"I want to go where it’s cold. I want some snow," said the woman behind me, in a Scottish burr, as we queued in the A line at the Southwest gate. I was headed for Midway, she was continuing through to Manchester, then north through New Hampshire. "I’ll be there a month. I should see some snow." "What do you do in July?" I wondered. She shuddered. "Ah, I hate July."
My seatmate also had a Scottish accent, thicker, white hair, and a blue blazer with a crest on it. She was headed someplace warm. It took me three tries to understand. Fluu-dah? Ah, Florida. Naples.
I walked along the lakeshore bike path, south from Grant Park and the museums, past Burnham Harbor and McCormick Place. The sky was heavy, the air muggy. Lightning flashed to the south, in the direction of my walk. It began to rain lightly, then gave up. The lightning intensified, striking over the lake and between clouds, in that flickering way that lasts for several seconds.
The birds were active. Every copse of trees seemed to have several Yellow-rumped Warblers. On the ground, among some ornamental grasses, a Palm Warbler pumped its tail up and down (a key field mark), next to a White-throated Sparrow. I have fond memories of White-throated Sparrows from my Long Point Bird Observatory days, where we banded them by the hundreds. A Brown Creeper crept up a tree just 5 feet from me, and then my call phone buzzed against my chest. It was my client from the college. I shared my birding discoveries and we talked about arrangements for the morning.
I finally arrived at the 31st Street Beach, where I was going to meet up with the cross country team on their morning run. I wanted the lay of the land, to pick out where I needed to be when they came running by tomorrow. It was starting to get dark, and I had just called 411 to get hold of a taxi when one drove up from the Lakeshore Drive offramp. Such luck.
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