Outing

Bored of sitting around the condo and wishing I was in Wisconsin with a friend at the Pet Expo, I got to feeling a bit restless. Restlessness is not an unknown feeling to me. I often feel restless and used to go for a ride, a walk, or just out in the yard to play with animals or garden. Now I get to be like a filly kept in her stall too long, just brimming with unused energy that is sure to show up in an unpleasant manner if not gotten out.

So Mike decided we should go on an outing. He loves to just say we are leaving at this time and not tell me where we are going. I have long ago given up asking for hints or begging him to tell me. He is just about as stubborn as me, and more so on some occasions. Sometimes we leave by train, others on a bus. Today we took the car.

Along the way Mike will clue me into the history of the places we are traveling though. I have seen the Dunkin Donuts once locally known as Punkin' Donuts because it was a notorious hang out for runaway and homeless teens. He tells me how the neighborhoods have changed, this one might not have been safe a several years ago but now it is a trendy place to live. We drove through Obama's neighborhood where "black and whites stand shoulder to shoulder to keep the poor out" as I was told yesterday. That is Hyde Park if you are wondering.

Our final destination yesterday was The Oriental Institute Museum

The Oriental Institute Museum is a world-renowned showcase for the history, art, and archaeology of the ancient Near East. The museum displays objects recovered by Oriental Institute excavations in permanent galleries devoted to ancient Egypt, Nubia, Persia, Mesopotamia, Syria, Anatolia, and the ancient site of Megiddo, as well as rotating special exhibits.

That is a quote from their website.
It is a wonderful little museum. Unlike so many of the other museums in Chicago, you can actually see the whole thing in one day.

They have some rather impressive artifacts: A 17 ft high statue of King Tut. large reliefs of oxen and horses, mummies and writings.

My eye always wanders to the items that showed what daily life was like. I marveled at the sewing needles that woman would sew with. They were so large and would have left a large hole in most of today's fabrics. Except I guess they were normally sewing on animal hide and material that was woven with rather coarse thread. I wish I had gotten a picture of it but didn't think to at the moment.

They also had beads made out of many materials: clay, stones, and even glass. The little drills they used to craft these times were made by them also. No running down to Michael's or over to JoAnns. I felt a bit spoiled and lazy to think of the number of time I have said to myself that I would do a craft if only I had this that and the other thing. My mother's house is filled with those gadgets, but these people just made everything they needed. I have to admit I admire that.

It dawns on me as I am looking at early sculptures that these were real people with real struggles living long ago. They had real obstacles to overcome. They had real human emotions. I wondered about the woman who crafted a bowl. What about the man that chiciled out the character on this stone tablet. Who is the little five year old boy that was mummified? What was his short life like? How did his parents grieve his death, not just in general terms of what is customary of the day, but how did HIS parents deal with it.

Answers I will never know, but ponder.

To see more of what I saw please visit my other blog Fearless Riding. I show more of the horse related artifacts there.