July « 2009 « The Third City

Randolph Street: More From the Heartland

July 3rd, 2009

Chicago’s finest photojournalist Jon Randolph takes us through America along US Highway 61. From 1975 through 1985 he captured the lives and the places along the legendary thoroughfare that follows the Mississippi River for much of its length.

“Porch Sale” Davenport, Iowa

“Tourist Center” Thunder Bay, Ontario

“Halloween Parade” Greenville, Mississippi

“Aerial Pedway” Minneapolis

“Show Baby” Boscobel, Wisconsin

“Two Kids” Arkansas

Join us every Friday for more of Randolph Street. We’re here every day at The Third City with the best in words and images.

Letter From Milo: The Ballad of Mickey and Bonnie

July 2nd, 2009

Mickey came home from Vietnam in February of 1970, just a few days short of his 21st birthday. He had been an infantryman, a rifle-toting grunt who had slogged through mountains and swamps, bombed out rice paddies and impenetrable jungles. He had seen and done things that no person should ever see or do. Some of the memories would never leave him.

Back home, Mickey was at loose ends. He didn’t know what to do. He was lost and confused. His old friends, high school buddies, seemed like childish strangers to him. He wasn’t sleeping well and was eating poorly. Even his mother’s cooking, which he had always relished, was tasteless to him.

Mickey spent most of his time in his car, driving aimlessly, listening to the radio and smoking lots of marijuana. Sometimes he’d pick up a six-pack or a pint of whiskey and drive out to the beach, where he’d find an isolated spot near the shore of Lake Michigan, park his car, and watch the waves roll in and out for hours at a time. The sound of waves lapping at the shoreline soothed him and often he would fall asleep, lulled by the rhythmic play of the waters.

Mickey knew there was something wrong with him but he couldn’t quite put his finger on the problem. The term Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder hadn’t been coined yet. If he had known about PTSD he might have tried to get some help, although Mickey was by nature a self-contained type and probably wouldn’t have asked for help even if he knew he needed it.

After being home for a few months, the time had come for Mickey to make a decision. He could either get a job in one of the local factories or do something else. He opted for something else. He decided to take advantage of the GI Bill and go to college for a year or so, just to clear his head. Maybe he would get a new perspective on things. Maybe his demons wouldn’t follow him to southern Indiana. Maybe he could outrun his past. Maybe.

His first months at college were not much different from the life he had been living in his hometown. Mickey wandered around in a daze, keeping his head down, unable to reach out to people, unwilling to expose himself more than absolutely necessary. He attended classes sporadically, spent time drinking alone in the local taverns and smoked pot to take his mind off of, well, who knows what. He may as well have been a ghost, his presence unnoticed except for those whose senses were attuned to the high and lonesome end of misery spectrum.

And then Mickey met Bonnie.

She was a beautiful, long-legged art student, a farm girl from southern Indiana. She saw something in Mickey that he thought had been lost and gone forever. She saw a spark of intelligence, a glimmer of humanity that he thought no longer existed. For some reason she decided that he was someone worthwhile, someone she wanted to know better.

Bonnie took Mickey under her lovely wing. They became friends, then lovers. She had a kind and generous nature and, more than that, she seemed to have an intuitive sense of how to deal with Mickey’s damaged psyche. When he went into one of his funks, she knew how to lift his spirits. When he woke up in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat and gasping for breath, she soothed him with hugs and kisses and gentle words until he was able to fall asleep again. She was comfortable with his silences and listened patiently when he felt like talking. Although Mickey didn’t realize it at the time, Bonnie was exactly what he needed at that point in his life.

When Bonnie brought Mickey into her life she also introduced him to her world. As an art student, Bonnie’s social circle included other artists – actors, writers, dancers and musicians. Mickey, who was used to the rough world of soldiers and working men, found himself enjoying the company of his witty and creative new friends. They made him laugh and think and look at the world differently. He was changing.

Slowly, Mickey began to come out of his shell. He felt healthy again. He was sleeping better, too, his dreams less vivid and frightening. He took pleasure in good conversation, good music and even began enjoying some of his classes, although it must be said that Mickey had a low opinion of organized education. He no longer had a sense of dread when he woke up in the morning. He had the odd but welcome sensation that he was becoming a human being again, reconnecting to the person he once was and seeing intimations of the person he might become.

Mickey understood that none of this would have been possible without Bonnie. She had literally saved his sanity and, possibly, his life. She had lifted the darkness from his soul and replaced it with dawning hope. Mickey knew that he could never explain to Bonnie what she had done for him. He could not find words that adequately expressed what she meant to him. In fact, he doubted that the proper words of thanks existed in the English language. The only thing he knew for certain was that without her he might have remained a ghost, a blue-collar Flying Dutchman, doomed to spend eternity wandering. He would never forget what she had done for him.

All stories have a beginning and, sadly, an end. When she finished school, Bonnie decided to move to New York City to pursue her artistic dreams. Mickey’s future lay elsewhere. They went their separate ways, but Mickey always kept Bonnie in his heart, safely tucked away in a place where a person’s most precious treasures are kept. He thought of her often, wondering where she was and what she was doing. Always, when he thought of her, he wished her peace, love and happiness. There was nobody more deserving.

And there was absolutely no doubt in Mickey’s mind that when Bonnie thought of him, she wished him the same.

Benny Jay: Positively 4th Street

July 1st, 2009

I fly to New York City to look at schools with my wife and younger daughter, who somehow or other got old enough to apply to college, and we’re sitting in a conference room, packed with teenagers and their parents, listening to the admission’s officer sell the deal.

She’s doing a great job — the kids are all jazzed up, raising their hands, asking all sorts of spirited questions, as though they’re already going to the school.

Meanwhile, the parents are largely sitting in glum and somber silence, occasionally asking nervous, almost edgy, questions about tuition, deadlines and other procedural stuff. I know what they’re thinking cause I’m thinking the same thing: How the hell am I going to pay for this?

Afterward, this lovely young theater major — with a sunny disposition and bright red hair — gives a bunch of us a tour. We visit the library, a dorm, a classroom and so on. My daughter’s hooks up with this kid she knows — call him Larry. They’re sharing dreams and devising plans.

We wind up walking through Washington Park in the heart of Greenwich Village, and, of course, I start thinking about Bob Dylan. He used to hang around here — singing songs while he passed the hat — back in the early Sixties, when he was new to town from Minnesota. I start singing to myself: “You got a lot of nerve, to say you are my friend….”

Can’t get that song out of my mind.

As I recall from various books and documentaries, Dylan was an arrogant and cocky kid. He was like a magpie, taking books, records, ideas, women and throwing them away when he was done. I guess you can get away with a lot of nasty shit when you’re a genius.

We run into Larry and his mother, sitting on a bench by the fountain. Right away I start in with the typical parental spiel, moaning to the mother about tuition. She cuts me off to tell me that she’s got it all figured out. Turns out she’s a divorcee running a business that’s not making much money. But her ex — he’s a surgeon. And you know how surgeons do — the dude’s got a pile of dough. The thing is — Larry’s in her name. As far as the college knows, he’s impoverished. And what the college doesn’t know — heh, heh, heh — won’t hurt them. Get it?

I’m trying not to look at her like she’s out of her freaking mind. I mean, is she for real? Does she think the college is so stupid that they won’t, you know, ask to see papa’s tax returns? What — are they going to pretend that the kid was conceived by immaculate conception? God, I hate this crap — it brings out the worst in us all.

I keep my mouth shut — it’s none of my business — I figure she’s just shooting off her mouth. We say good by and head off. Closer to the fountain, a quartet of musicians stands clustered around a guitar case, open to collect coins and cash, playing New Orleans jazz. They got this sweet-looking young woman with red, low-cut Converse All Stars blowing the trombone. Man, that girl can play.

I swear to God I can feel the spirit of young Bobby Dylan, singing his songs by the fountain. We start out playing our music in the park and wind up devising schemes to pay the bills….