Spring Is Here......Time To Explore Chicago

This morning I contemplated building an ark and gathering animals two by two, but by late morning the rains had subsided and the temperatures began to climb. Despite a few downpours, the last few days have been quite pleasant and signs of spring abound. The crocuses are starting to wane, but the snow drops and daffodils are starting to bloom. 

Daffodils  (c) 2013 Eric E. Paige, All Rights Reserved

Snowdrops (c) 2013 Eric E. Paige, All Rights Reserved

I even was treated to these early blooming miniature irises on one of my walks this weekend!

Miniature Iris (c) 2013 Eric E. Paige, All Rights Reserved

There are also signs of Spring in the built environment. I walked into Andersonville this afternoon and saw my first paleta vendor of the season. Paletas are Mexican style popsicles. They come in almost any flavor you can imagine, and probably some that never would've occurred to you!  In the warmer months pushcarts and bicycle carts filled with these delicious, frozen confections can be spotted along Chicago's beaches and in any neighborhood with an appreciable Latin American population.  

Another sign of spring: the fountain on the northern edge of Andersonville was happily bubbling, and the gardens, urns, and the Gethsemane Garden Center were all bursting with color from pansies and other hardy annuals.

Andersonville Fountain (c) 2013 Eric E. Paige, All Rights Reserved

I love this time of year for exploring the city. The quality of the light is wonderful for picture taking, and it's nice to be free of the heavy, winter jacket.  I've been wanting to get to know my city better, so I recently purchased a deck of cards printed with walking tours of Chicago neighborhoods.  

City Walks Chicago
Text by Christina Henry de Tessan
Maps by Bart Wright
Published by Chronicle Books
ISBN-13 978-0-8118-5558-7

Each card has a map and directions to tour part of a Chicago neighborhood. The tours highlight points of interest (not just historic sites, but also shopping and eating opportunities). Sunday was beautiful so I decided to break the deck in by doing the Old Town Triangle walk. This is a beautiful area of the city with a variety of architecture styles. Among other things, I saw one of the last surviving fire-relief cottages built after the Great Chicago Fire.  I am still sorting through the images, but will post the photos later this week.

Today, I a found another great resource for exploing Chicago, only from a culinary perspective. As you may have noticed, photography and food are among my addictions.  I found this book at a Goodwill store today (a true bargain at only 89 cents, though I'd recommend it, even at its full price), 

"A Cook's Guide to Chicago by Marilyn Pocius
Published by Lake Claremont Press
ISBN 1-893121-16-X

The book is a great guide to the various ethnic foods available in Chicago, and includes a directory of stores, a top 10 list of ingredients for each culture, and though it is not primarily a cookbook, there are some great recipes.  Look for future blog posts about my culinary exploits as I tour the globe, without having to leave Chicago!

I Didn't Find Any Eggs......But I Did Find This Gem!

For the past several years, I have spent Easter with my brother-in-law's family. It's a big celebration with lots of people and lots of Polish food! Though my family and my brother-in-law's are largely of Polish descent, the party is truly an American celebration in that it incorporates traditions from other branches of the family tree. There is kugel on the buffet most years and last year a group of my my brother-in-law's cousins sang a Passover song, while this year we all joined in a rousing chorus of the African American spiritual 'Amen!' Though there is no Easter egg hunt, the past two years we have had an egg smashing contest, sort of a food-based version of thumb wrestling. It is definitely one of my favorite holidays and it's nice to be part of a family celebration when I live so far from my parents and grandmother.

I love holiday celebrations, but I have yet to master the art of being fashionably late. So, despite my best efforts, I arrived in Logan Square half an hour early. Fortunately, I brought relatively easy to carry food (a butter lamb, homemade horseradish, and chocolate lambs for the youngest guests). Thankfully, I also brought my camera, so I decided to explore the neighborhood a little more. I came upon this beautiful Art Deco bowling alley.

(c) 2012 Eric E. Paige, All Rights Reserved

Art Deco is one of my favorite architectural periods, and I am particularly fond of Moderne facades like this one. I also a have soft-spot for neon signs of this period, and this building has a beauty.

(c) 2012 Eric E. Paige, All Rights Reserved

Photographing this gem of a building was the perfect way to fill in the time until the party started. I shot more than 75 images, plus I spent this afternoon and evening playing around with colors and effects.

(c) 2012 Eric E. Paige, All Rights Reserved

(c) 2012 Eric E. Paige, All Rights Reserved

2015 Update: Some of these photos are also available as photo blocks.  You can view the collection by clicking here and learn more about photo blocks by clicking here.  My online photo gallery is currently offline, but if you would like info on ordering copies of these prints or would like to see others in the collection, you can e-mail me at eepart@gmail.com

Stepping Outside......Looking Inside

It was an absolutely gorgeous day here in Chicago. After a stretch of cold, damp, gray weather, sunshine and temps in the low 50s were a welcome change. Though there is plenty that needs to be done here at my apartment, days like today are gift to be savored. One nice thing about living in a city - you can get away from it all without going too far.

I had a nice lunch at a Thai restaurant in the Buena Park neighborhood, hopped the L to the Wicker Park/Bucktown area, and grabbed a latte in the Loop before hopping the L back Rogers Park. Chicago is definitely a city of neighborhoods, each with its own flavor and claim to fame. I have to confess, despite the fact I have lived in Chicago for nearly 5 years, I still am unclear as to the boundaries and locations of several neighborhoods. Sometimes you can find a banner, flag, or sidewalk marker to let you know where you are, but in the case of Bucktown and Wicker Park, they have the same sidewalk markers, so unless a place advertises that it's in one neighborhood or the other, I am never quite sure which neighborhood I am in.

Over the years, people have tried to explain the boundaries to me. I smile and nod and say "Ohhh, okay," but most of the time the information is meaningless to me. Part of it is a product of being born and raised in the Northeast. Roads out East ramble along around mountains and over rivers. Out East, directions are usually given by landmark, not by compass point. This system makes more sense to me, but it is not without its disadvantages. For one thing, a house is almost always referred to by it's PREVIOUS occupants, unless of course those occupants weren't "from around here." The house across the street from my folks was known as 'The Paul House' from the time they sold it in 1970 until it was demolished nearly 40 years later.

That sort of sense of tradition is not unknown here in Chicago. Bucktown got its moniker from the herds of goats kept there in the 19th century. Wicker Park is named for Charles and Joel Wicker, the brothers who laid out one of the original subdivisions in the neighborhood. Though the area has a decidedly urban feel, I felt connected to my East coast roots today. Milwaukee Avenue runs at an angle to to the rest of Chicago's grid system, so there are streets that meander and aren't parallel or perpendicular to each other. Just as I would out East, I spent some time today exploring some of the little side streets.

The area is a mix of 19th century and contemporary architecture and I spent quite a bit of time photographing a beautiful, gable front, brick building with wonderfully weathered Italianate details and a cast iron fence that had seen better days. Many of the commercial buildings have cast iron facades, not unlike the commercial buildings in Upstate NY, where I lived for about a dozen years. The neighborhood is also home to Santullo's, one of the few places I've found in Chicago where I can get real, New York-Style pizza. I even happened upon a connection to Cherry Valley, the little town of 1,200 people were I lived in NY. I was exploring a book store when a 'Just Arrived' sign caught my eye. The book, East Hill Farm, by Gordon Ball, is about a farm in Cherry Valley that Allen Ginsberg purchased and used as a writers' retreat back in the late 1960s.



Thumbing through the book brought back pleasant memories. Though I didn't live in Cherry Valley in the 1960s, I did help with a beat poetry reunion and festival hosted there some 30 years later. I had seen most of the photographs in the book and part of the poetry weekend included tours of what remained of the East Hill Farm. I had ventured out today because my head has been swimming with all sorts of thoughts about this blog, my artwork, and what I want from life. I had been in this very bookstore not 24 hours earlier, listening to presentations by two very different artists, yet each gave me perspective on my own creative journey. As I put the book back, content, but not the least bit homesick, I realized that I am where I need to be.

It was nice to get outside without the weight of a heavy, winter coat, and it was nice to look inside and see the past without the weight of second guessing.