There are times when Chicago seems like multiple cities occupying the same piece of lakefront space. A ride along the red line takes you from one world to another…a similar ride along the green line does even stranger things: you not only depart one city and arrive in another, but you switch time-periods as well. The Green Line takes you from edge to edge. It follows a roughly east/west axis. The Red Line does the same edge-to-edge thing, only along a north/south route. It is the Green Line, however, that shows you the horror of Chicago. Its southern apex branches and one part of the line give access to the neighborhood in which I live. It is this part of the Green Line that makes you feel as if you have stepped from Chicago into New York’s Bedford-Stuyvesant region, shortly before the race riots the came to define the area in the late-middle period of the twentieth century. And perhaps, my interest in revisiting Samuel R. Delany’s novel Dhalgren stems from the fact that I currently live in an area of Chicago that physically resembles the fictional city of Bellona. There are gangs here, there are stores that remain open, despite empty shelves. There is violence. There are churches…zillions of churches…zillions more churches, and each of them is a marker of singular desperation. As you ride the Green Line north and in towards the core of the city. The scene changes. Vacant lots colonized by broken bottles and scrawny grass give way to refurbished condominiums. Refurbished condos give way to warehouses. Warehouses give way to the crystal shards that mark Chicago’s commercial heart. And as the line continues west, the scene changes again. Chicago’s commercial heart gives way to warehouses. Warehouses give way to condominium complexes not yet occupied. Unoccupied condos give rise to run-down buildings, braving the advance of broken glass and scrub grasses. But for a short time—if you follow the Green Line—and listen to the clatter of train wheels on tracks, you will see the heart of Chicago. You will marvel, though some aspect of New York’s Bedford-Stuyvesant will remain in the back of your mind, like a splinter you can’t remove. You’ll wonder why and how such disparate cities can co-exist: and you’ll know that the truce they enjoy is a fragile one. There are many cities like Chicago, but only Chicago marks itself in this particular way. There are class tensions here, ethnic tensions, tensions between religion and secularism. Chicago is a city of conflict, its identity is forged in crisis and perhaps this is a part of Chicago’s charm—it’s ability to harness crisis energy and stand forever on the precipice of…well…I don’t know what, but a precipice nonetheless. The metal/crystal shards at the city’s core are a bold declaration—a doodle of arrogance written across the night in the colors of high-pressure sodium vapor, halogen, and florescent light. And from the run-down regions of the city, these crystal monoliths stand, beaming their business energies into the night, mocking the poverty and the decay in which many of the city’s citizens live. It is odd. It is uncomfortable, but as I’ve thought of it more and more of late, it’s also incredibly boring. But the lights—ah!—Chicago is a city infatuated with light, and when the darkness is just right, and the clouds above are thin (or thick) enough…that light and those crystal splinter towers make you ask a single complicated question: What is Chicago’s dream, and how much of itself will be destroyed in the desire achieve it? *** As always, thank you for viewing, reading, and commenting, and hopefully you're all having a great weekend.