Consider me a women of adventure.

Scratch that-maybe not adventure.

That may or may not give off the impression that I’m a big traveler or that I’m not known as one of the greatest homebodies my friends and family have known.

So, consider me rather a woman of spirit.

I’m a woman who enjoys atmospheres embodying energy and movement, so that I can dance freely and sing loudly, though I admit I cannot sing well.

With that being said, Chicago is my home, and it’s the home that has provided me with the rejuvenated life that my animated soul fiends.

I mentioned I’m not particularly a lover of travel, and that therefore, ‘adventurous’ may falsely identify me as a person; however, who’s to say that the city isn’t a source of thousands of adventures in itself?

See, that’s how I look at things.  I may in fact one day decide to travel around the world, envisioning and experiencing all of what alternative cultures have to offer; but I can’t help but surmise that if one can’t initially search and discover their own special sense of journey within the culture they’ve been naturally born, they’ll struggle finding it elsewhere.

I’m a native of Chicago Heights, a southern suburb of Chicago, where I was exposed to the vividness the downtown city had to offer at a very young age, though not up until my senior year of high school did I undergo one of Chicago’s greatest styles of instilling life into the people. 

I encountered Lollapalooza, one of Chicago’s top music festivals.

I had never been to a music festival before, in fact, I’d hardly been to a concert before.  I saw Kelly Clarkson when I was 10 and Jason Aldean twice the year before Lolla. 

I enjoyed music, but not the way I did post Lollapalooza.

I experienced watching not just one artist live that I loved and not just one genre.  For example, I saw Kendrick Lamar and Chance the Rapper, two prominent rap artists; I saw Mumford & Sons, an extremely famous band within the indie folk and the folk and alternative rock genres; I saw Flux Pavillion, a well-known electric dance music DJ; I saw Eric Church, a beloved country singer. 

My friends Danielle (to the left of me) and Hannah (to the right) at Eric Church's 2013 Lollapalooza performance.

I brought up my love for dancing and singing.  I was able to carol my favorite songs within vocalist-related cultures such as the mentioned Mumford & Sons, and I was able to dance not only at each and every artist’s performance stage, but everywhere… and with everyone! 

The unsolicited typicality of today’s society was lost.  Too often people refuse to smile at one other on a street, too often a book is judged by its cover, and too often the beauty of each other’s true colors goes unseen-but not at a Chicago music festival. 

I took my beloved memories of Lollapalooza and became a faithful ticket holder for the upcoming summer music festivals that following summer.

So, I confessed to being one to struggle finding ease with journeying to places that I may deem as foreign, but it’s evident that there may just be more than one definition to illustrate the true meaning of adventure.

Through events such as these that the city of Chicago has to offer, my full of spirit self has defined my own personal sense of adventure. 

I now define adventure as not only meeting new people, but becoming friends with them; I define adventure as listening for which song grabs your heart most, and then dancing to it until your shins hurt; I define adventure as finding people that will sing with you as long as you do, even though you all may sound miserable.

And what’s even better than Chicago’s music festivals?  The fact there’s over 400 other festivals that may reveal your adventurous side. 

Maybe you’re interested in art.  Maybe you're a chef.  Maybe you’re a fan of theater.

Adventure is out there.  Define who you are, and then go find your own perception in the uplifting festival events of Chicago.