As I blissfully soaked in the sights and scents of Chicago this past weekend, I couldn’t help but daydream about how I so desired to one day make the windy city my permanent residence. It’s a place where the melting pot of cultures and the picturesque Lake Michigan have always put me at ease.

With its monstrous skyscrapers and its glitzy nightlife, Chicago, ever since I attended my first Cubs game at Wrigley Field when I was 9 years old, is a habitat that has been simply mesmerizing to me in a surreal way.

Although plenty of downsides exist when it comes to city living, including highway robbery prices that can easily deplete one’s budget in a startlingly rapid fashion. I mean, is anyone up for paying $35 for a measly bottle of rum? Or perhaps a $3 20 oz. bottle of Coke? I think not.

Despite the array of downsides, the allure of the city has always seem to outshine any negative experiences or circumstances that come with city living.

However, the daunting hurdles of city life that get butterflies churning in my stomach are the navigational challenges Chicago presents.

Granted, I’m quite inept when it merely comes to navigating within suburbia. Somehow though, I don’t think I’d be able to muster as much courage to ask for directions from residents in the city as opposed to the suburbs.

It’s not so much that I have this profound fear of asking for directions as much as it’s an etiquette issue to me.

I might not mind being bothersome on a rare occasion by asking some clean-cut businessman where a certain landmark was located, but knowing myself, the city landscape would not become any more familiar to me even if I lived in the heart of downtown for a year. Therefore, I would probably run into the same predicament on a regular basis and continuously feel guilty for asking grizzled civilians where Michigan Avenue was in proximity to Lakeshore Drive.

Sure a map would help to a certain extent, but I have no ambition whatsoever to carry a map around in a city where I spend a good portion of time when I’m not at Eastern; it would be quite embarrassing to say the least.

Places such as the various grease pits scattered throughout Chicago have often served as my lone tools in finding my way around.

There comes a point, in my own experience in pacing the city sidewalks, when every city street corner seemingly mirrors the next and having a keen sense of direction might just mean the difference in whether one can handle city life for a substantial chunk of time.

When it comes to getting lost, I panic, and that’s quite a problem.

Perhaps I should forego my aspiration of staking out permanently in Chicago and stick to mundane suburban living.