I couldn't actually think of a name for this photograph and so I just stole an element of the image itself and indulged in a bit of playful recursion. I have a thing for recursion. I like it. And so—recursively—image and title contain a single unifying (recursive) element. I have a thing for recursion, and for self-reference as well, which probably explains why I’m also the very first word in this sentence. I snapped this shot while making my way from the deep south side of Chicago to the far north side of the same city. Though Chicago prides itself on quite a large number of things, a fully-functional, city-wide el/subway system is not something Chicago can truly boast. There is an entire section of the city ill-served by the Chicago Transit Authority. If you hold your hand in front of your face, palm facing you, and fingers pressed together, you have something of a rough map of the city. The el and subway systems serve the portions of the city stretching from the tip of the longest finger to the meaty part of the palm, right where the thumb terminates and loses itself in hand-skin. The portions of the city corresponding to the heel of the palm and the edge of the wrist do not have direct access to the el/subway network. I live in the far southern portion of the city: the deep-fried south. I live in the Roseland area. I live in what locals know as the “Wild Hundreds.” Essentially I live on 108th Street. El/Subway service terminates at 95th Street; the rest of Chicago extends at least as far south as 120-something. It’s no short walk from home to the el. I require the services of a bus. I snapped this recursively-titled photo at the 95th Street terminus. In this portion of the city, public transportation serves as something of a highway median, a fat lane divider. One may stand on the platform, listening to northbound and southbound traffic making all sorts of grating, urban, annoying traffic sounds. When one stands on an el platform as far south as 95th Street, one may rest assured that train service will be delayed for some unknown and unknowable reason. One may rest assured that the more…um…colorful residents of the city will find their collective way onto a northbound train, where they will immediately begin selling dubiously appropriated socks, stolen iPods, and “loose squares”: fast-burning, mentholated cigarettes. I have yet to discover why cigarettes (cylindrical in shape) are called squares. You can’t smoke on the trains, but in a particular stretch of the south side, you may buy single cigarettes for fifty cents, and smoke as you depart a train station. Loose squares are available in one brand and one brand only…I’m one of the very few people on the deep-fried South Side to smoke something other than over-priced, fast-burning, Newport 100s. None of this interested me. I was more intent on heading north, hanging out with Corey, and taking pictures of things. This is one of few photographs I have of Chicago’s deep-fried South Side, and all it shows are insulator assemblies, and occasional urban-pigeon resting places. I like the lines, the strange sense of regularity, and the rat-belly coloration of the track-securing gravel. I have no idea what “pre cast” might mean, but it’s something transit related, and apparently, it is important enough to find expression in green, municipal spray paint. There isn’t much else in this photo: no dubiously appropriated items for sale on a train, no stolen iPods, no mentholated loose squares. Oh well. I simply liked what I saw and so I decided to post it here. As always, thank you for viewing, reading, and commenting, and I hope you’re all having a great week/end. (With our without recursion, self-reference, or palm-shaped maps of Midwestern American cities.)