FOUR AND A HALF months in Chicago, three months with Carolyn. For a time, she asked many questions, about my mother, my father, my childhood, where I grew up, what I dreamt about when I was a kid. How much of my past, I wondered, could I keep hidden? There was no doubt my coyness frustrated her, but what worried me most was the chance of that frustration turning to despair, which would inevitably segue to hopelessness. How long would she stay? We were living on dreams in those days; was that enough? But I tried to keep hidden, a fool’s hope if there ever was one. Not only the past, but me, the present, my emotions, my thoughts, the negative aspects that encompass the person I had allowed myself to become. Did she see through it all even then? Probably, and in time, the inquiries stopped. I figured she was sick of asking questions she knew I’d evade. Quite a bit later, I learned just how wrong I was. The past was with us both then, all the time.

2

From the northern walkway that runs between Lake Shore Drive and Lake Michigan, the Chicago skyline, in its own way, looks every bit as majestic as New York’s. The buildings rise, they fall. The land itself gently curves like a crescent moon and the buildings curve with it, making the skyline look much bigger than it really is, pristine and proud. Indiana smokestacks far in the distance. Harsh weather to the east. Nothing but a great expanse of land to the west.

I trudged along, the neighborhoods to the right, sand, water, ice, cold, wind to the left. I headed inward. Lakeview with its pubs and galleries, its independent shops and bookstores. The city’s youth, the passionate, the down-to-earth, the self-sustaining eking out a living on their own. Coffeehouses, tree-lined streets, brownstones. Then to Lincoln Park, with its money, high rents, darkly lit bars, and cafés playing soft music. Wider streets housing trust fund kids. An extension of collegiate Greek life, former sorority sisters and frat brothers. People well into their twenties still living on daddy’s dime, still living without consequence, living without having to survive. Then into Gold Coast with its extreme wealth, the snobbish, the haughty, the old money, fur coats, big hotels, condos, suits, expensive cars, and tall buildings. Martini bars, nightclubs, world-class dining. The city’s conservatives, where the few celebrities live. Beyond here the Magnificent Mile begins, Michigan Avenue with its stores and crowded streets filled with tourists. The locals stay away unless they absolutely must go, and when they do, it’s like entering tourist hell not unlike an inhabitant of New York City visiting Time Square. Times Square is not New York. Michigan Avenue is not Chicago.