The Chapter Before This One

This issue is about a time in my life that was defined by the Where. The Where can be very special (no shade to the Who and the What). At the risk of sounding like your kookiest, bead-adorned Aunt: places have energies. But if you’ve ever felt in tune with the energy of a place, or in my case the city of Chicago, then you will understand what those kooky Aunts are putting down.

I wrote this poem the night before I left Chicago. This poem is dated for September 5, 2022 in my notes app, the app where I put all my special poems, secret wishes, and parking spot numbers I don’t want to forget. It has remained largely unedited to preserve who I was and how I was feeling at that moment in time. Ultimately, it’s a poem about living in Chicago during my early twenties. It’s also about all the fun, messy, and hard-to-describe feelings I had during those five years that, in hindsight, turned out to be gratitude.

If you have ever lived in and/or loved Chicago, or if you’ve been lucky enough to be young, dumb, and shaped by a Where, then I hope you will enjoy this poem.

Chicago — 9.5.22

How do you write a poem about Chicago?

Sitting on a mattress on a bedroom floor at 1 am, and contemplating the daunting task of expressing what the last 5 years mean to me in stanzas and rhymes. Really, who has the time?

In the story of my life, Chicago would be a whole chapter. In a movie about my twenties, it’s a main character. In a Wikipedia page about me, it’s a footnote from before I moved to LA and forgot about everyone I ever met in the Midwest.

I wish I could wring this city out, squeeze out all the goodness and the Guinness and take it with me. Keep it close to my heart, or in a drawer in my desk next to my passport and a checkbook I’ll never use. Keep it forever somewhere safe and treasure it always.

I wish I could capture a summer lakefront day that feels never ending, sitting on the hot pavement with bells from ice cream carts dinging as their owners push them by, lake waves splashing on cement steps. “What time should we head back,” is the question. “We’ve got time,” is the response.

I even wish I could bottle up a winter walk to the L. One where your toes freeze through your shoes and multi-layered socks and your nose runs and you curse this city and the idiots who thought it would be a good idea to rebuild after it burned down. At least if I had that moment, I'd have an eternity saved, like those bone-chilling, 5-minute waits for a too-crowded brown line train always feel.

I wish I could take every single one of my friendships, fold them up, pack them in a suitcase, and take them with me. The friendships I made here, the friendships I strengthened here. The ones I always wished I could give more to, because they gave so much to me. The friendships I consider myself lucky to have witnessed over meals and wine nights and card games, over messy tables with too many chairs pulled up, and over serious conversations and seriously childish fits of laughter and the most deadly serious viewings of Taylor Swift music videos. I’m sure I could carry those onto a plane, place them in an overhead container, and unpack them at my next destination.

Let’s face it. I don’t know how to write a poem about Chicago. It’s as impossible a task as capturing a moment and taking it with you. And yet, it’s been written. And yet, I have captured the millions of moments that have made up my time here. I’ve captured them because I share them with you. The moments that have shaped us and bruised us and cut us and comforted us. These moments are mine and yours and ours to hold on to, to share, to keep, to hide away, to treasure, to travel with and carry on and unpack at our next destination.

And when I leave, these moments that we share and these friendships we have formed are what I will take with me. Chicago will always be here and it will always be ours.

Tata for Now!

This issue was not written from the usual narcissistic, fast-talking, and iconic voice of Town Cryer. Instead it is coming from the regular shmegular voice behind Town Cryer, Elyse Ruppert, who coincidentally is also an iconic, fast-talking narcissist. Subscribe for irregularly scheduled Town Cryer issues in the future. And if you liked this issue, then please share it with a friend, lover, or your lover’s friend. But don’t make it weird.