Summer Reruns

It's July!*  Do you know what that means?  Do you remember?

July is the month of my birth . . . into Chicago.  Do you remember that? 

It's the month of successful musicals about the T.  Do you remember that? 

It's the month in which I perform at the Neofuturarium.  Remember?

The month in which I begin to volunteer my ass off?

In which Second City and I flirt but go our separate ways?

You don't remember much, do you?  C'mon.  It's only been a year.

That's okay.  You can catch it this time around.  Life is a big fat rerun.

Last year, Chicago welcomed me with fireworks and wild celebration.  This year, the city went all out.  On the day of my one-year anniversary, I was invited to a mysterious building in Wicker Park (a neighborhood I can now find "all on my ownsies").  I followed signs to the top floor, then to the roof.  I was handed a beer and engaged in pleasant conversation under a full moon that I'm pretty sure was fake.  Then, Rahm Emmanuel personally entertained me all evening with a fireworks display in four dimensions.

Is this a sign of things to come . . . er, that is, things to repeat?  If you don't think so, have a look at some other omens.^

- This month, I will again be performing at the Neofuturarium.  Sure, it'll be as part of a class, "Intro to TML," but performance is performance, and I intend to call a cigar a cigar. 

- Yesterday, I volunteered with Second City.  I washed dogs.  I did not dress up like one. 

- Speaking of Second City, after a year on the "in," I am once again, like last summer, "on the out."  Was it my overuse of quotation marks? Or was a year just enough?

- As I write this, I'm listening to "Living on Prayer" on repeat.  I'm pretty sure I also listened to that song sometime last July, too.  Weird. 

- And that musical?  Well, it seems to be speaking for itself again over in Beantown. 

Yes, any way you slice it, July is (give or take) the third most exciting month of the year.  And it's a great time to start all over again.  

"We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time."  - TS Eliot  

I first learned that quotation in July.  

Weird. Again.
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*I don't know what an e-socialist is.  

^ Not official omens, mind you.  Haven't seen one of those for a while.