Absence makes the heart grow fonder?
Apologies for having been kind of AWOL recently. I’ve been so busy seeing/performing in improv shows, reading books for my other blog, Christmas shopping, making a gift for the Tumblr Secret Santa Exchange, and getting ready to go home for the holidays that I haven’t had much time for my digital life. Miss you Tumblr, but hope to be back to my regular use soon!
When I was in college, I lived across the street from one of my favorite restaurants, Hackney’s (the one in Printer’s Row, for all you Chicagoans out there). I ate there at least once a week, and by the time I was getting ready to move to LA, the entire wait staff knew and liked me, so much so that when I ate there on my last night in Illinois, they comped my dinner. There are many things about Chicago that I miss, but Hackney’s is definitely at the top of that list.
Yesterday, my mom and I went into the city to shop, then went to Hackney’s for dinner. It was decorated with Christmas lights, the food was just as fantastic as I remembered, and the waitress still remembered me! For a little while, it was like I’d never left Chicago.
The Sky Whirl was one of my favorite rides at Great America when I was a kid, though I always referred to it as “the birdcages”. It was a triple Ferris wheel, one of only two that ever stood in the U.S. Unfortunately, this one was removed from Great America in 2000, three years after its sister version was taken out of the Six Flags in Santa Clara.
Old map of Six Flags Great America in Gurnee, IL.
Book 3: The Great Perhaps
Author: Joe Meno
Dates read: September 24, 2009 - September 29, 2009 (6 days)
Pages: 414Still on track, now with book three under my belt. The Great Perhaps was next on my docket for a very simple reason: the author happens to also be one of my favorite teachers from college. This is his latest novel, so naturally it was high on my list of things to read.
This book follows a Chicago family in which each member is dealing with a crisis of uncertainty in the days leading up to the 2004 presidential election. The father, Jonathan, is a paleontologist narrowly focused on finding a live specimen of a prehistoric giant squid. The mother, Madeline, is an animal behaviorist with a failing experiment and a growing fascination with an oddly shaped cloud and its movements. The oldest daughter, Amelia, is a cynical teenage revolutionary wannabe trying to derail capitalism. The younger daughter, Thisbe, is searching for God and frustrated with her results or lack thereof. The grandfather, Henry, is waiting to simply disappear from a life that has given him as many regrets as it has memories.
I have to admit that knowing the author does make me like this book even more than I otherwise would. Reading this felt a bit like being home for me. It took me back to living in Chicago during the autumn of 2004, and my memories and experiences of that place and time certainly made the book more vivid for me. But even more than having been in the place and time he’s describing, the strength of Joe’s voice is what really makes reading his work feel personal. When I read something of his, it’s nearly the same as talking with him: I hear the words on the page in his voice and see his expressions change as he tells the story. And anyone that knows Joe can attest to the fact that conversing with him or listening to him do a reading is unlike listening to anyone else.
But I can also definitely say I would’ve still really liked this book even if I didn’t happen to know Joe. Uncertainty and self-doubt are obviously feelings every person has dealt with, but Joe manages to explore them through every character in the book without the ways in which he does so overlapping from character to character. They each have their own anxieties, regrets, and attempts at redemption while still easily fitting together in one familial tapestry. Joe also employs a handful of ancestral time jumps that create the sense that this family has been doomed to cowardice and self-doubt forever, yet each one of them ultimately is individually responsible for their successes or failures. And while Joe may have begun writing the book to explore, in his words, “how the country could’ve made such a terrible mistake in re-electing Bush”, the political aspect of the novel doesn’t overshadow the characters because he treats the setting of October 2004 as the perfect backdrop for his story rather than treating the characters as the perfect way to anthropomorphize the setting. In the end, he manages to find a truth about humanity in general rather than simply answering his own question. Add to all this the dashes of magical realism in Madeline’s pursuit of a man-shaped cloud as it walks about the city and you’ve got a wonderfully unique novel that I highly recommend to anyone, even if you don’t happen to know Joe Meno.
I enjoyed The Great Perhaps so much that I wanted to reblog this entry from my book resolution tumblr into my “main” tumblr too. I really encourage everyone to read this book, it’s fantastic!
Reblogged from Fifty-Two Books
nowwhat says, “Is it a California winter yet? I want to lay in bed like I did in Chicago reading a book, half listening to the words aloud in my head and the drops knocking against the window. Is it too much to just want fall and winter evenings to be here. My sweaters are getting lonely in their drawer.”
—-Yes, please.
Yes, yes, yes. My heart needs a change of seasons like this.
Reblogged from walpaper
I can’t wait for autumn!
I’m a Windy City girl
I’d love to have this as a print for my bedroom wall! No matter where in the world I am, I’ll always be Windy City Girl.
Reblogged from Lookin' Fresh & Brand New
I refuse to call the Sears Tower by any other name.
Sears Tower to open glass-bottom Skydeck in June
I can’t wait to check this out and experience the most exquisite vertigo of my life.
Reblogged from chicago tumbls too
Taken in 2005 on the set of Take Down (one of Jen’s films).
This is the best photo I’ve ever taken (regardless of quality or composition), because even now I can’t look at it without smiling.
(via my flickr)
This image means more to me than almost anything else in the world.
Reblogged from Incline
Chicago dreams
I have them, sometimes, and they’re usually a combination of things I always did and one thing I never did. For example:
Always:
- Going to Hackneys.
- Riding the Red Line
- Walking to the Shedd Aquarium
- Ignoring Redeye vendors, ads, and paper boxes
- Cabbing it to Union Station
- Seeing shows at The Mutiny
Never:
- Dressing in White Sox garb
In the dreams, I’m almost always wearing White Sox branded hats, shirts, jackets, sweaters, etc. There’s no rhyme or reason. Going to Hackneys in a Sox hat. Walking to the Shedd with a Sox jacket on.
This is the real life equivalent of giving me a deep-dish pizza (love) and covering it in anchovies. It could just be so, so much better.
Okay, you always tell me the Chicago dreams but have never spilled the Sox part until now, which makes them so much better! Next time, full disclosure, please.
Reblogged from Incline
