Getting Lost in East Berlin

I suppose I owe all of you a bit of an explanation about this pseudo date I have recently written about. I wanted to remain vague and make you call me (some of you got the clue....others of you, I'm wondering if you've fallen off the face of Colorado or if something else is morbidly wrong. In which case this is another plea to call me and assure me that you are just too busy; not dead.) Circa remaining vague: you all know I'm only capable of such for like 12.7 seconds before the details spill out of me like (insert clever metapor here or just keep reading and see what I mean) . . .

The first thing I want to clarify detail-wise is that I'm not sure how much of a "date" this was. It did indeed have a "datish" feel. We ate dinner. We went to a jazz club. He paid. I think that is why it felt like a date. If that aspect had been absent I could have said: "Nope, not a date." But I mean, really. He lives in England.

Ok, so, he is Jonathan. And I had a great time. Over dinner we shared experiences/life stories and learned a fair amount about each other. We ate a neat little place off Damen Ave called Yes Thai! The Green Mill Cocktail Lounge was an experience unlike any I'd ever had. Gypsy Jazz is one of the most unique sounds I've ever heard. It was completely different than what I expected to hear at a jazz club/bar/cocktail lounge, where I might add, we were one of the youngest couples in attendance. The memebers of the band Swing Gitan with Alfonso Ponticelli were, on average, also younger than the crowd.

After hearing a couple sets, we walked on the stoop a short ways to the car. Then took a drive down Lake Shore and up Michigan Avenue. Then we did a drive-by viewing of Navy Pier...with some very illegal traffic maneuvers made by yours truly along the way. It was all delightful. Even the part where I got lost. The funniest thing kept happening. I would just second guess my direction, stop at a petrol station, and they would assure me that I was going the correct way. We turned a corner and Jonathan was certain we were in East Berlin. A building stood to our right which made him come to this conclusion. I said it was absolute crap and in need of help, and he said "Yes, like the whole of East Berlin." The next wrong turn took us to a seriously posh neighborhood where I vocalized the opinion that I'd never earn enough money to live. I called it my "backwards tour of Chicago." It was certainly more detailed than it would have been had I gotten the directions in a better order than I did. And it's not every day you get to see East Berlin in Chicago. Even though I did manage to get him back to his hotel, I felt like a directionally challenged buffoon.

Just before making back to his hotel in Gurnee, I missed the exit I was supposed to take, which extended our trip just that much more. But that bit of getting lost was well worth it for one thing. The words on the sign of Gurnee Community Church once we'd just entered the town of Gurnee read:

"Do you know where you're going?"

-God