I had to go down to 181st & Halsted this afternoon. Met a client at 2:30 there at the Panera’s and we had one of those fun conversations where you get a focused amount of business done and enjoy yourselves too. It was raining so we used that as an excuse to hang out and just chat until late in the afternoon. As I was settling back into my car for the drive out of the parking lot and back to Palos I got the message to go to Colin’s grave and visit. It was only a mile or so away. So I drove over to the Homewood Gardens cemetery on Ridge Road.
I wondered if it would still be open and when it would close. I’d forgotten that it had no gates, just a gatehouse and 2 simple entrances off of Ridge. What was nice was that I knew exactly how to find his grave. Back in the far corner of the cemetery. I looked for the infamous bench with his name on it, saw it and said a quiet Thank You for its presence, a visual reminder of so many sad things.
I stood for a long time looking at the Memorial for Sam Angelich, his 6 month old son Sam and on the far right of the tombstone, his grandson and my nephew Colin Sam Ehlers. The tombstone is a burgundy/orange color and it was surrounded by large piles of Pin Oak leaves. They too were burgundy/orange and brown. The rain had soaked everything and the leaves never moved and were silent as I stood there, shuffling my feet occasionally. Because the cemetery is so old, and was in a far flung area when it was started, not only is it hilly, the trees are huge with age and everywhere. Unlike where my folks are buried, this place has a calm about it that is healing and nurturing. I was moved to take a few pictures of the tombstone knowing I would send it to Colin’s Mom, who now lives out of State.
I turned around and saw a silver sedan pull over and stop on the far south side of the area. I sensed, because it was late in the afternoon (rush hour) and probably close to closing that this was an employee checking to see who was in the place and what was I up too. Eventually I got into the Subaru and slowly drove off. Only then did the silver car leave and return to the area by the Maintenance shed in the cemetery’s Southeast corner.
I got onto Ridge road and drove through the Quarry into Thornton, turning on the block before Williams to go into the old neighborhood past Bozo’s Hot Dog Stand. It was still there, but closed and looking abit delapadated. Turned right on Hunter Street and mentally gasped at how huge the building at 213 South had become. Current owners have built a full 2nd story on it. I’ve seen it before, but this time its size startled me and erased any urge to stop. I went straight down Hunter into Brownelle Woods and turned around in the parking lot. There was one car parked there, but no one was in it—out hiking or whatever.
I stopped half way back to the entrance and got out of the car to go look at the empty filed that was there. I knew from hanging out in that field watching the Fire Departments have annual battles with the pumper trucks to see whose hose pressure was stronger. They’d suspend a metal ball on a wire, hung way high up to my little kid’s eye and do sorta’ a fireman’s version of tug of war over getting the ball to the other guy’s side. Silly fun and a big event back in the day. Tucked back in there was the farmer’s field that we use to go take pickles out of and eat raw.
As I walked over to the field I noticed that the flagstone perimeter of the driveway’s border was slightly askew, the stones covered with that black stuff that means they are very old. I was about to step up onto the flagstones for a little bit closer look when I realized that there was a White-tailed doe watching me off to my right. I stood still, put my hands in my pockets and started to tell her my stories of the area. She politely listened for a few minutes, licking her lips and gauging who I was and the threat level she was in. When I got a little teary eyed about the history of the place she decided to meander off to the right and into a small cluster of trees. Her fawn was off to my left and he stayed and watched me until I left.
Driving back north on Hunter I saw how dingy and used the houses and everything looked. There didn’t seem to be the ‘life’ I knew from before thriving there. It felt dull and struggling. Carl Johnson has a pair of pickups parked on the north side of the house. He still has the old asphalt like shingles on the building. The old oak that had the basketball hoop opposite our driveway is gone. He used to beat me at hang-man there all the time.
Then I drove over to the Brewery by the creek. It’s been renovated into a condo building that’s four stories high and directly next to the creek. I spent some time there thinking about when Dad had his pop stored there, about how haunted the old place was. Some of the old building remains and is now a bar/restaurant. Wondered if the Condo folks had the old ghosts show up occasionally. Wondered how they could enjoy their balconies, perched right there over the creek and its population of mosquitoes.
When I left I headed across the bridge, there’s a traffic light there now (!) and turned right to try and find the house that belongs to the Librarian who I loved so much, Ms. Templan.
The whole tour was a process of realizing the scenes I remembered were just that. Everything was familiar, and everything was different. Although I’d experienced this before today’s tour was different. The impact and realizations were deeper, more severe, more tender. More clarifying.
Home to me will always be the same, a place only in my memory; I was so lucky but I’ve lost so much that can’t be shared or replaced. In their place is a feeling that can’t be taught and requires years to acquire/ripen.
How innocent were the days that I lived in Thornton. How safe and protected my life and how remarkable that was in that era. How grateful I am for the gifts of that time. Is this true? Or is it just a biased memory? Nope, true. I know the innocence of the era, stunningly difficult to find now. I know the caliber of the people in that area in that era. Findable now, but certainly more difficult.
Was I naive? Of course. I was primed to believe that the whole of the Planet was as safe and open and honest as the four blocks that I grew up on were. That the adventures were only going to be as dramatic as the ones we had in the forest preserves finding dead turtles and falling off logs, spitting on mosquito bites to stop the itch and hunting, drying and then ‘smoking’ cattails from the bushes because that’s what kept those mosquitoes away. I didn’t learn that change would always come. Always.
Nothing would ever keep change away. Nothing.
Along The Way I Learned 