neo-Tourist

There’s nothing like being a tourist.

For the past week and a half our travel buddies Ted and Carol (we met five years ago in Venice) have been visiting us and we’ve been showing them Chicago, all four of us tourists. In that time we’ve been places we had not visited, at least not lately.

The day after they arrived we went to the Museum of Science and Industry. I hadn’t been there since the early nineties when we went to visit the Frank Lloyd Wright Usonian House exhibit. This time we took the submarine tour and went down in the coal mine, neither of which I had ever done before. My wife had been in the coal mine when she was a child, and it has been revamped completely.

We took Stella and Brando to the Indiana Dunes National Park and let them race along the shore for an hour or so. We were the only people there, and the only dogs. The dunes is (are?) one of my favorite places to go, and I try to take the critters for a good run at least every other week when it’s mostly deserted.

We drove into Chicago at rush hour (a nightmare!)to go to Tony and Tina’s Wedding, and had a great time. Alas, I didn’t get to dance with the bride, but we sure dished the dirt with the bridesmaids.

We visited the Jasper Johns Gray exhibit at the Art Institute and toured Millennium Park, with emphasis on Cloud Gate. Ice skating has begun for the winter, and I had a hard time not rushing down, finding a pair of fat boy skates and soaring out on the ice. Or at least trying.

We spent a day in Oak Park, where we toured the Frank Lloyd Wright Home and Studio, and took the walking tour to see the Wright houses in the vicinity. We had never taken this opportunity and it’s fabulous.

Today we took the memory lane tour, which truly opened my eyes. In a circuitous route, I drove us back to Joliet, a place we hadn’t been for years, to see the house we lived in over twenty years ago. The neighborhood is completely different, thanks to a tornado a few years ago, and completely the same. Some houses are gone, some houses are painted, but I felt as if I could park the car, get out and be home. It was tempting to stop and ask for a tour. I didn’t.

On the way to Joliet, we drove through the school district where I taught for 33 years until I retired almost seven years ago. The school looks the same on the outside, but I know all of the students I taught are gone, and many of the faculty have retired, replaced in part by some of these former students. (A huge new school will be ready to open next fall, and another one the fall after that.) What is more amazing than one school building where I used to teach, however, is the area. When I started teaching, Lincoln-Way High School had around 1,200 students in the district, which covered abut 100 square miles. When I retired, there were about 1,700 students in the graduating class. This year, there will be far more graduating seniors than that. Those students all have families, and they all live and shop in the area. The fields are gone for the most part – at least along the main drag. Those fields are filled with commerce and upscale homes, townhouses, and condo buildings.

Every square foot of land seems claimed.

I guess that’s progress, and it may pretty far off the point I intended to make. Or not.

I think what I’m trying to say is that every so often we need to step back. By looking at Chicago through Ted and Carol’s eyes, I gained a new perspective on the city. It truly is magnificent. Except at rush hour when we were trying to get from the south burbs to Piper’s Alley on the near north side. The school district I taught in is overwhelming. Thomas Wolfe said we can’t go home again, and it’s true. I never feel quite comfortable when I go to the annual Christmas party the school district puts on for old timers. But I was able to look at my surroundings as if seeing them for the first time. And that’s an astounding experience. Thanks, Ted and Carol.