#851: For the Chuckles

November 17th, 2017 § permalink

Occasionally the chattering teens let the sound of football break through.

The football was on TV, the teens were on plastic chairs pushed beneath the two-tops Tetrised into the restaurant. The usual corner pizza place contrivances were there — heat-lamp rack for the slices, illustrations of fat Italians in chef hats on 3/4 of the walls.

People shoved in and people shoved out, slices in hands. Only the teens, the football and a middle-aged man working a crossword puzzle from a barstool along the storefront window were permanent fixtures.

Eventually the man got up and went back to the kitchen. Eventually one of the teen couples left, saying goodbye to the other one on the way out. All that was left was one teen couple, an anxious-looking blonde woman standing behind the register and hundreds of photos of Hegewisch Chuckles. » Read the rest of this entry «

#850: Barricades

November 15th, 2017 § permalink

There is a spot where the dollar stores no longer have chain-link fences and concertina wire rounding their roofs.

There’s a place along Illinois Route 1 — Halsted Street to Chicagoans — where the dollar stores just become dollar stores, no extra security needed in metal and mesh. Then there’s a place further north where they disappear entirely. » Read the rest of this entry «

#849: Big Marsh

November 13th, 2017 § permalink

There are only a few signs you’re still in a city. A spider’s web of telephone lines off in the distance. A tanker truck speeding down an access road to one of the lingering industrial sites that survived the 20th century. A name on the signs that say not to fish, get off the trail, let your dogs bother the birds or go into the fenced area.

You’re in nature. You’re in Chicago. » Read the rest of this entry «

#848: The Last War Dance

November 10th, 2017 § permalink

Chicago’s last war dance started by the Wrigley Building, then headed west along the riverbank past Trump Tower, Marina City, and The 3D Printer Experience. » Read the rest of this entry «

#847: Making It

November 8th, 2017 § permalink

He didn’t talk for as long as he could.

You could tell he wanted to. You could tell he had comments to add, things to say in our conversation that he was not a part of. He’d chuckle silently at a joke one of us made, his body quivering a little behind the wheel. Or he’d nod along at a point as he flicked on the turn signal or merged into traffic.

But he held out from the moment he picked us up at the 26th and California courthouse in Little Village up until the pre-rush hour glut by the Ogilvie train station when he just couldn’t take it any more. » Read the rest of this entry «

#846: The Purpose-Driven Life

November 6th, 2017 § permalink

For all I know, I’m romanticizing a stage set from a guerrilla student film.

For all I know, this is a fantasy I concocted on a drowning wet day in a vacant bread factory in Bronzeville. » Read the rest of this entry «

#845: Julie’s Angles

November 3rd, 2017 § permalink

The bed is problematic.  » Read the rest of this entry «

#844: The Thought

November 1st, 2017 § permalink

“No, no,” the slim woman said, looking out at the scattered crowd eating pizza and toying with microphones in a far Northwest Side rental hall. “Stay where you are. Do not break the stillness of this moment.”

No one did, not the microphone tinkerers, the laptop typist nor the woman running line-by-line through a Braille transcript of the slim woman’s words.

“For this is a time of mystery, a time when imagination is free and moves forward swiftly, silently. This is… The Haunting Hour.”

And the music swelled.

“The Thought,” she said, taking a step backwards from the first of four mics. » Read the rest of this entry «

#843: Meresamun the Chicagoan

October 30th, 2017 § permalink

From: eteeter@********.edu

To: 1001chicago@gmail.com

Questions for Meresamun:

What did your music sound like? Was it more like chanting? Were there duos or trios?

I know that you worked in Thebes. Where did you and your family live? 

Did you know any of the other people who worked at Karnak that we know from their mummies-like Paankhenan (Art Institute) or Djedmaatesankh (Royal Ontario Museum)?

…

Amun loves her, that’s what the name means.

Meresamun worked as a singer-priestess in the wind god’s temple at Karnak in Thebes twenty-eight hundred years ago. She was about 30 when she died, a woman of wealth and status who pacified Amun, king of the gods, three times a day, one month out of every four.

Today, she lives under glass in Chicago, Illinois. Dr. Teeter and I wonder about her. » Read the rest of this entry «

#842 ½: An Announcement

September 15th, 2017 § permalink

When I started this site my worry was getting to my goal. Now I’m scared I’ll get there too soon. » Read the rest of this entry «

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