M as in Marriage, Maybe

It’s been so long since I’ve considered being married that I’m nearly at a loss for how I might go about it.  I’m only sort-of seeing someone and outside of a little kiss here and there, there is nothing quite yet visionary about us.

There hasn’t been anything visionary in terms of couple-hood with me for nearly a decade so it’s unlikely that I’ll be rushing head first into marriage.  It’s currently not legal in Illinois but it may be soon.  Even when marriage becomes legal I’m not sure where I’ll begin because I’ve spent all of my life accepting the idea that it could never happen.

The first step would be to date someone but the older I become, the more difficult dating has become because there seems to be only two groups of forty-something men to choose from.  Those that are completely set in their ways as if they’ve been married for decades already (though just to themselves) and men who are still enamored with bar hopping, getting laid, and roller coasters.

I’m not saying that I need to find a doctor or lawyer – though the latter is quite prevalent in a city like Chicago, but it would be nice to have someone around the house who could install a new kitchen faucet or at the very least, help me get the down comforter into the duvet cover.  Every time I attempt to do this I end up inside the duvet cover myself and cursing like a sailor over the fact that I can’t get the corners into place properly.

At first I try folding the comforter in half, attempting to gently slide it into the duvet cover.  It never works.  Next I try standing on the bed so as to allow the weight of the comforter and gravity to get it in correctly.  This never works either.  Inevitably, I end up laying on the bed, inside of the duvet cover and pulling the comforter in after me.  This always works.

It would also be nice to have someone around to shave my back – something that my barber says I can have done in any number of places in the city.  I suppose I could go to a men’s grooming salon but that’s just not me.  My would-be-husband would do this for me just a few times a year, like before our vacation to Europe and before shirtless bicycling season begins.  He’d probably try to talk me out of it, saying something like “I think your back hair is sexy” and I’d refute his claim by pointing out the old Jewish men I see along the lakefront each summer who, even though they are with their wives, still do not have enough sense to clean themselves up a little before taking off their shirts.

And speaking of Europe, this would be our preferred vacation destination.  We’d get there in Business Class seats that we’d saved for with miles earned by trudging around for years in Coach Class.  Appreciating Business Class only comes from knowing what the alternative is like.  It’s the little things.

Things have changed, especially when it comes to dating.  Back when gay men were expected to be seen and not heard, if even that, dating meant having a steamy and seductive relationship with someone you’d pick up in a bar.  Even the bars were different back then, typically old buildings with bricked over windows that sat on the edge of town.  There was no signage and just a steel door off which opened onto the side street or alley.  I actually lost track of how many cities I visited that had gay bars named Back Street.

It’s not like these bars were inhabited by men destined to be husband material.  We were socially conditioned to believe that we would never be husbands to one another, so instead, we went to bars to catch a buzz and forget our loneliness.  After a few beers we’d end up on the dance floor and if we were lucky our mating rituals would pay off and we’d find someone with whom we could go home and stave off the loneliness a bit longer in hopes that it might lead to something more, like maybe a message on the answering machine later in the week.

We used to write our telephone numbers on matchbook covers and hope that the guy didn’t smoke so much that he’d go through an entire book of matches and discard the one we’d written on.  Or we’d write our number down on paper napkins, fold them in two, and place them in a guy’s pocket.

If this were to have happened during the seasonal transitions, I may not find that telephone number until next season when I’d pull out that jacket or sweater.  But more often than not I would find the remains of that phone number shredded across my black socks when I pulled them out of the washer or attached, in tiny pieces, to the lint trap of the dryer.

Back then we had only one phone number each and text messages weren’t something anyone would have ever imagined.  If our first impression was made on a dance floor, then our second impression was surely the message on our answering machines.  Knowing this, I would time the sound of my voice in foreground during the riff of a Madonna song in the background.  Over and over until it sounded just right.

If I’d met someone over the weekend I’d rush home after work each day hoping to see the blinking red light.  If there was a message from some newly met man, I’d hope he’d not forgotten to leave his number because there was no caller ID then either.  If there was no red blinking light, I’d often sit at home waiting for the actual call.  This behavior is the makings of neurosis.

Now I wait for the vibration of my phone in hope that it’s a text message. It’s the same concept but with a different delivery method, kind of like how the patch or gum has replaced cigarettes in the delivery of nicotine.  I suppose I could write my telephone number on a guy’s nicotine patch.

Anyway, if you were lucky a guy might call you and invite you over for dinner next Friday night.  When this happened to me I’d run right over to Weinstock’s during my lunch hour and pick out a new outfit, making sure that whatever I chose fit the demographic of the man who’d invited me.  That wasn’t easy then either because gay men of every ilk frequented the same places.  For all I knew, the man who invited me to dinner was serial killer – at which point whatever I would be wearing to dinner could just as easily end up on the front page of the next day’s newspaper.

A dinner date back then meant one thing for sure – having sex.  It was a good idea to bring a bottle of wine to dinner, if not for appearing to be the perfect guest, then at least to ensure that there’d be enough alcohol to wash away inhibitions as we sat on the sofa after dinner listening to Enya.  Madonna was fine for the bars and answering machines, but once invited into another’s home, it was important to display the depths of our cultural attainment.  It was also best to bring along a toothbrush because even the best host could forget a detail like this and waking to morning breath after a night of red wine, cock sucking, and analingius is never a good idea.  Intimacy has its limits on the first date and bad breath is one of them.

Throughout my twenties and even into my thirties I was pretty good at these sorts of things even though I had only simple stoneware and mismatched silverware.  I did however, always have a spare toothbrush on hand.  Actually, I still do, though it typically ends up in my shoe shine kit where it’s used to remove dirt from the crevasses on my wingtips.

Finding a husband was never on the docket because that vocabulary didn’t exist in the social lexicon.  Lover was the term used then and finding lovers was relatively easy comparatively speaking.  I didn’t have to expect much from a lover and I didn’t have to expect much of myself as one.  Finding a lover was a lot like finding a good mustard at the neighborhood grocery store.  Always surprised that it was there in the first place and devastated when they stopped stocking it, only to find another suitable brand when the current jar was empty.

Dating in my forties feels like an entirely different situation.  For one thing, I can’t stay out all night and expect to be useful in the morning.   For another thing, I’m not really keen on sitting in a noisy bar.  It’s much easier to sit at home with a bottle of wine and read on-line profiles of eligible men while listening to Philip Glass. At the end of the night though, both make me feel as if I’m suffering from vertigo.

Some on-line dating sites create matches by zip code or by calculating responses to questions and then determining potential likability.  The first pick of one of these sites gave myself and the other guy a very high percentage chance that we’d get along so I wrote a quick note and sent it through the site’s messaging service.  After a few emails we decided to meet.  So good was this site’s algorithms that it turned out he worked for the company that I had left eight years earlier and had dated the guy that had recently dumped me.  Boy, did we have a lot to talk about.

Thankfully he was not one of these guys who had pictures of himself with his teddy bears.  What is it about some gay men in their forties who think that their teddy bear collection or their Disney figurines in the curio cabinet make for a good background in photos?  Am I supposed to think that he’s just a kid at heart or, like I’m sure to conclude, that he’s stuck in some kind of childhood experience where imaginary friends take the place of actual adult conversation?

Then there are the guys who take pictures of themselves with their pick-up trucks. Even when I had one I never ventured to thrust my vehicular preference onto another man.  How much an axel can carry or how much torque a drive train can produce only speaks to how much a man is willing to go into debt for the sake of masculine imagery.  If you happen to live on a farm it’s one thing….

Now, if that pick-up truck happens to be parked in a deeded parking spot then I may be more likely to strike up a conversation.  Deeded parking spots represent stability and for men in their forties, stability means something.  None of the new condo buildings have deeded parking.

Sometimes I’m at a loss for what fills the gaps between the narcissists, bar-hoppers, teddy-bear collectors and the bro’s who love their Ford F-150’s.  Where are the normal guys?  Like the guys who buy their sheets at Sears, or the guys who use their old t-shirts for rags rather hiring a cleaning service.  And then I realize that we were never expected to be normal.  Because we had no place in mainstream society, we didn’t have to develop the standard social skills.

I mean, let’s face it, if we knew enough not to tell our neighbors that we gave blow jobs to bartenders during their fifteen minute breaks, then we sure as hell knew not to tell them about our collection of hand painted porcelain Gone with the Wind miniatures.   Since we knew that the nature of our true selves could never be shared with the public at large, what difference does it make if we dress up like construction workers and drive around in our trucks?

We learned to make-believe and we learned to live in a world where nothing mattered because we didn’t matter.  We became socially stunted in a fraternal state that didn’t really evolve into anything more than that.

Now that I’m in my late forties I’m beginning to understand how to relate to other gay men but it’s still not easy.  I recently went to dinner with a friend that I hadn’t seen all winter and when I asked him about his new boyfriend the only thing he had to say was, “He’s a top.  With bad teeth.”  While it’s somewhat comedic, it’s also kind of sad.  After all, this is a fifty-four year old man using a preferred sexual position to describe another man’s primary character trait.  Ironically, I knew exactly what he meant.

All of this wishy-washiness makes me want to be the guy who is honest, truthful, and forthcoming.  There’s that old saying that you have to be the kind of person that you want to attract and the one that says “we’re the change we’ve been waiting for.”

I’d been chatting with a guy on line who asked me about my fiction writing, though when I told him about the idea I was working on now, about what you’ve been reading about here, he ended the conversation.

When I talk about financial responsibilities with those who ask, they suddenly stop asking questions when I tell them about my retirement goals and how I’m achieving them.  Then they think I’m stand-offish when I say no to going out to expensive dinners and nights on the town that I simply cannot afford – and neither can they, which is why they have no savings.

I’ve noticed that when I tell a man that I like how I truly feel about him, he typically disappears.  So, if we can’t be honest about who we are and what we’re hoping to accomplish, how are we going to address lives that include something so strong and meaningful as marriage?  How do we affirm our beliefs in one another when we have not yet learned how to communicate our own positions in life?

I take a lot of crap for comparing myself to my straight friends, but it’s my straight friends who actually seem to give a crap, not only about themselves, but about me.  After a friend of mine had broken up with his girlfriend he’d told me that he had a date with a new girl not long after.  I asked him if he was looking for something long term or if he was just looking for regular sex.  He told me that he just liked having someone around to talk to at the end of the day.  I felt as if my question to him was representative of my own naiveté.

When I mentioned to this same friend that I had no plans for the upcoming weekend he suggested I get on line and find a date.  He sat down with me while we looked at the on-line dating site that I belong to and after a while he said, “this reminds me of looking at a yearbook.”

Here I am.  Thinking about something as bold as marriage and not even knowing where to find a steady boyfriend.  My straight friends that are my age have grown kids and have gone through all the same things that I’m going through now, but they did it twenty-some years ago.  Some of them may have gone through it once or twice, and some of them may be finding themselves single again.

The difference is that they’ve had social situations in place all of their lives that support and encourage meaningful relationships.  They’ve seen their ideals represented in advertisements for new cars, retirement planning, real-estate, and toothpaste.  They’ve been the best man at their friends’ weddings, and vacationed together with other couples – in separate beds even.

Within my grasp is now something that will have social meaning and something that can define not only myself, but those around me and at times it feels almost too large to comprehend.

I asked a friend of mine about these things.  Not really a friend, I guess, but a guy that I chat with on-line every now and then.  We typically have good conversations.  He’s fifty years old and as handsome as you could ever imagine.  Salt and pepper beard.  Well built.  Tasteful tattoos.  Articulate.  Well-read.  He looks like the kind of guy you’d see working on the docks at a shipyard.  I asked him about his take on dating.  He told me that he just broke things off with someone a couple of months ago.  I asked him if he’d be willing to tell me about it.

“I can’t talk about it,” he said. “I will just start sobbing uncontrollably.”

Dating is complicated.  Marriage, even more so.  And while I’m always saddened by the sight of a grown man crying, I’m glad my buddy told me this, even if it’s not the complete story.  I’d rather he shed tears over a break up than over the untimely death of Maria Callas.  What I want him to have, though, are tears of joy.

Not every man may want to marry but very soon it will be a choice for some who have never had the option.  This new option will, none the less, require us look at ourselves through a different set of lenses – possibly even bifocals, which is what I expect to be wearing after my next eye exam.

Husband Material

A friend and I were watching a movie with a wedding scene and one of the groomsmen, in an attempt at humor, made some unsavory remarks about both the bride and the groom – typical Hollywood pandering.  I said to my friend, “I’ll never let guests speak at my wedding.”  Shockingly, I had uttered the words “my wedding”, words that, together, left my vocabulary some thirty years ago.

 

Thirty years ago I had come to the conclusion that I was gay.  Thirty years ago I realized  any relationship and any home I’d eventually create would not include marriage.  I deleted thoughts of honeymoons, picket fences, anniversaries and every other cultural implication of marriage, including the word “husband”.

 

Thirty years ago the term used by gay men for a live-in partner was “lover”.  That word never sat well with me because of it’s clandestine characteristics but it was a word that would eventually define my romantic interests for the next three decades.  I didn’t realize that it was also defining me.

 

Finding a lover was a matter of being at the right place at the right time and interacting with the right person, or so it seemed.  It was the bar after bar, party after party, and eventually the coffee shops, where one was expected to appear coy while peering over the top of a book or a laptop computer.  I was constantly on the look-out for the one who would become my lover.

 

I wasn’t very adept at the activities required to find a lover.  I’ve never been fond of crowds.  I dislike small talk.  I’m perfectly happy sitting alone in a bar or a cafe, and I never really cared if anyone talked to me or not.   Regardless, this is the routine I had adopted.  An act, a series of motions that I was pretending to enjoy for the sake of finding a lover.

 

When I sensed a level of interest from another man, I’d readily board a plane to spend a weekend with him.  I’d drive across the state to see a man for an afternoon.  My long-distance phone bills were in the triple digits.  I thought I was doing everything right, but things just never seemed to work out.

 

Most of the time things didn’t work out because I was making unwise decisions.  I spent one summer dating a former East German soldier who was living in Frankfurt.  It wasn’t the most convenient place to have a lover, but it was exciting and romantic, especially when we’d stay in the lake-side dacha that was previously reserved only for the top communist party bosses or when we’d zip to Berlin to visit his friends.

 

There was the horse trainer from Provo.  Acres of land, a barn filled with horses, tight Wrangler’s and muddy boots.  He was a dark and mysterious lover, and rightfully so.  As it turned out, he had one of his own who already lived with him.

 

I shouldn’t omit the guy who owned a shop in East L.A. that sold First Communion dresses. I had a lot of fun jetting to and from the west coast and our passionate kisses in front of the airport were something that I looked forward to each week.

 

The German was the perfect lover because immigration laws meant that we’d never be together permanently.  The cowboy’s pre-existing lover meant that I got to have all the fun and wasn’t the one left cleaning the stalls.  And the language differences with the guy in East L.A. meant we never had to really share our thoughts – though I’d picked up enough Spanish to get around on my own.  Enough Spanish in fact to find yet another lover in Los Angeles when things fizzled out

 

We were all great lovers at the time.  Mysterious.  Passionate.  Elusive.  Jetting to and from.  Airports and hotels.  Never having to disclose a whole lot to one another and then always retreating to our own homes when our time together ended.  We had all the makings of lovers, including being disposable.

 

Now, for the first time in Illinois men can finally start talking about marrying the man that they live with and refer to that man as their husband.  I can’t help but admit that this new vocabulary is changing the way that I think of myself because husband is a vastly different construct than lover.

 

It is a state of being that I never expected – not of myself and not of any other gay man I’ve met.  It is a term that requires more than the physical act of love.  It is a role that asks us to love, honor, cherish, and respect, for better and for worse.  It requires us to care for and protect.

 

Being a husband requires commitment, like sticking around on Christmas Day, rather than doing what I had once done, which was to leave my lover home alone on our first Christmas together.  I did that once, choosing instead to drive to the other end of the state to be with a friend who didn’t bother to question my judgement.  The funny thing is I despised Christmas because someone had done that to me – a lover, the software guy from Little Rock.  The straight married man I had been seeing did the same thing a couple of years earlier.

 

This new vocabulary requires more of me.  I’m no longer afraid to talk about the man I’m seeing because for the first time I see this man as someone who could be my husband and not simply a mysterious lover who would remain absent from certain parts of my life.

 

I’m more comfortable saying that we’re planning a vacation rather than simply telling my coworkers or other acquaintances that I’m going on a trip.  This new vocabulary requires me to introduce the man I’m seeing as someone other than just a friend.  It requires me to care about his emotions and his well-being.  It requires me to treat him better than if I only expected him to be my lover.   Society is changing and it is redefining my expectations, mostly of myself.

 

I can’t help but wonder how my life would have been different if I had grown up with the idea that I could marry the man I love and that I could be his husband.  I’m not one to regret the past…it was a whole lot of fun, but with this new vocabulary, I have for the first time, a place to go that is beyond the illicit.  I have, for the first time, a legal vocabulary that is also a destination for how I want to live my life.

 

Chicago Public Schools – 40% Do Not Graduate

As I set out to write this I remind myself that I’m a relative new-comer to the city of Chicago.  I’m not fully aware of everything that takes place in this city – it is too large and too multi-faceted to know all of it’s nuances.  None the less, I cram daily to learn about it’s political and social past, present, and future.

The recent strike by the Chicago Public School Teachers brought an entirely new subject to the forefront of my reading.  Union contracts aside, I believe that teachers are generally underpaid and under appreciated by our society as a whole.

We bulk at the idea of a teacher earning $75,000 a year, but thinking little of a sports figure who earns millions.  We cry foul when NFL referees strike and our teams fail, but think little of children who are not getting a proper education.

Teachers prepare our population for the future, kind of like infrastructure prepares our cities to meet present and future demands.  A city without electric and water lines won’t grow and a city with poor education won’t grow either.  So when I read that Chicago public schools have a graduation rate of just 60% I became a bit bewildered.

The people I know love Chicago.  I love Chicago. I moved here, in part, because civic pride is as broad as the city’s shoulders.  We relish this place, from it’s architecture and high-rises to it’s parks and museums.  We thrive on our ability to get things done and be the city that works yet we pay little attention to the fact that 40% of students who attend public schools will not have an adequate education to obtain even the most menial jobs.

In denying this aspect of our city’s future, we are creating our own problems. We are creating poverty faster than we can solve it’s problems.  We are creating the very blight that we’re trying to eliminate.

An under-educated population has fewer options.  Without access to entry level jobs or college or trade schools the city will experience sustained unemployment levels and will see sustained levels of crime and injustice perpetuated on both sides of the economic and social platform.

These injustices lead to higher costs for the city as a whole through the increased need in social assistance, police presence, and increased economic demands on individuals and families.  Chicago already has challenges with these issues yet the root cause continues exists.

Teachers and the school board cannot take the all blame.  Societal issues play a large role in a child’s education.  These societal issues are, however, primarily rooted in poor education and lack of access to income.  It is a cycle that is being perpetuated by a broken system.

Rahm Emanuel must address this part of the city’s infrastructure if Chicago is to become the world class city that he envisions.  Every business that is located within the city of Chicago must address this issue as well, because without an educated workforce, few businesses will be able to sustain their presence here.

Rahm secured millions of dollars for transportation improvements that will keep the city moving.  The owners of Wrigley Field seek funding to renovate their infrastructure for the sake of economic viability.  Corporations seek tax benefits as a reason to stay or relocate here.  These incentives help make Chicago a city that we love.

Still, no matter how improved our trains become, how nice our stadiums become, or how beautiful our skyline becomes, none of it will matter if 40% of our students cannot find a future in their own city or any other, for that matter.

Throwing money at the education isn’t necessarily the issue at hand.  The issue at hand is that the education system is broken and a city that ignores the basic education needs of it’s population will never be a world class city.  It cannot.  A city that ignores education will be forever caught in a cycle of repair rather than growth.

Fixing the education system is not a challenge that is unique to Chicago.  It is, however, I believe, a challenge that can be met here because Chicago has a history of being able to get things done.  This city has a history of making great things.  Our education system must be great as well and there should be no greater priority for Rahm Emanuel than to create this infrastructure alongside every other piece of the city.

I don’t claim to have the answers to this challenge but I do know that this city is filled with incredibly talented people who know how to make things work.  There is an entire floor of the Prudential building staffed with some of the brightest people in the country and they’re working on Obama’s reelection campaign.  These people are passionate and I’ll bet that they’d have some ideas.

Here is one idea.  How about setting up an on-line site for donations?  Individuals could contribute $5 or $15 or whatever they could to help the Chicago Public Schools.  Corporations could donate.  People living anywhere could donate.

Obama’s campaign brought in $181 million in September alone.   Half of that could be of use in creating a world-class education system for this city.

Why not take donations?  Let’s let Chicago see who is really interested in this city’s future – and let’s let them out do one another for the sake of public opinion.  Let’s see who’s really invested.

 

 

 

Biking Chicago – Summer’s Recap

“There are those two months of winter when I won’t be biking to work,” he said.

“Two months?” I asked.  Then I told my neighbor that I wanted to use his calendar.

I’m the guy who prefers summer biking.  When I awoke at 5am to seventy-five degree temperatures and was out on the lakefront trail by 6am I was in a state of pure bliss.  Today I awoke to a temperature of forty-nine degrees and it’s a sign that my outdoor bicycling season is nearly over.

When I was a kid my summers were spent riding my bike.  Day after day, summer after summer it was me and my bike.  My third bike, pictured here, had an odometer and as I raced around the block day after day, Lucy, the old woman who lived at the corner of our block would ask with each round, “How many?” and I’d blurt out the latest mileage as I passed her.

My next bike, of which there are no photographs (we didn’t have pocket cameras) didn’t have an odometer, but it was a three-speed and by this time I was exploring the neighborhoods surrounding mine.  Throughout those summers I’d bicycle from the shores of Lake Calhoun to the Cathedral in St. Paul and to all places in between.

Back at home after a day’s ride, I’d pull out my map of Minneapolis /St. Paul and highlight the streets that I’d been on that day, using the map as a way to discover  new streets to explore.

Fast forward to 2012 and I now have GPS tracking available which not only maps my ride (www.mapmyride.com) it also offers statistics on distance, time, elevation, average speed, and calories burned.   I now have this wealth of data at my fingertips  thanks to orbiting satellites that make our lives on earth easier.

While the data surrounding a season of bicycling is nice to have, for me it’s never been about the data.  My bike rides have always been about exploration and freedom.  Freedom to move through time and space in near silence in a narrow sliver of space that I control.

In smaller cities, that sliver of space was seldom interrupted.  In Salt Lake City I could bike up a canyon and only pass a handful of people.  On the bike path along the river in Columbus I might pass a few dozen people when I was near the university.  In Chicago, however, I often navigate through hundreds if not thousands of people, especially on the weekends.

This is List A and this is what I’ve learned from bicycling on Chicago’s north side:

• Know that only those behind you can see you.
• Assume that those coming towards you cannot see you either, especially if they’re passing in heavy traffic.  Lights on at all times is best.
• Expect runners in front of you to stop immediately at any given time and/or dash to the lake without looking first.
• Understand that tourists on bicycles is NOT a good thing.  Not for anyone.  Tourists commandeering their own four-person pedicab is a really bad idea.
• Avoid Navy Pier between the hours of 9am and 8pm.  Realize that this is impossible because the the trail crosses the entrances to Navy Pier.
• Remember that you will say aloud every word of George Carlin’s Seven Words while navigating the bridge over the Chicago River which is the lower level of Lake Shore Drive.
• Translate “on your left” into every language you can and assume that only local bicyclists and runners know that this means.
• Assume that the mom pushing her double-wide stroller and talking on the phone has no idea that there are other people living in Chicago.

This is List B and this is what I’ve discovered from bicycling along the lakefront:

• The earlier I ride, the better.
• Every morning I’ll see the gray-haired woman on roller blades.
• Often I’ll see a very old man in a yellow hi-viz vest shuffling along just north of Fullerton.
• Equally as often I’ll see the very old woman in her housecoat, orthopedic shoes,and giant bug-eye sun glasses out on the trail pushing her walker.  She’s still got it!
• Every morning, evening, and weekend I’ll see the tanned and toned shirtless runner near the Oak Street Beach that looks exactly like Carmine Ragusa.
• I never see people inside of the Mies van der Rohe apartment buildings.
• Heading south from the Museum Campus and through the prairie restoration area is amazing!
• Heading further south to where the city is creating separate paths for bicyclist and runners is even better.
• Passing McCormick Place on the way home and realizing that there is still 90 more blocks to go feels exhausting.
• Rounding the corner northbound towards the Oak Street Beach is exhilarating and makes me want to keep going.
• I’ll pass Carmine Ragusa again.
• Getting splashed by crashing waves near Fullerton when the lake is rough feels great when it’s hot outside.
• The lake can take on so many different shades of blue.

Everything on List B makes dealing with List A worth it.

 

Year to date I’ve biked 550 miles in 45 hours and have burned 23,714 calories.  I’ll likely make it past the 600 mile mark before it’s just too chilly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thirty Minutes

If the timing is right there are seats available, but standing isn’t so bad.  It’s thirty minutes of elation whether sitting or standing.

A crowded street filled with pedestrians.  Workers.  Shoppers.  Residents.  Commuters. Tourists.  Children.  Store fronts displaying the finest wares, some of which are affordable and some which will be affordable in time.  Tailored jackets.  Polished shoes.  Sparkling cufflinks.  Supple leathers.  Bold prints.

Thousands of windows look down upon me and I look up in response seeing things that are the results of tremendous egos.  Stonework.  Brickwork.  Metalwork.  So many tall structures, each trying to outdo the other in some way or fashion.

Long before the last stop all the seats are taken and the aisle is now full of people standing.  Those seated have their bags on their laps.  Those standing try to keep a narrow profile so as to leave some room between one another.  Some are plugged into an electronic device watching or listening and some are reading books.

Half of the trip is spent passing through Michigan Avenue, bumper to bumper.  The Drake Hotel passes by and we accelerate onto Lake Shore Drive and can do so because we’re at the leading edge of rush hour.

In the blink of an eye and off to the right tall buildings are replaced, as far as the eye can see, by a body of water so vast and so blue.  A brave soul out on a sail boat.  To the right residential buildings rise again, higher and higher.  I’m passing through a narrow strip of land that separates the two – elements made by nature and elements made by man.

Lining the lake are people living atop one another, crowded together for one thing only – a view of the water.  More windows, more stonework, more brickwork stretching northward and these man-made elements stretch too, as far as the eye can see.

The boats are back in the marina.  The bridges along the river were raised last weekend  so their owners could take them out of dry dock.  The greying wood docks and the white bows of boats against the calm blue waters.

Looking out to my left I see the building where Carol lives.  It’s next to the French restaurant that’s perfectly situated in a building with a mansard roof and ornate dormers.  A moment later the Imperial Towers are in view, a pair of buildings in which I’d like to live.  No one is rowing in the shallow lagoon built inside of Lincoln Park.

Overhead large jet liners begin their descent, their tail colors barely visible but their four engines and their wide-bodies allow for an estimation of the distance they have flown.  More people arriving waiting anxiously to fill the already busy streets.

On the soccer fields are uniforms that move quickly like colored pixels on a screen.   Another marina passes by.  A tall man is standing facing backwards and I watch his eyes trace against the moving landscape.  Everyone else is facing the lake as it’s view washes away the memories of their work day.

To their backs are more high-rises still, one of which is the Aquitania with it’s ornate lobbies and menacing plumbing problems.  Shortly thereafter emerges the mass of pink stucco known as the Edgewater Beach Hotel, the long-ago summer resort to some of the city’s elite.  It’s even more imposing when viewed from an eleventh story balcony in the building across the street.

As we exit Lake Shore Drive yet another high-rise is nearing completion.  A friend refers to it as a Stalinesque monstrosity.  I like it for that very reason.  Turning on to what will be soon a residential street once again, a man on a bike waves hello to the bus driver and smiles.  Half of the riders exit at the next stop and file into the new grocery store.  Dinner awaits them.

In another mile I’ll be home.  Views of the lake are replaced with more high-rises and the view is shadowed because of them, even by the lowest ones along the west side of the street.  Here the streets are filled with commuters – pedestrians and automobiles but the pedestrians move faster than those in cars because now rush hour is in full swing.

The temperature is noticeably cooler as I exit the bus across the street from my building.  It’s always ten degrees colder here than it is just a few blocks inland.  Dogs are being walked after being indoors all day.  Neighbors carry home groceries.

Thirty minutes have passed and an entire world has passed before my eyes.  Something to see in every direction.  From the majestic waters of Lake Michigan to the majestic structures of steel and concrete.  Constant movement all around.  From rhythmic waves to jumbo jets.  I marvel at these sights from the windows of the express bus from downtown.  I never tire of this ride.  It is always magnificent.

The California Zephyr – the photos

Photos from the Amtrak’s California Zephyr can be viewed here.

Emigration Canyon - Utah

The California Zephyr – Almost Home

I’ll call it one of the ten best steaks I’ve ever eaten. Medium-rare with herb butter, a baked potato, and green beans. A dinner salad and warm bread rolls accompanied each dinner entree. Crab cakes, ribs and sea bass were the other choices.

Just as flavorful was the dinner-time conversation. At my table sat a man from London, a woman from Vancouver, a professor from the University of Utah who moved to Utah in 1969 from Chicago, and myself. Perhaps you can imagine the wonderful political and social debates that emerged from this group – all in good humor, of course. I think our table was the envy of the dining car because of the amount of laughter as well as solid discourse that came from our foursome.

With dessert and coffee we prolonged our conversations until we had arrived at the Denver station. During our time together we learned why our train was late. The night before, the inbound train that made up our outbound train was hit by a rock in the canyon just outside of the Moffat Tunnel. Quite a large rock, in fact. So large that when the rock hit the Amtrak locomotive, the locomotive leaned enough for one set of wheels to come off the track.

This action caused the emergency breaks to engage and when the locomotive’s wheels locked, there was so much force behind them that they were ground flat by the friction. Consequently, our train was being pulled by a Union Pacific locomotive. We passed the two disabled Amtrak locomotives along the way. As the professor said, “How the hell does one go about changing flat tires on a locomotive?”

The attendant in my car was working that consist and said that a new locomotive had to be dispatched which created a ten hour delay. “It’s a good thing that the locomotive only tilted slightly,” she said. “Had it been just a bit more forceful, we’d have ended up in the river.”

I was in bed by 10:00 pm and I didn’t wake until we had departed Lincoln, Nebraska at 6:15 am. It had been a good nights’ sleep, though I always sleep well on trains. It’s the gentle rocking that occurs when not being hit by falling boulders.

I freshened up downstairs before breakfast and was delighted to have the professor join me again. It was just the two of us so we debated the brands of political corruption in Salt Lake and Chicago, neither one being declared superior, though both brands being declared equally effective. We finished breakfast by the time we passed through Council Bluffs, Iowa.

Now we’re heading east through Iowa and still behind schedule. I suspect I’ll arrive in Chicago right around the tail end of rush hour. Once home I’ll post a link to Flickr where photos from the trip will be visible.