1,001 Chicago Afternoons

I’m standing in a darkened room while soft, almost New Age music plays overhead. It’s relaxation-tape music, down to the odd moments of the simulated sounds of rainfall trickling around the carpet and glass.

I’m staring at a severed head. » Read the rest of this entry «

4-1-90

Happy Birthday. I hope you have a good one. It’s nice you won’t have to work.

I hope you enjoy the book and remember your sister while your reading it. I love you. Enjoy your birthday.

Love your sis,

Cheryl

I put the spray-painted copper copy of “Clear and Present Danger” back on the shelf in the fake child’s room. It slid easily between similarly coppered copies of “A Monetary History of the United States 1867-1960” and a Tom Clancy’s “Without Remorse” that, based on a stamp on the title page, once belonged to a dentist from Santa Rosa, California. » Read the rest of this entry «

There’s a stretch of the Gold Coast where the homes are beautiful.

It’s not the most visible part, the tall condo buildings from that misguided period of American architecture known as the 1970s, when the point of a building was to crane above the others, out out out into a view you could brag about to your ground-dwelling coworkers.

Before the deluxe apartment in the sky was the ultimate in movin’ on up, luxury was low, squat and gorgeous. » Read the rest of this entry «

The Frisbee haunts me. » Read the rest of this entry «

Peace to the old man sipping drinks at the VFW bar.

And the bagpiper on the condo roof.

Peace to the newsman, chasing stories for cartoons.

Peace to the lady who jammed in Tunisia.

And peace to the one who makes really sexy ladies’ underthings. » Read the rest of this entry «

He was thin, mostly, with light brown hair in a blocky cut that would be called hipster if he weren’t doing it authentically.

“Nope,” the doorman said, narrowing his eyes and looking away from me. “Haven’t had any complaints about a bagpipe.” » Read the rest of this entry «

Real Chicago is a white woman in a white dress walking down a corridor lined with mirrors.

According to the ad on the hotel wall, at least. » Read the rest of this entry «

All I remember is the heat and her dance. » Read the rest of this entry «