The train ride was just an hour long. Perfect. Calvin and Ruby sat in a seat together and scribbled notes onto tiny note pads and split their Kit Kat and Mounds candy bars right down the middle, so they both got some of each.
Incidentally, how many 5 year olds choose Mounds candy bars from all of the options at Target? It cracked me up. Homeboy is a coconut addict.
Only my bag was no where to be found.
Let me back up.
Immediately following this picture:
I turned around and got the kids on. the. train.
He, as it turns out, put his camera back in its special bag, picked up not two but one bag, and followed behind us.
Back in Dreary Gary, my Vera Bradley bag sat alone on the train platform. Inside that bag was all of my stuff, and all of Cory's stuff. Our clothing, our toiletries, our books.
Wah.
We tried in vain to see if the bag had been turned in at the station, but we never were able to get any answers.
The kids were so excited and it was only one night.
We hit up a Walgreens where we bought overpriced tooth brushes and deodorant and socks. I felt so...low-maintenance. So...roll-with-the-punches. So...wildernessy. City wildernessy, that is.
Cory and I spent most of the meal straining our ears to hear the conversation at the table behind us. A particularly annoying girl piqued our interest in a very loathesome way when she ordered her meal, "I'll take the chopped salad, dressing on the side." "Half order, or full order?" "Fine, I'll do the full order. Whatever." She spent the rest of the meal talking about the creators of Facebook as if they were personal friends (maybe they were? doubtful.) and making statements such as, "You think 20 million is, like, a lot of money, but in this day and age, it's totally not."
Her two table-mates never did get a word in edge-wise.
But, hey! Thanks for the entertainment, Spoiled Girl!
Two different ladies stopped to tell me how "precious" it was.
I had to agree.
Then, we tucked them all into their City Beds.
Cory and I watched fancy cable TV and listened to city noises and scoured the book shelves of people with very good taste.
Can I just say that I know a person gets me when she leaves me this type of note.
I was in Big City Heaven.
And just like that, we were back on a train.
Miraculously, my bag was safe and sound in the Gary train depot lost-and-found.
I am lucky they didn't call the bomb squad in and blow it to smithereens.
Although that would have made for one heck of a story...