Wicked

Way back in August, Ashley's birthday present was tickets to Wicked.  She had to wait, for the show to come to town and for the best seats, we chose a show in December.  It was a long time to wait, but it's Wicked, so it's worth it!

Dave and I saw the show quite a few years ago when it first came to Chicago, but this was Ashley's first time.  I consider our experience this time, the tale of two stories--the good and the bad.   The show itself was fabulous, but everything else that evening was a bit of a nightmare for us as you shall soon learn…

First up, we had three tickets to the show.  Dave, Ashley and I were going to go.  Paige had mandatory dress rehearsal for the Nutcracker so she couldn't go.  Unfortunately, the day before the show, Dave developed a hernia and was in and out of some serious pain.  He decided that he probably couldn't go with us.  We thought about taking Paige, but she decided she needed to be at rehearsal so we had an extra ticket.  Considering the $100 price tag for each ticket, I didn't want it to just go to waste, the least we could do was give it to someone to enjoy.  So last minute, Ashley invited her friend, Jane, from church to go with us.  This was seriously, last minute, the girl went to school thinking she was going to have to babysit her brothers and sisters that night, but came home to learn that she had about 1 hour to get ready to go see Wicked.  Surprise!

The original plan for the evening had been for Dave to drive to work and Ashley and I would ride the train downtown and meet him after work for the show.  That way, we could avoid rush hour traffic going into Chicago and have a car to drive home after the show.  We could also grab a quick bite to eat before the show.  It would have been perfect.  Unfortunately, with Dave sick we had to change plans.  I will say that I still thought that we should take the train.  The only risk was that after the show we had a short window to catch the last train out of the city back to the burbs.  If we missed it, we would be stuck.  Dave suggested we drive in.  We could leave home at 4:30.  Even if traffic was bad, it wouldn't take us 3 hours to get downtown.  The show started at 7:30.  I didn't know what to do but eventually decided to drive.  I did, however, buy parking in advance, because I didn't want to have to deal with the hassle of parking, once we got there.

Ashley had bowling practice that afternoon, so the plan was to pick her up at the bowling alley, go get her friend and get on the freeway.  When I went into the bowling alley to pick her up, I saw her sitting down, face red and puffy from crying and an ice pack on her hand.  What?!  How did she get injured bowling?  Apparently they were practicing some kind of rolling technique on the carpet of the bowling alley and her finger got stuck in the hole of the ball and her hand got smashed between the ball and the ground.  It hurt pretty bad and her fingers were very swollen and already starting to bruise.  It looked bad.  But we had tickets to Wicked, no refunds!  Since she broke her finger before, I have a little knowledge about broken fingers and although they were smashed, she could bend them and they didn't seem broken.  Still, her hand was throbbing with pain.  I felt bad for her but we stopped at the store and bought her some ibuprofen and decided to continue icing as we drove to Chicago.

We quickly picked up her friend and headed downtown.  Things were okay for about 20 minutes then it all went bad.  TRAFFIC JAM, it was epic.  I think there must have been some kind of accident.  Plus one thing we did not consider was that traffic inbound is always worse on Friday night.  For whatever reason, this was a perfect storm, literally the worst traffic I've seen in my 10 years here.  At first, I wasn't too concerned.  It was going to be slow going, but it couldn't take us 3 hours to go 40 miles, right?!

At one point, we were basically at a standstill.  All I could do was watch the clock.  Eventually, as we crawled along, the panic started to set in.  It was a very real possibility we would not make it in time.  This is live theater, if you are late, they might not seat you.  I had Ashley searching the traffic maps on my phone.  I told her to look and tell me what color the road was on the map--red or yellow.  She said, neither, it was black!  Not good, black is worse than red.  Then we tried to call Dave and see if he could map out an alternate route for us if we got off the freeway.  He couldn't see a better way so we just had to wait and pray.

Basically, we entered the city at 7:10pm.  I drove like a madwoman or maybe I should say a crazy cabby to get over to the theater.  By this time it is 7:20 and I still have to park the car.  At this point, I didn't want the girls who had not seen the show, to miss anything, so I gave them their tickets and let them out in front of the theater and told them to go straight in and text me when they were safe and seated.  I then rushed to park the car.  What a blessing that I pre-purchased parking.  I still had to drive through the garage to find an open spot and ride the elevator back down to the street and run like a crazy woman to the theater.  I don't know how it was even possible but I walked through the front doors at 7:28, just as they were making the last call.  At this point, after having been in the car for so long, I definitely could have used a bathroom break, but there was no time for that.

Okay now the good part.  Our seats were amazing.  We were on the front row of the balcony, no one sitting in front of us.  It had been so long since I saw the show, in some ways it was like seeing it again for the first time.  Ashley, Jane and I loved it.  The music was fabulous.  Even though it had been hectic getting there, we were rewarded with a great show.

At intermission, once again I had to send the girls out on their own.  I gave the girls some money and told them to go get some concessions, because remember, we didn't have time to eat dinner.  I HAD to go to the bathroom.  The thing about the Oriental Theater is that there are not enough restrooms and there always huge lines.  I seriously, made a run for the bathroom line and probably had about 25 people ahead of me and 100 behind me.  Intermission is 15 minutes.  I stood in line the whole time.  Just as they flashed the lights to give a 5 minute warning, I was number 3 in line.  It was not an option to wait until later.  I finished my business with seconds to spare.  It was crazy.

After the show, this was the first time all evening we weren't in a time crunch, so we took a few pictures.

Then we tried to figure out where we could get some food.  The bad thing about this is that it is 11pm at night and nothing is really open and most of the downtown area is deserted.  I just decided to drive towards the freeway entrance and see what we could find.  Fortunately, we drove by a
Subway.  A Subway that was looking pretty sketchy and deserted with only a homeless guy inside.  The girls were too nervous to get out of the car, so I illegally parked right in front, locked the doors and went inside to buy sandwiches.  We ate in the car and thank heavens enjoyed an uneventful ride home! Man, the things we do for fun.