Where I invite you to check out where I live…

Rogers Park is a suburb in northern Chicago, on the banks of Lake Michigan and ten miles from Navy Pier as the crow flies. It’s where I live. It is carved out by the Red Line that runs to the southside of Chicago, and the long avenues that run east all the way to the lake. The part of Rogers Park that I live in has a slightly old-world feel to it; it is lined by mature trees, grey-stone apartment buildings of varying architectural merit and colorful Victorian houses whose front porches cry out for rocking chairs, iced tea and people like me to sit all day reading books. Rogers Park ranks among Chicago’s most diverse and populous neighbourhoods and it’s a very liberal community – partly because it’s so near two large universities, Loyola and Northwestern. There are many reasons to like Rogers Park; the community spirit, the diversity and the public art at every turn. But the area’s primary asset is Lake Michigan, that beautiful behemoth that protects us all from Canada. Some public service announcements:

1. I love, love, love, love swimming in the sea (or lakes the size of seas)
2. Lake Michigan is not much smaller than the whole actual Republic of Ireland[1].
3. The Republic of Ireland covers 27,132 mi² and Lake Michigan covers 22,393 mi². I found that out in a book but later found a far more fun way of finding that information; MapFight, https://mapfight.appspot.com/ a website that compares the size of any two geographical areas and is responsible for my procrastination of 1400-1500 today!
4. Lake Michigan is one of the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes are Lakes Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie and Superior (HOMES). Someday you’ll be asked that in a table quiz and your heart will be glad that I told you how to remember the names of the Great Lakes, I mean, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon and for the rest of your life…

Clockwise, from top left; Rogers Park Beach and one of many magnficent skies, pretty Victorian house nestled amongst apartment buildings, evening sky with setting sun reflecting off clouds, shabby bridge turned art mural, other pretty Victorian house with a porch that I want.

Not that I actually swim much; I mostly float or tread the water, letting my imagination run amok like a big mad eejit and seeing what shapes the clouds make (often European countries, who knew). Pure bliss. The lake is a central aspect of Chicago’s personality or identity; it is why Chicago is where it is and did you know, some people even refer to it as the “Third Coast” of the United States, after those of the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean?? (All them people live in either Chicago or Milwaukee). A cycle route lines the shore for eighteen miles and there are a plethora of beaches on its shores, one of which is just four or five blocks away from me. And living beside a lake is truly a beautiful thing. As Kevin Barry writes in Beatlebone,

“Moony types get drawn to bodies of water, Charlie. They always have done…. It’s because when you look out to sea, you’re looking at a fucking infinitude”

Kevin Barry, Beatlebone.

Nowhere does my imagination shake off the shackles of control and run free as much as it does when I’m beside the ocean – hours of my life have been spent staring out at the Atlantic or drifting “in vacant or in pensive mood… the bliss of solitude” [1]. My little corner of Lake Michigan boasts a beautiful beach that is a delight to paddle in or ramble on, there are always infuriatingly fit college students playing volleyball, families making sandcastles and the park is simultaneously a great place for barbequing and doing tai-chi or yoga or whatever they’re doing. The water is warm and cold at the same time, but well guarded by lifeguards who yes, carry the red float-devices that the cast of Baywatch carried. From the beach we can see downtown Chicago with its skyscrapers and Navy Pier fireworks, whilst away up the lake where the sun sets we can see to Evanston and beyond. Throw in the sailboats of the wealthy and it’s like the California coast. And yet for all that, it’s the sky that often steals me away at Rogers Beach Park. Unlike the Atlantic, the lake doesn’t change colour or have a distinctive colour in a given place, unlike say, the coral green off Mayo’s coast for example. Lake Michigan is just always blue, which is kinda cool because such consistency allows flakes like me to turn their attention to the sky. And my God, when the sun sets, the most vibrant colours streak across the sky; fiery magenta that I thought existed only on Instagram, riotous orange, the gold of the sun’s last gasps and to the west, a blanket of aquamarine. Sometimes in the evening the sun will reflect off the clouds, making them look like bronzed mirrors. Skygazing (not a thing) is splendid from the beach, but better still from the water when coupled with the lightness of floating and/or drifting, it’s like being on air.

I’d say it’s some craic stoned.

Clockwise, from top left; railway murals, arty bridge, mini-garden on a sidewalk (look at the blue flowers!), give-a-book-take-a-book library box, Rogers Park library.

The dry land part of Rogers Park also has much to offer; it’s a liberal and artsy kind of a neighbourhood with murals and sculptures everywhere. Local artists have taken the shabby concrete posts and arches of the Red Line bridges and created biographies of the community. There is an outdoor sculpture garden with one of those little phonebox libraries. A local gallery offers a space for local artists to exhibit their wares and a farmers’ market every Sunday offers the best of organic food and baking (I love cake). A volunteer group called PO Box collective runs a neighbourhood space for arts, culture and activism. There is a palpable sense of community here and it is the result of careful nurturing and hard work. And its results are to be seen all over, from the small corner spots on the sidewalk that have been nurtured into mini-gardens to the friendliness of staff in the bars and coffee shops.  

Rogers Park is also a very diverse area, an area where the shop selling gloriously colourful material for styles of African dress is adjacent to the Mexican restaurant that’s always got soccer on, a Family Dollar store and a Korean grill that opens sometimes. There is actually much less intercultural mixing than would be expected from an area so diverse (based on my very scientific methodologies of ‘walking down the street’ and ‘hanging around’) but when an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raid was scheduled for late June, businesses and volunteer groups rallied. Under Obama, ICE prioritized removing undocumented immigrants who had committed serious crimes in the United States but the Trump administration took a more hard-line stance and directed that anyone in the country illegally be targeted[2].The truly frightening reality of that is basically your da being detained and deported to his native country where his life could well be in danger with no opportunity to say goodbye, fix up affairs or anything – all in the space of life-altering and traumatic minutes. According to the 2010 census, 21.1% of the Rogers Park population is Hispanic and nearly every business displayed posters (see below) that informed migrants of their rights should ICE come knocking at their doors. Furthermore, a local group called Protect Rogers Park put out calls on social media looking for volunteers to canvass the neighborhood and educate Rogers Park neighbors of their rights should ICE appear. In the end, the raid was postponed, though that will be of little comfort to families who remain petrified of being split up despite having lived here for ten years or more. I actually found the idea of such raids so shocking that I took a picture of the flyer. We actually don’t know we’re born.

I didn’t even pick the neighbourhood, it just so happened that a mate had a spare room in an apartment here and once I heard it was near the lake, I was in. Of course, everywhere is wonderful in this summer sunshine and in the winter I might be killed-out giving out about the place and that damned lake which, don’t forget, is the reason for the volatility of the weather here. It also froze over during the polar vortex. For now though, I’m happy to lie back and stare at clouds. I’m not quite as happy cleaning up all the sand that ends up everywhere but sure you can’t win ‘em all.

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[1] That’s Wordsworth there, and definitely not me in case anyone vastly overestimated my ability to string good words together. It’s from The Daffodils. .

[2] New York Times, ‘What Is ICE and Why Do Critics Want to Abolish It?’, July 3, 2018