Today I went to the Chicago Cubs Victory Parade, and you could say I learned a bit about patience.
Sources say that this parade in downtown Chicago was the 7th largest gathering in human history, with 5 million people in attendance. Now, please take a moment to imagine this, and then take a moment to imagine me in the midst of this crowd, wheelchair and all. How many other delbasid people are crazy enough to try this? Not many. (Also, how cool are my parents for letting me go to this? Very cool.)
My friends and I got up early in the morning, and after stuffing ourselves with PB & J to last us the day, we headed out to the city. After some struggles and walking at about 0.0001 miles per hour, we found a good spot. We stood in this single spot, unable to move, for approximately 4 hours, playing name games, observing people do stupid things like climb on top of bus stops, and singing various songs, doing basically anything we could to keep ourselves occupied.
The energy in the city was unbelievable. After all of this hype up and waiting, the double decker buses finally began passing by us, and it was over before we knew it. 4 hours of waiting for 4 seconds of seeing Kris Bryant’s face. Getting out of the parade area was way more difficult than getting in. A woman acted as if she was “with” me and my group, because she thought people would let me through faster. At one point, someone’s purse caught onto my joystick and drove my chair.
Was it worth it? Absolutely. There is nothing like being in person at an event where all of the enthusiasm is directed at one thing, whether that one thing is a musician at a concert or a baseball team at their victory parade for winning the World Series. Every single one of the 5 million people there were connected in some way by the sheer fact that we were rooting for and celebrating the same team. Yes, the amount of times I had to apologize for running over someone’s foot was a bit higher than on a normal day, and yes, I almost fell asleep leaning against my friend while waiting for the parade to reach us, but the patience paid off when I got to see with my own eyes the smiles on the players faces and feel the pride and unity of one of the greatest cities in the world.
My heart and mind now knows what true patience is and that having patience does have its rewards in the end. I mean, hey, the Cubs won the World Series for the first time in 108 years.
Be patient. History is being made.
