is the rub, am I allowed to write reality and not be called a bigot? Unfortunately no, so I will let the reader fill in this blank – anyway there were these two young guys in the corner. They were wearing extremely baggy clothing, talking in very slurred English, and noticeably tipsy from the multiple beer cans sitting on their table.  They were speaking way too loud about obscene content, and not caring at all about their surroundings.

The man behind the counter was very agitated with these young men, rightfully so since they had not ordered anything since entering the restaurant (at least that’s what I gathered).  He was at once trying to take orders, make food, and threaten them to leave. They only ignored him and became more arrogant, loud and abrasive.

A white guy walked in, he seemed perfectly normal, he ordered his food take-out and left with a quick glance of disdain at the rowdy boys.

After this culture-shock bath, I left the restaurant and headed towards school. A drunken street-person came up to me and begged me for money. Through the course of our 15 minute conversation he spoke only a handful of words of truth. He told me he had a lot of money, but he needed a few dollars more to buy a bike; he had 3 dollars. He told me that the strong smell of beer and his slow mind were due to the only beer he’d had in his entire life, many hours earlier. When I left him I felt completely dissatisfied.

So, who is my neighbor? The man who made my food, the two guys who were complete louses, the white guy who refused to even sit down in the restaurant, or the drunken liar who asked me for money? Yes.

But the bigger question for me is this: how do we break through the stereotypes when people all around us are so stereotypical?

tortillas

My bike slid out from under me and I caught myself with my leg just in time, as I skidded across the icy patch of sidewalk. I recovered my control a little bit and then, with my heart beating faster after this near crash, I sped off into the darkness of the night. Splashing through puddles, dodging potholes and snow piles, I maneuvered my way along the streets until I reached the Walgreens 12 blocks away. It was 11:30 pm and my schedule for the night was now drastically altered.

A few minutes earlier I had been sitting in my room, watching a movie, moving quickly to that dormant state one reaches late at night (if indeed I was not already in it). I had been inside since noon, and had no plans of venturing beyond those (safe?) walls. Earlier that afternoon I had taken a long nap, which at the time I thought was simply to catch up on sleep, I soon learned that it was to get me rested enough for the night ahead.

I had gotten a text from a friend informing me that another friend was in need of some help; soon that friend called me and apologetically enlisted my assistance. I became a man on a mission: acquire 20+ flour tortillas, and do it quickly.

Unfortunately, I soon discovered that Walgreens does not carry tortillas. I called my, extremely harried, friend and informed them of the bad news. Luckily, they knew of a grocery store, some 6 blocks away, that was open for another 20 minutes. I hopped on my bike and continued my late night adventure. As I got close to one of the cross streets I asked a gentleman which direction I needed to turn and he pointed to my right. I came up and stopped at the red light, ready to turn right when the light switched. I happened to glance over my left shoulder and catch an old sign in the corner of the parking lot that had all but given up its former glory; it was the grocery store I sought. I released a sigh of relief, realizing that if I had turned my mission would most likely have failed. I got into the store, got the tortillas, and then biked the mile and a half back to campus to help my friend.

When I walked into the kitchen, in the basement of the old dorm building, I surveyed my surroundings: big bowls of chopped vegetables, a pile of grilled chicken, and my friend who had been working on this lunch for the previous 6 hours. It was a meal for our church, and my friend had tackled the task single-handedly.

It was midnight when I arrived. At about 2:30 the wraps were completed and we began to clean up the kitchen. I decided that we needed to bake cookies, especially since my friend had all the ingredients already. We made these eggless, chocolate chip chocolate cookies with nuts; they turned out delicious by the way.

We didn’t finish cleaning the kitchen and baking the cookies until almost 4 in the morning.

All the while we talked, shared, and strengthened our friendship.

I had to get up at 7 the next morning for work, but I don’t regret this time for a moment.

Sometimes we have this concept that love is a checklist. That we give our pre-determined amount of it, and then we can rest peacefully. Anything beyond the normal (or should I say, the comfortable) is considered above and beyond the call of duty. Baloney.

The command is this: “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Unless you have given your life up for your friends you haven’t even reached the goal, let alone gone above and beyond.

Let’s stop worrying about our time, our schedule, our sleep and start loving from a genuine heart. This is not about me, or any sacrifice I made, I am a work-in-progress taking another step towards the goal.

u-fail

I planned a little extra time before the meeting began to run and pick up my pre-printed, CTA u-pass. As a returning student, I would not have to deal with any fiasco like the one in the fall.

No, this fiasco turned out to be much worse than that.

After I had stated my reason for coming to the office, the lady went into the next room to retrieve my u-pass. It was a bit of a red flag when I saw her return with the whole box, a stack of papers, and a notebook.

“What did you say your name was again?” she asked. I repeated my name. “And you say that you are a returning student”

“Yes”

“Well we don’t have you a u-pass for you, and you’re not on our list of students who are eligible for one”

For those who may have been with me in the fall, my response this time was much more cool and collected. Within a few minutes (most of which we were waiting awkwardly for her boss, in the next room, to get off the phone) it was established that I was indeed eligible, that they would order me one, and that I would be contacted when it arrived; I was also assured that this would be a week or less.

The next week I made an extra, unnecessary visit to school, just to get my u-pass. I hadn’t been contacted about it which made me worry that it may not have arrived yet. Good thing I checked.

I waited at the office door for the girl who was there before me to finish her business. It didn’t take much time to realize that this girl and the lady in the office were having a social interaction, and thus I should content myself with waiting for a while. Eventually, the girl bid adieu and exited.

“Hey, I’m here to pick up my u-pass”

“Oh, you get those next door”

Right, so I did not have to stand here and wait for you to finish your conversation. Plus I should have remembered that from last time I came to your office to get my u-pass, because you sent me next door then as well. Wait, actually, scratch that last sentence, because it’s not true.

As luck would have it, the guy in the next room was gone; instead, I saw a little sign that informed me that he would return in a few minutes. At least I knew I was waiting for my u-pass, which made it all worth it. Upon his return I was informed that no u-pass was there for me. He went on to tell me that my name was not on the sheet of paper that I had put it on the week before. This I flatly denied, and soon found my name on the sheet. It was in the middle of a page, with green highlighting over every other name on the page (which signified that that person had picked up there u-pass). I showed him my name, he went and showed it to the lady in the other office.

A few moments later she came in, “Oh, yes, see we don’t have a picture of you on record, as you can see, that’s whats written here by your name.” I glanced at the page and saw the words, “NO PICTURE,” in the column that said, “delivered,” for everyone else. She continued, “And we don’t notify for that.”

Right, because, obviously, I’m just going to realize that you don’t have my picture and that I should come back and check.

“So what can we do?” I asked.

“Well, see,” she replied, “I already checked with the office downstairs and they can’t send me your picture. But, I do have this camera here that we used to take the u-pass pictures with.”

“Okay,” I prodded her along under my breath.

“But, it doesn’t have any batteries.”

Right, so let’s not do something radical like, say, put batteries in it.

She sent me downstairs to talk to the office. The guy there was super nice, and equally unable to help me.

“Well, you have a picture on the screen here. I can see it, it’s the same one that’s on your ID there. But the strange thing is, it doesn’t appear to be connected to a file on my computer.”

After hearing this, the lady next to him chimed in, “what? It’s not a file? I’ve never heard of such a thing with any student.”

“Yeah,” he continued, “this picture is not really on my computer. I can see it, but I can’t do anything with it. Effectively, it does not exist.”

At least this efficient group of basement dwellers had a camera with batteries. There was a bit more drama down there, but nothing of major consequence. They sent my picture upstairs, and I was told to come back in a week or so.

The next week there was a blizzard in Chicago, I didn’t make it to school.

On Monday I bought myself a transit card with enough money to go downtown twice. I used it to get there on Tuesday morning. That night I returned to school and decided to check on my u-pass. As luck would have it, they had it. I finally had my u-pass no less than a month after getting to Chicago and paying to ride public transportation every day.

 

As I walked to my train that night, I passed a poorly lit bus stop with a man huddled inside. I walked over to him.

“Excuse me sir, how would you like a transit card?”

He looked at me skeptically, as I held out the card.

“It has five dollars on it, that should be enough for a few rides plus transfers.”

“Oh, you’re trying to sell it. No thank you.”

“No, sir, I want to give it to you.”

His face began to deny his skepticism a little bit. “Why would you give me card with five dollars on it? What are you going to use?”

“Don’t worry about me, I have a u-pass that gives me unlimited rides. Take it, so that you can stay warm tonight. See, I am a student at Moody Bible Institute, and I am giving you this card because of the love that God has given me.”

He began to beam, “You have been feeding me for nine years, every Tuesday night, at the YMCA. Not you, but Moody has been, students like you. And now you are giving me a free bus card? God must be truly at work.”

intentional spontaneity

Sometimes we let ourselves pull away from community for any number of terrible reasons. Then we get so cold and reclusive that we attempt to shun community. Then we look around and realize that we’ve dug ourselves into a hole so deep that only one thing can penetrate the depth: love.  This may sound circular, but that love most often comes from that community we’ve been avoiding.

I had a tough week.  I had to work late almost every day, I had a bunch reading for school, and I my city got hit by the worst storm in 50 years. All I really wanted to do was be alone, dig my hole, and shun community.

On Friday, night I didn’t leave work until 5:30 (and there was still much to do). I had to stop at the store on the way home. And then my lovely friend, the CTA, kept me on a bus, in traffic for 45 minutes (a normally ten minute trip). I got home very tired, slightly irate, and not very ready to go invest in community.

I dutifully went to Intervarsity Large group, however, and as soon as it was done attempted to bolt for the door. They were planning on watching a movie, and I just really wasn’t feeling it. There was much commotion, I said things I regret, and I wasn’t able to leave right-away. There was a good reason for my being held there, though; soon a defecting faction emerged from the room, headed to get Medici shakes (the Med is a popular college hang-out restaurant near UChicago’s campus). I was persuaded to join this group.

Upon emerging from the building my spirits rose a bit, and I thought it necessary to throw myself into a massive pile of snow, and then another one. I was covered in snow, but feeling much lighter.

As we walked towards the restaurant I realized that my keys had fallen out of my pocket; I ran back and luckily found them glistening in the first pile that had received my signature. Running in the cold, through/over snow was so freeing. I ran back to the restaurant but totally went the wrong way and ended up running an extra two blocks.

That night, chillin’ at the med was beautiful. I felt more connection with this community. At the end of the night, and very last-minute, I decided to register for the winterfest retreat to take place in a few weeks. Not because people were pressuring me too, but because I realized that I wanted/needed to embrace this place in a new way.

Don’t let yourself get so bogged down with duties, tasks, and things. I needed to get the focus off of myself and onto the people I was with/near.

We need to be more spontaneous: go get the milkshake, jump in the snow, and go on the retreat. Don’t plan so much, be intentionally spontaneous.

the Hurricane* must continue

Call me a naïve California boy if you will, but when I am told to be somewhere I will make an effort to be there; even if that means conquering snowmageddon. Such was the case this past week; our boss (who was at a conference in Orlando where it was going to be 70 and sunny mind you) told us that he wanted us all in the office the day of the Chicago blizzard.

I awoke on Wednesday morning to the most unbelievable sights. Our living room window (on the third floor) was almost entirely obscured with snow. Our front porch was full of snow, nearly covering the chairs and completely disguising our Smokey Joe® BBQ. Upon reaching street level things only got more insane. The front steps of our building were piled high with snow, the sidewalk didn’t exist, and the street was indistinguishable. The 20+ inches of snow easily topped my boots and got inside of them as I trudged through the mess. When I finally reached my bus stop, I saw the demarking, curbside sign standing 15 feet from anything that one could feasibly call a road. The mighty 55^th street, normally two lanes each direction, had been whittled down to approximately 1 ½ lanes total. Due to the enormous amount of snow blocking the road, the bus we got rerouted, adding ten blocks onto a ten block journey. We made it to the train station though, and things appeared to be all green lights.

A lot of stations now post the time of incoming trains, which for the most part I’ve found very accurate. On this morning the following projected times greeted me upon my arrival at the station: 1) 2 min; 2) 4 min; 3) 6 min; 4) 6 min; 5) 6 min; 7) 9 min; 8 ) 13 min. I was surprised that so many trains were projected in such short amount of time; normally not more than 3 trains are predicted within the quarter-hour. Needless to say, I was disappointed. The train times kept decreasing, then passing, and no train was forthcoming. After almost 30 minutes of standing in the cold, with the snow and wind beginning to pick up again, a train came into sight.

The redline runs over ground until it reaches downtown, and then it becomes one of two subway lines. When I emerged from the subway I was in the middle of an active blizzard. There were a handful of people (remember this is downtown Chicago), two cars, and I could not see the tops of any buildings. Snow was violently whipping against my face as I trudged through the snow and haze to get to work.

A nearly silent office greeted me.

I walked around, looking for everyone, anyone.

One guy was there, in the back office, everyone else had bailed.

Within a few hours two more people showed up, but that was it. As we all patted ourselves on the back for braving the blizzard, and received adulations from our non-present co-workers, something changed. I became a part of the team. I was able to relax, let my guard down, let them in. it was a good day at the office, we had a nice lunch, I was super productive, and I got to know my co-workers in a newer, realer way.

The next few days in the office were my best to date; and I hope that I will retain this new-found connection with the team.

*our company name is Brain Hurricane