Living a Dream

A man named Parker Fernandez was one of my college roommates during my senior year at Ohio University. We then lived in different areas for a few years, but he would occasionally show up in Chicago and we'd have a hell of a time wandering the city. Not long after I came to Italy, Parker moved to Madrid to teach English through a much-more-official-than-mine program. In mid-November, Jenna and I visited him. This is our story. We had a 6:40 a.m. flight from an airport almost an hour outside of Milan, so we got up at 3, waited outside for an overnight bus to take us nearish the train station, then walked 2/3 of a mile to the train station, got on a shuttle bus, and arrived at the airport around 5:30. That's not a fun start. I stayed optimistic and upbeat, my bride to be was...less enthused. We were both also getting sick. Madrid is big. Like, really big. Just the airport took ages to get through, and eventually we got the train to the appointed meeting location for Parker and...