There are places in Alaska and Scandinavia and other parts of the world where you don’t see the sun for days at a time, sometimes weeks or even months. Then, when the sun returns, the villages rejoice.

There may be sunshine during the harsh Chicago winters, but it only serves to sting your exposed, wind-whipped skin. Outdoor time is spent dashing from building to building, train to bus, car to bar. People ask why you would need a car in Chicago where, despite its reputation, public transportation is reasonably accessible citywide. The answer is, for those eight months of a year where the weather is punishing, the thought of walking six blocks to the nearest grocery store or worse, standing still at a bus stop or on a train platform for ten minutes is unbearable.

As difficult to endure as the winters here (which seem to stretch from October to April, or longer) can be, the summer months are paradise. With the exception of a few 100+ degree days in July, the weather is usually between 75 and 90 degrees with the city’s famous winds exhaling every few moments to cool your sticky skin with a fan-like breeze.

The city comes alive in the summer. Tens of thousands pour in and out of the ballparks nearly everyday, and the North Side is humming with hope that the Cubs will break their 100-year dry spell and the South Side is buzzing with the sound of White Sox fans airing their opinions on the team’s management, potential trades, and hottest home run hitter. The beaches, stretching from Foster Ave. to Grant Park and beyond are dotted, from dawn to dusk, with people facing off in twos, fours, and sixes at hundreds of volleyball nets. Boats ranging in size from kayaks to tall ships come into and out of port, and family motorboats drift lazily down the river through the center of the city, the boaters’ tan bodies and beer cans a stark contrast to the towering steel skyscrapers above and suit-clad workers scurrying across the overhead bridges.

This is my third summer of beach volleyball, and this year I play twice a week: Mondays on the gritty, crowded silt at North Avenue and Thursdays under the shadow of the Hancock Building on the soft sand of Oak Street Beach. Most teams have alcohol-themed names, like “In It for the Beer” and “Six-Pack,” reflective of the popular post-game activity of drinking at your team’s sponsor bar. I’ve always been more excited about the playing time than the drinking. I love the feeling of throwing myself on the sand for a dig, the aching in my muscles immediately after a game that lasts for days, the way I feel stronger during the summer than I do the rest of the year. I feel momentarily ticked off that my pants all feel tighter, and then I realize that the reason is because I’m getting more toned, and my tanned thigh muscles are firm, therefore less likely to “give” when I squish them into pants. You know what I mean.

Last night, while waiting for my teammates to show up, I watched a professional photographer shooting photos of a couple on that part of North Ave. beach where it juts out into the lake, just south of the boathouse and the southern-most volleyball courts. There’s this breathtaking view, where the Hancock building, the Drake Hotel, and the cluster of skyscrapers near Water Tower just stretch up into the sky, only two miles away… far enough not to cast a shadow but still close enough that their magnificent, towering height is evident. The couple embraced, doing variations of him kissing her cheek and her kissing his cheek and facing the camera, and facing the city. At first, I thought, how beautiful. They must be doing those official engagement photos, the ones couples take and then have displayed at their weddings near the guest book and place cards. Then I felt jealous. That’s where I wanted to get my official engagement pictures taken! Granted, I’m not engaged yet. But the thing about Chicago is, it’s a big enough city without being overcrowded, so you have enough room to feel as though you “own” certain spots. 

K told me that she went to a spot near the beach in Evanston, on the craggy rocks at the lakefront there, with a date. They wanted to just sit in the beautiful setting and watch the sunset together… when the tripped over a couple making out. And another. And another.

I don’t own that view on North Ave. beach anymore than I own Hot Doug’s, or the community garden along Ravenswood in West Andersonville, or the storefront windows of Louis Vuitton on Michigan Ave., or the scones at Taste of Heaven or the quiche at Sweet Occasions or the great parking spot at the Montrose “L” stop that I have to get to by 8:00 a.m. on workdays or it’s gone.

Outside of our apartments and offices, outside of our winter hibernation spots and our cars, we don’t own anything and at the same time we own everything. The wealthy have no more share in the sunset from Montrose Beach or the Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park than the homeless.

I’ll have my pictures taken there too, one day, and so will thousands of other couples so long as there is a North Ave. beach and a Mag Mile and love in this city. In the summer, I know I have to share my Chicago, and you know what? I really don’t mind so much.

It’s a new year, and although I usually avoid making resolutions (I typically intimidate myself into breaking them), this year I’m really making an effort.

Resolution #1: Get Fit(ter)

Friends and my boyfriend get ticked at me whenever I refer to myself as fat. I know I’m a long way from fat. I’ve been fat. I was a size 16 eighth grader. Try that on for adolescent insecurity.

But the point is, I got myself down to a size 6 two years ago, and I’ve more or less kept it that way since. Ever since I got back from vacation in December, my pants have gradually been fitting tighter and tighter until some of them stopped fitting. So I’m on the large end of size 6, and maybe even into the early days of size 8. Which is fine. I don’t base healthy weight on dress size. But if I can tell I’m swelling at the midsection within the span of one month, there’s probably something wrong with my eating and exercise habits.

So I signed up for a package at Essence Pilates studio, a Ravenswood storefront that specializes in nothing but Pilates, which is the one exercise I never get tired of doing. I hate gyms; I hate watching people more fit than me strut their stuff on stationary machines for hours, and then I psych myself out and slowly stop going as often. Most fitness classes, even some yoga classes, require you to go at the pace of the instructor or the rest of the class. Pilates isn’t like that. I love it. So for $150 this month, I can take as many classes as I want at Essence, where the class sizes are smaller than eight people, the sessions are a grueling hour long, and the music is often the Garden State soundtrack or Wilco as opposed to Britney Spears or some other crap (although they did play Black Eyed Peas once… wasn’t the end of the world, but there is something a little disconcerting about working out your glutes to the sound of “My Humps”).

I’ve been to two classes already and it’s only January 6 (considering that they were closed Jan. 1-3, that is more impressive than it sounds). Tomorrow I have an hour-long private session so the teacher can show me how to get more out of each work out. So see? Almost a week into 2008, and this resolution is still very much intact.

Resolution #2: More Girl Time

When you live with your significant other, time spent with others seems to dissapate. So I’ve been working to arrange all kind of girly get togethers, namely a monthly Book Club for shameless appreciaters of chick lit. The first book we’re reading is “Good in Bed” by Jennifer Weiner (author of “In Her Shoes”), which I’ve already read but in re-reading it these past few days, I’m already loving it more than I remembered.I bought a cocktail counter at Pier 1 with a built-in wine rack, which I hope will serve as the central point for numerous girly get togethers. Wine brings, and keeps, people together. It helps erase the awkwardness of acquainting yourself with a new group of friends. I have a lot of awesome girl friends who didn’t used to know each other, but through several dinners and chocolate tastings and nights at the wine bar, they are all more familiar with one another. Some even get together without me. I love spending time with my girlfriends and helping them meet and spend time with other cool people.

Resolution #3: Keep apartment clean

I had to interview the woman who invented the concept of “Home Staging” for the magazine I work for. Home Staging is basically presenting a home in a way that makes simply being in it pleasant for its residents as well as visitors. So we sorted through piles of old mail, donated clothes too small for us, threw out junk and broken appliances, and really spiffed up the place with plants, candles, and a few new things. We’ve already had company once since, and I feel like it’s easier for me to keep the place clean now that it’s already clean. I’m sorry we waited so long to do this!

There are other silly personal resolutions dealing with my professional life, friendships, love life, but the three most important ones I’m working hard to keep, and am proud of having done so thus far.

I have PMS and cramps so bad it feels like my insides are on fire, it’s a Thursday, my boss it out of the office, and all I want to do is curl up on my soft, comfy couch in front of the TV and watch ten straight hours of Whose Wedding is It Anyway?, How Do I Look?, What Not to Wear, Flip This House, or America’s Next Top Model reruns while scarfing McDonalds double cheeseburgers and fries and flipping through my girly magazines in the A/C.

I think all menstruating women should have extra sick days written into their contracts to use when PMS hits this hard. One a month. One day where you can sleep in, spend the day in your boyfriend’s tee-shirt and pajama pants, and not have to speak to another human being unless you truly want to. Perhaps I should start lobbying women’s rights groups. After all, we all know that if men had to live through PMS once a month, they’d be crying like babies instead of rolling their eyes when we ask them to pick up more tampons on their way home from work.

It’s gonna be a long day.

Last week was a matrimonial one, to say the least. Two of my friends got engaged (not to each other) and one (who we’ll call A) got married. I sobbed loudly while A exchanged her vows, hoping I wasn’t embarrassing my boyfriend to the point of discomfort, but to my great fortune, every other woman in the room was in a similar state. The couple whose nuptials we were witnessing had spent six years together, and many of us had seen their relationship evolve and grow, through smooth sailing and stormy. But that day, even guests who did not know A&D’s (her now-hubby) story were getting choked up and shedding the occasional tear of joy.

Wedding fever supposedly strikes every summer, but for whatever reason, this is the first year I’ve noticed it. My summer commenced with my best friend M’s marriage in New Jersey on Memorial Day weekend. I’m attending J’s bachelorette party this weekend, and after Labor Day, my band will play at J’s wedding here in Chicago. The following day I’ll be attending a “Bridal Beauty Day” with JF, and the following weekend, I’ll be trying on bridesmaid dresses for K’s wedding (May 2008). And I’ve already committed to contributing the ceremony music for JF’s wedding in October 2008.

Bridal showers, bachelorette parties, engagement parties, rehearsal dinners, weddings. Not to mention shopping for gifts, dresses, shoes to match the dresses, cards to go with the gifts; the creamy, sauce-covered, fried, frosted foods that’ll go straight to your hips; and the hotel rooms, flights, and four-hour drives that’ll clean you out for months. 

But when you sit in the pew or stand next to the alter at an actual wedding and watch love literally happening before your eyes, like we did at A&D’s ceremony, you forget all the exhausting work that goes into simply attending a wedding… until it’s your turn.

through circumstance and not choice, i am required to take the Brown Line to and from work everyday if i am to avoid six bus transfers or mile-long walks through less-than-ideal neighborhoods. for non-Chicagoans, the Brown Line is a segment of the “El” (Chicago’s elevated train system) that runs from the north side to the Loop (downtown) and back. over the past year, the Brown Line launched a construction project to overhaul and update each and every one of the stations along its path. to do so, they have decided to close nearly every other station on the north side, forcing many people to walk four to six extra blocks to catch their train or resort to taking a CTA bus.

because my stop is on a small side street and one of the northernmost stops on the Brown Line, by the time i board the train around 7:45am each morning, it is usually still fairly empty. well, this was the case until they closed the nearest major Brown Line station and all of those people have been relocated to my station. now it’s a fight to the death for a seat, and if not a seat, a pole to hang on to so as not to be flung against the wall when the train takes a turn or comes to an unexpected stop for no reason, whatsoever.

getting a seat is a privilege. it protects you not only from being thrown about like a rag doll, but from the overwhelming stench of people who stand way too close to you for absolutely no reason and suffer from unfortunate body odors. since i get motion sickness from reading on the train, there is nothing to distract myself from the vapors infiltrating my nostrils and i try to focus simply on not throwing up in my mouth.

sometimes, a true vagrant, i mean someone who has not seen the inside of a shower in months, possibly years, makes his way aboard, and always when the pain is packed to capacity. my favorite thing to do when this happens it watch the people directly next to the vagrant, who are practically climbing onto each other’s backs to get away from the smell of urine, body odor, and God knows what else. of course, when i am one of those people, i pray that the vagrant will get off at the next stop, otherwise, i will quickly de-train and dart into another car.

when you want a microcosm of society, there is nothing that compares to the Brown Line. you have businessmen in swanky suits with gadgets hooked up to their ears and pockets, chins held high as if they are reminding themselves that they are better than this, and if only their Mercedes weren’t in the shop, they wouldn’t have to stoop to this level. there are always very young mothers, maybe in their late teens or early twenties, with three or four kids clinging to their skirts, looking desperately for a way to sit together. there are people who will be deaf in three years because they feel the need to have their iPod on as loud as it can possibly be, and while i understand that all sorts of unpleasant sounds are present on the El, it’s really not worth blowing out my eardrums over. And of course, there are the ignorant SOBs who talk as loud as they possibly can on their phone so that we, the people without iPods or screaming children to distract us, are forced to hear one-sided conversations about redecorating, divorce, pregnancy, or someone’s job interview.

twice a day, every day, this is what i endure. when i feel too sick to read, i look out the window at the porches of apartments i wish i lived in. sometimes i check out what the other women my age are wearing. sometimes i compare myself to them, weight-wise. but always, no matter how crowded or uncrowded, no matter how fast the train goes or how many times it stops due to “signal clearance,” i am always, always hating every minute of it.