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Notice: Uninitialized string offset: 0 in /usr/home/web/users/a0026794/html/wp-includes/blocks/blocks-json.php on line 1 August 2008 • Page 2 of 2 • words and images↓
I was in a locker room looking for a bathroom. I found a hole in the floor that seemed to be designed for the purpose and usable. Something, perhaps a thought or a fear, made me leave before I took advantage of it.
When I returned, the area of the locker room around the lavatory hole was under water. This didn’t matter to me because I seemed to be able to pass through it as though it were air. Lush aquatic plants flowed past me, along with colorful fish. The beauty of it was haunting, yet disturbing, and I hesitated, uncertain.
“We are in danger,” a voice said. It meant that I was in danger. I knew that it was correct, but I did not know from what.
As my senses adjusted to this otherworldly environment, I could “feel” the presence of malevolent beings or spirits in the form of bizarre, toothy sea creatures. They could not be seen, but would flash in and out of my perception, trying to lure me to my doom through the beauty of this mysterious underwater realm. The voice was trying to save me. I was more fascinated than frightened.
During this time of multiple medications, I’ve had many interesting dreams and no time or, later, energy to write about them. Now I’ve had a dream twice, with only a few varying details — or I think I’ve had a dream twice. The fact I am not sure is somewhat frightening.
In this dream, I am being shown a series of images and told that this is how the sideshow and the illusions work. I can no longer remember all the specific images, although many involve reptiles in a pool of water. In one of today’s, a tiny rainbow horse leaps into the pool and emerges unscathed, and it is clear to me how and why. In every case, the situation and the vision are nightmarish, the odds unbeatable, and yet, as the smooth narrator speaks soothingly into my ear and my eyes track the horrible, unreal images, I can see how childish, how simple, how safe it all is, and I wonder at my instinctive fear. My perception is the nightmare, not reality.
We come to the final image, the final test. I am a young girl, pinned down, with no choice but to move forward. I do, into a changing kaleidoscope of abstract images that slowly congeal into the pieces of a puzzle and then the puzzle itself, changing from monochrome to color. I realize I am seeing through a virtual reality device. When I come to an edge, it’s easy for me to decide to leap — but where to? Looking down, I see the emblems of at least two comic book superheroes in the tile at the edge of a giant pool in the upper right-hand quadrant. I veer toward it even as my natural gravitational descent begins.
Out of the water leaps an enormous mechanical supervillain — no, a megavillain, too powerful to be understood. “I AM BACK!” he proclaims. I am to understand that he defeated the heroes whose emblems are preserved mockingly in tile.
“SO AM I!” I pronounce, equally pompously.
At a loss for a moment, I fling my arms toward the monster, and his torso is spattered as various mysterious moral weapons strike and sink him back into the depths. Now the pool seems to be attached to a high-end hotel, a place for recreation.
In moments, I have been transformed from a young girl, trapped and terrified, into a savior, merely by my acquired power to distinguish the virtual from the real. Equilibrium is restored, and I no longer have to listen to the insidious explanatory voice or view the disturbing, hokey, yet exotic imagery. I am at peace.
Just in case I wasn’t up to a post-UFE trip to Bristol Renaissance Faire, we went back on Sunday, August 17. This time J. succumbed to the claw game at the Tri-State O’Hare Oasis. Seeing that he was determined, I contributed $5 and five moves. After I had set it up, with a cue from me he got the drop on a furry, fuchsia, “Flirt” flower. There’s nothing like spending $12 on a $2 toy to make the male of the species feel good.
We arrived late enough to avoid the parking fee, but too early to get a pass on admission. Although the weather was perfect, to my untrained eye the clouds seemed to be moving in from the west in a determined way, and I wished I’d brought an umbrella.
While we were shopping — I for a wizard-style walking stick, he for CDs and later for a similar stick — the skies darkened abruptly. Just as we had recombined and were looking at beads under a couple of inches of awning, the downpour came. It rained, and rained, and rained. Suddenly there was great interest in beads [shelter], and we kept being nudged gently aside.
When there seemed to be a slight letup we ran across the way, only to find that the “awning” was really a trellis for plants and as porous as could be. Time for Plan C — dashing to a sheltered footwear store, where the amply bosomed matron informed all that dry shoes could be had and offered plastic bags as a practical headdress. Outside the opening, a few young people, already drenched, gave in to their inner child and danced in the puddles while their friends called out to them from the surrounding shops. The rain didn’t cease for more than a half hour.
Food was next on the agenda — shepherd’s pie for J., spinach and cheese calzone for me. It’s not easy, I assure you, to eat a very hot calzone with a plastic fork on wet table while standing in mud. Throwing all proprieties to the winds (or rains), after I dropped the fork in the mud I wiped it off with a dry paper napkin — and lived to tell of it. Let that be a lesson to the over fastidious.
After the rain stopped, I don’t think we did much except stop in at more shop. I haven’t felt brave enough to try to throw knives, battle axes, or brass stars this year, although I’ve done tolerably well in the past (the battle axe man once giving me a look of respect not to mention space).
To J.’s dismay, I wouldn’t let him stop anywhere to eat when we left a little after 7 p.m. We’d eaten enough, and I’d taken into account that he had to work the next day and that I had to be at the hospital by 7 a.m. It was also easy for me to decide, because I wasn’t supposed to eat anything heavy.
And so to bed around 11:30 p.m., wondering what tomorrow would bring . . .
I experienced an utterly irrational and emotional reaction to something on Friday, which instantly steered my mood toward depression. I have been weepy since. I do like to think why I reacted the way I did and look only for the feeling to pass, as all things do. Reptilian brain.
I need to vacuum, take care of laundry, and pack an overnight bag, but otherwise I am ready for the UFE. I think.
Those who most like to govern often seem to govern badly.
After dreaming about my elementary school gym teacher, I woke up realizing that I may be older now than he was when I knew him and that if he is still alive he may be quite old and frail. When you lose someone, or lose track of them, time stops. He’ll always be the big, athletic, dominant man I remember. The same is true of all the teachers, professors, classmates, and co-workers I recall but haven’t seen in years.
As a species, house sparrows are a troublesome intruder. As individuals, they can be quite charming as they cock their heads at you as you sit outside the bakery, hoping you will carelessly drop some crumbs their way.
I’ve seen some small children, proudly escorted by parents with more money than brains (attribution: Dad) driving battery-powered cars. Last week at the bakery, however, it was a tiny wooden bicycle without pedals parked at the door that had passing toddlers drooling. After trying to draw his insistent tyke away several times, one dad muttered, “It is very cool.” Children might appreciate simpler things if given a chance.
Wouldn’t it be a better world if politics weren’t dominated by politicians?
It would be a better world if people could make the small extra effort to turn the pool shower here off instead of three quarters of the way toward off. What a thoughtless, lazy waste of water. In the meantime, someone somewhere is dying of want of water.
Do some people have children so they can have someone to yell at and bully? Sometimes I want to ask. And sometimes I want these parents to be put into a program in which they are treated in the same way they treat their children, 24/7. The problem is that they would know that they will be released in a reasonable amount of time. The children are stuck with them for 18 years, an eternity for a bullied child.
Whether or not you buy into the Myers-Brigg personality typing system (I’m on the fence), the ESTJ has been the bane of my professional existence. Perhaps they could be granted an island, a distant island, where they can mutually admire each other’s purported leadership abilities, adhering mindlessly to pointless rules and sparing the rest of us. If only.
Lately I have been seeing young people in the faces of the old, and old people in the faces of the young. An old man will pass me, and my mind pictures him 20, 30, 40 years ago. A young woman on the bus is transformed into a crone. Today, a young man walked briskly by me, and I saw him in 50 or 60 years, thin, stooped, shuffling along with his walker.
I had sneaked into a man’s unused underground apartment (he lived in a house), where I turned on an unusual TV screen. The images that paraded across it were unlike anything I had ever seen, and I became transfixed. I couldn’t move for a long time.
Time passed, and perhaps the images paused or stopped. Absentmindedly I picked up what I thought of as a pipe and bit through the stem, which was more like a somewhat flattened plastic gun handle. An inch or so broke off from the back. I didn’t know what happened to the piece I’d bitten off (had I swallowed it?), but the break was clean rather than chewed.
The man came in, perhaps with another person, although later I thought we were alone. I was frightened of him, but didn’t know why as I didn’t think he minded the trespassing although he appeared to. Then I stumbled into a floor-to-ceiling plastic case similar to those used as display packaging; this one had shelves full of crystal and other valuables. I caught the case, but to my horror two tiny pieces of iridescent crystal fell to the bottom. I looked at him in terror and wondered when he would notice the broken pipe stem and what he would do.
Somehow he pushed the plastic case away from me behind the sofa without knocking anything off. I marveled at this even as I babbled something about how I was at my best only in the morning, as though I were making an excuse for my intrusion and clumsiness.
He seemed to be disgusted and unhappy, and so was I. Both of us were disturbed by my presumptive behavior and my inadvertent destructiveness. I sensed that he was acting, too. Despite appearances, we knew one another and were attracted to each other. It seemed to be my behavior that was keeping us apart and that it was intentional. Why was I trying to alienate him, and why couldn’t he accept me as I was?
Later, I was at a party looking for my husband, who had been my elementary school gym teacher. I could not remember his first name, and neither could he. I caught a three-quarter profile glimpse of myself in a mirror. My head was pale and hairless, and my skull the shape of that of a female gorilla.
It’s when you’re in a hurry or late or in some other strait that you take greatest note of life’s conspiracy against you.
After we’d decided to go to Bristol Renaissance Faire, I asked J. to pick me up, then we could get on the Stevenson at McCormick Place and connect to the Tri-State from there. It sounded easy enough until we got to McCormick Place — only to see that the on ramp was closed. Now what? Don’t ask me. I don’t drive. Per J.’s direction, I programmed my eyes to look for 57, but it didn’t turn up during several trips around Chinatown. I asked if he had any maps, and he dug out a street guide with a high-level overview of the expressways. While he drove and his blood pressure peaked, I took off my glasses and peered cross-eyed at the map. “Say, it looks like I55 connects with the Tri-State,” I said.
We were about a block away from a cluster of signs near a ramp, including one indicating 55. Had he not had both hands on the wheel, J. would have slapped himself. “That’s what I meant — 55, not 57. 57 is by me. What was I thinking?” he said. One closed on ramp equals one half hour in lost time and probably an unhealthy amount of blood pressure points.
The drive was uneventful, except that J. resents reduced speed limits in the absence of workers. Eyeing the concrete barriers and semi-trailers hurtling by in the narrowed lanes, I am more inclined to agree with the rationale.
Ignatius the thriving fibroid doesn’t care about lost time; my bladder makes its needs known as he makes his weight felt. At the O’Hare Oasis, we put a couple of dollars in the massage chairs and split a pretzel (while he was debating with himself whether he should get one, the counter person put out a sign, “Be back in 5 minutes” and disappeared, which perhaps was not the best customer service I’ve ever seen.
Earlier, I had teased J. that he times his arrival at the faire so that he can get free parking. This time, we benefited not only from free parking, but from free admission — we arrived at the ticket window at 5:59 p.m., and the man there told us to hold out for another minute. We did.
Despite the false start with the closed on ramp, we had a brilliant time. The weather could not have been one whit better for walking — sunny and comfortable. Perhaps because it was a little later in the day, the crowd had thinned. It was my idea of a perfect day to be in the woods.
We stopped for a few minutes to watch and listen to “Wheel of Sin,” where the man who sometimes portrays Little John chooses where he wants the wheel to stop by pounding on it, none too discreetly, and the group performs bawdy songs. J. didn’t realize it, but I knew it was time to move on when one of the men (the one who sometimes portrays Robin Hood) found himself with felt reindeer antlers perched on, then falling off, his manhood, which apparently was not up to providing support. His reddening face made his predicament seem genuine, and his smile is always infectious.
We ate, of course — the traditional Renaissance known as portobello bangers. J. was about six feet in front of me when I bit into mine, and the spurting juice and cheese just missed his back. You know food’s good when it spurts.
After we left the portobello stand, J. confessed that he couldn’t help noticing a woman with a generously sized chest (amply set off by her costume) sporting a large bandage over one breast. I admitted I had observed it, too. I told him he should have asked her if she’d had a rough night with the master. Well, perhaps not.
This brings me to what I saw next — a T-shirt worn by an older teenage male bearing the apropos phrase, “Please tell your boobs to quit staring at my eyes.” Men, how many times have you had that problem and wished you could so tastefully address it?
What would a Renaissance town be without a music and video store? Even Shakespeare must have popped a CD or DVD into his home theater and sound system every now and then. After numerous CD binges in the 1990s, I had stopped buying them, especially when I learned my hearing had become so poor, but on this occasion I couldn’t resist songs with titles like “Come, you pretty false-eyed wanton,” “Pined I am, and like to die,” and “I cannot keepe my wyfe at howme,” and so ended up with three CDs for my Elizabethan collection. Of course, J. bought CDs. And magnets. And tote bags. And Shakespearean insult chewing gum. And T-shirts. And personalized note cards for me and another friend. And who knows what all. I believe he’s determined to keep the economy afloat, or at least his bank and credit card company. Indeed, it was past 7:30 p.m. by the time he completed his purchases (and a half hour after closing).
On our way to the souvenir shop, however, we were waylaid. Not by robbers, who I might have found easier to cope with. No, we were stopped in our tracks by a singer demanding to be allowed to perform for such a “beautiful” and “fair lady.” (“You talkin’ to me?”) He didn’t believe me when I claimed that my name is “Gertrude.” Robin, whose manhood was unable to support toy antlers, was no more embarrassed or red faced than I was by the impromptu serenade. My investment advice? Glasses.
At last this tribute to my beauty was completed, and I took off for the bridge. J., fascinated by the turtles, had to pause to capture them on chip. Had the souvenir store not stayed open well past normal closing, he may not have made it there in time to get his credit card chewed up.
There wasn’t enough time for Apple Holler, so we headed home. As we stood outside the Flamingo and J. dug around among his purchases for my gifts (“Don’t buy me anything” being beyond his comprehension), I realized that I was shivering. Cold, on a night in mid August. I’m not complaining. August here can be and often is brutally hot and humid. I’m also not disturbed by summer rain because I’ve seen drought. But the dearth of butterfly sightings (and landings), the growing rabbit (he’s so big now!), sunsets before 8 p.m., cloudy days, and cool evenings all give me a sickening sense that another summer came and went, slipping from my grasp and separating me even more from the remembered idylls of my youth. Will I live long enough to look back at these days as fondly as I do the days of strawberry picking in Eden or visiting Old Fort Niagara? I wonder.
Saturday J. and I headed to the Sand Ridge Nature Center, another part of the Cook County Forest Preserve District. This one is close to the train station in Homewood, which is why I suggested it. Of course, we took several detours and didn’t go there directly, making the convenience moot. My mood improved when I saw a bumper sticker in the parking lot that still makes me giggle: A cartoon pig says indignantly, “No, I don’t have any spare ribs.”
First, we walked through the building, which has a number of educational exhibits and herpetologic and fish inhabitants. The educational information was punctuated by “Fun Facts,” for example, the saying, “There’s more than one way to skin a cat” refers to catfish. I had never heard of one of the species on display, a musk turtle or “stinkpot.” Nearby in the same aquarium, a painted turtle sprawled catlike on partially submerged rocks. It had extended its front legs straight out, as relaxed cats do, and pulled its head into its shell so that it looked like a comfortable headless turtle.
A woman who had been cleaning offered to help us. She gave us a map of the trails and samples of insect repellent to get us through our walk.
Cook County government has a poor reputation, and I developed a poor opinion of government employees based on an experience years ago at the State of Illinois Secretary of State’s Office downtown. I went with a friend who needed something and who was the only person there on business. A woman came to the window and told us to form a single-file line. I said, “Oh, I’m not in line; I’m with her,” to which the woman replied, more firmly, “Form a single-file line.” It soon became apparent that she would not assist my friend until I was standing precisely behind her in line. Her behavior and attitude clearly didn’t make her happy. I could picture her at home, telling her family about the difficult person who made her day hellish by not cooperating instantly and forming a single-file line of two, and her family commiserating with her about the horrors of coping with John and Jane Public every day. Today, she would be a natural for the TSA.
All of this is to highlight that the Cook County Forest Preserve District employees we’ve met have been eager to provide a good visitor experience. They have seemed to like, even to love, their jobs, with no inclination toward mindless bureaucracy. I noticed, too, that the District promotes a new Chicago Wilderness program of which I heartily approve: “Leave No Child Inside,” which tries to get children away from their electronics into the great outdoors. (My proposal: A similar program for adults.)
The sky was overcast, so the butterfly garden wasn’t buzzing with activity. J. did try to get photos or video of a red damselfly that posed for him for several minutes.
We didn’t have much time and my natural bent is toward water, so we took the Redwing Trail that skirts a man-made pond. Around this pond were large, showy orange and pink flowers of a variety we had never seen before. We also spotted tiny powder blue flowers whose little protruding centers fascinated me.
From the direction of the pond I heard a bird calling and saw a flash of gray and white. Although I couldn’t recall the sound, I remembered that belted kingfishers call in flight and was pretty sure that that is what I’d seen. J. also got a quick look at it on the return trip. As always, I wished I had brought binoculars.
As it was a cloudy, humid, relatively still day, the mosquitoes were out in force in the woods. J. offered me insect repellent, which would have helped with my arms and legs, but a large proportion of the bloodsuckers chose to bite my posterior. Next time I’ll know to spray my pants ahead of time.
Apparently, the forest proper, or portions of it, is fenced, so when we went through the gate beyond the pond, I had to pay attention to the amount of time it would take to return before it would be locked at 4:30 p.m. The fence may be intended to keep humans out when the preserve is closed, but it serves another purpose — a sign asks you to close the gate behind you to prevent white-tailed deer from destroying the gardens.
The forest preserves may be overrun by deer, but the only wildlife we saw was a rabbit sitting in the middle of the trail. More skittish than its Flamingo relatives, it dove into the cover when it realized we’d spied it. I saw a few birds, but not many — generally, most birds prefer areas that are more open.
The sun made an appearance just as we came to an open space next to the trail, and J. took a photo at my request. On the return trip, I explained that one fantasy of mine is to live in a clearing in the deep woods, not unlike Hansel and Gretel’s witch. Slapping himself, J. commented, “If you could keep the mosquitoes under control . . .”
Despite his discomfort, when we came to the Lost Beach Trail J. wanted to continue. I demurred because it was close to the time I’d decided we needed to turn around and backtrack to avoid being locked in with the unseen and unheard but voracious deer. This proved to be a good call, because when we were about halfway past the pond it began to drizzle. Shortly after we returned to the building, the skies poured in earnest. I wondered if the cheerful woman we had met as she headed out had been caught in it and if she were still happy.
We looked at the animal posters on the wall by the offices. In one, a green heron was doing what green herons do so well — taking a frog for dinner. “Poor frog!” J. exclaimed. Indeed. In this particular photo, the frog, its midsection trapped between the heron’s upper and lower mandibles, faces the camera and sports a facial expression eerily like that of Kermit the Frog.
Outside again we watched a couple of male goldfinches in the prairie garden area. One alighted on a tall plant that slowly dipped under its weight while J. again tried to capture the Kodak (Nikon) moment.
In the parking lot, impressive amounts of steam wafted up from the pavement, drawn toward the sun that had reappeared after the hard rain. After a brief detour to Hammond, Indiana, as far in ambiance from Sand Ridge as it is possible to conceive, we ended up at a Fuddruckers for a meal that probably negated any good we had done ourselves by walking. J., along with some seven-year-old boys, had his fill (or at least of taste) of video games, then we returned to The Flamingo. I admit I teased Hodge with the salmon that J. had picked up on the way at Treasure Island.
When I noticed darkness descending at about 7:30 p.m. on Monday, I didn’t know that I “ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”
Darkness had fallen 12 hours earlier, at 7:30 a.m. As I was getting ready for work, the clouds moved in, the wind picked up, and the downpour began. Fortunately for me, the worst of the wind and water was over by the time I left at 8 a.m.
When I returned in the evening, I thought about relaxing outside for a bit or even going to the stores for the walk. There was some sun, but it wasn’t the gentle, soft summer evening of my dreams. I didn’t feel very good, either, so I stayed in and felt guilty.
Then it was “déjà vu all over again.” I marvel every time at the speed with which a storm can appear to darken the world.
By 8 p.m., the thunder and lightning had begun, the clouds had opened up, and the skies were as dark as though it were hours after sundown, not minutes before. I love storms, so I watched the nearly constant lightning and waited for it to pass in due course.
It didn’t.
As the clouds lit almost like strobes with an occasional streak down to the horizon, I distracted myself by looking up the different types of lightning. I remembered being afraid and my parents talking about “sheet lightning” that wasn’t anything to worry about. I realized how comforting it can be to remain ignorant and to be reassured.
By 9:45 p.m., I had had enough. I tried to read, but was too tired and even too worn out to stay awake. As I dozed, I sensed the storm abating.
The reprieve was brief because at some point near midnight, I perceived flashes. More than that, I heard rain. Rain like I have rarely heard or seen before. It hit the windows in solid sheets. I thought about the young rabbit, which I’d seen in the garden earlier in the evening after a week’s disappearance, and worried that he was not only frightened and soaked, but that he might drown. In a half stupor, I imagined the wall of water coming through the bricks and running down the interior walls.
In east Hyde Park, a lot of tree limbs, some large, some small, were torn off. One tree’s secondary trunk was split off; I’m not sure if that kind of injury leaves it salvageable. My initial reaction to seeing the limbs all over the street was an odd, involuntary one — irrationally I thought with a sickening feeling that vandals were somehow responsible.
The Chicago Tribune reported that conditions sparked more than 9,000 lightning strikes in a four-hour period — not a typical midsummer’s eve storm. Knowing that now, I’m not surprised that this constant onslaught wore on me. But I was less frightened than by the October storm a few years ago in which the wind uprooted thousands of trees while I cowered.
As with many of my fears, nothing came to pass — rain didn’t stream down the walls, and I’ve spotted the young rabbit enough times since Monday to be convinced he didn’t die of fright or drown.
Last Sunday J. spotted a goldfinch that appeared to be in distress. I looked up animal rehabbers in Cook County and discovered the Hal Tyrell Trailside Museum in Oak Park. Part of the Cook County Forest Preserve District, the museum is no longer in the animal rehab business, but the woman he spoke to told him the goldfinch most likely was a fledgling learning to fly and that he should leave it be.
Located in a house built in 1874, the museum intrigued me, so on Saturday we went to it. It’s a straight shot down Harlem, but it took us more than an hour. Usually, I hate to have so little time to spend at a place (about an hour), but I suspected correctly that the museum is small enough to see in the time we had.
J. parked on a side street nearby, then we checked out the outdoor cages. The museum is home to a number of animals that can’t be released, including a turkey vulture (damaged wing), a red-tailed hawk, an American kestrel, a great horned owl (cataract in one eye), a coyote, and a red fox (imprinted). I could hear the fox before we got to her; she was running in and out of a crate, madly spinning and chasing her tail. When we went inside, I told the people in the office by the door, and a woman came out to look.
She told us about some of the animals and that the fox had been the only surviving kit from a mangy litter. As she approached the cage, the fox rolled over onto her back and cried and whined like a dog or perhaps any canid when a dominant member of the family arrives. At first she seemed okay, but she began to spin again. The woman had told us that yellow jackets sometimes bother her, but when she saw the behavior she seemed concerned and said they would keep an eye on her.
Inside, we found a fish tank on the first floor with carp, bass, walleye, and other Illinois species. In a turtle tank, eyes and a snout were the only parts above the water line. Throughout the museum, posters and exhibit show the visitor how to identify the more common butterflies, some of the vanishing species of wildflowers, and common bird nests. A cross section of a tree trunk and graphics cover local and building history.
On the second floor, cages house a Cuban tree frog (invasive species), a box turtle, an American robin missing part of a wing, and a 20-year-old crow who greeted us with, “Bon soir!” (which I took for “What’s wrong?” — well, that shows my mind’s tendency).
After a while, a visitor came in who attracted the crow’s attention. The visitor talked to her, and the crow crouched and stuck her bill through the cage for petting (which made me wonder how the crow experiences that sensation). When she could reach them, the woman also stroked the feathers around her nares. She told us that she is a frequent visitor and loves the crow, although the bird wasn’t nearly as keen on the little child with her. She also pointed out a cage with a sign, “Black rat snake coming soon” and told us that, a few months ago, someone had broken into the museum when it was closed and stolen the herps, including snakes and frogs.
A second woman from the museum told us the crow’s age and that she had always been in a too-small cage, but that she’s resisted attempts to move her to larger accommodations. She has bumblefoot and arthritis. I’m not sure about her entire vocal repertoire, but it includes “Hello!” in addition to “Bon soir!” Corvids are highly intelligent, and, deprived of the company of her peers, this one probably appreciates familiar humans. The robin, on the other hand, was agitated at first but settled down at last and even began pecking rather peevishly (or nervously) at what was left of its food.
Enchanted by the talking crow, J. decided to try to get video of her speaking. She had burst out several times while we watched her, but the moment he pulled out his camera and set it to video, she clammed up — just like a child. Part of her stubborn silence may have been because the crow whisperer had left.
After noting that the third floor is closed off and mysteriously labeled a “private residence” (I imagined ghosts), I left J. with his new friend so I could use the ladies’ room. Next to the stairs are photos and explanations about baby and juvenile animals, which suggest that they be left alone. Pinkie squirrels can be returned to the base of the nearest tree, where the mother can retrieve them, and helpless robins returned to the nest if possible. Otherwise, what appear to be baby animals should be left untouched; they have not been abandoned and may even be in the transition phase from parental care to independence. I had asked the first woman if they’d gotten out of animal rehab for space reason or for philosophical ones. She said it was mostly the latter; people would bring in young animals of common species that should have been left alone (like the goldfinch fledgling). The second woman told us that 80 percent or more of animals brought to such places had been ripped from their homes by well-meaning, concerned people who didn’t know that they weren’t orphans.
I asked about places to walk, so she gave me a Cook County Forest Preserve District map and sketched roughly where the trails are, describing where they lead.
I waited outside for J. and checked out the wildflower and butterfly garden. Two tiger swallowtails were engaged in an epic battle or courtship — it’s hard to tell in animals or people — while a brilliant male goldfinch flitted among the lower branches of the trees.
We followed the left-hand path and walked through the woods along the Des Plaines River for perhaps three quarters of a mile, then came out and walked back along the street. J. is not used to the woods, and the mosquitoes bothered his inner city slicker. I was bitten several times on the legs, arms, and face, but I was more bothered by sudden bursts of sunlight in my eyes (we were westbound three hours before sundown) and by the little insects that managed to fly up my nose.
I’m not native to Chicago and don’t drive, so the map revealed to me that the forest preserves follow the Des Plaines River and Salt Creek. This explains what I had observed — a number of parks along Harlem Avenue and the lack of cross streets. Now I have seen the Des Plaines River, which is believed to be the travel route of the coyotes that find themselves in places like a Chicago Quiznos. The Des Plaines River connects with the Illinois River, which flows into the Mississippi River, so it is part of an extensive pre-Columbian trade route. In nearly 30 years (gulp!), I’ve found it difficult to warm up to either Chicago or Illinois, but this waterway’s history sounds worth exploration.
After more conversation than I care to go into, we found ourselves at Los Cazadores in Oak Park. I know we’ve been there before because I recognized the colorful paintings of Indian warriors with what appear to be dead, yet nipply maidens. I bet there’s a wonderful story behind them.
On the way to the Flamingo, we stopped at Treasure Island so I could pick up cat litter. First, however, I took J. through the produce section so I could find a cantaloupe that would prove to me that Ignatius (official dimensions: 11.7 cm by 16.2 cm by 13.9 cm) is more substantial than I realize and therefore must be dealt with. I needed the 3D visual, which impressed me and J. August 18: Farewell to Ignatius.
