The adage is apt. You most certainly can get too much of a good thing.
Take country living. It is a good thing. A wonderful life. A wholesome, healthy lifestyle. An engaging, rewarding day-to-day existence. All that aside, regardless of where (or how) you live – country living included – over time you will most certainly hit patches when you’ll feel restless and irritable, like you have a burr in your shorts, or a bug up your ass; times when you’ll need a sedative, a reliable pest-control company, or a change. Of scenery, of pace.
Here in Moffat, we occasionally yearn for simple conveniences and comforts. To be able to pick up a carton of milk or a bag of Miss Vickie’s Jalapeno potato chips without having to embark on a road trip to the nearest grocery store in a nearby city. To catch a movie or attend a concert without spending more time in transit than at the venue. To be able to order a pizza without a delivery guy whining about having to cross time zones and pull an overnighter somewhere in the woods (suck it up, buttercup). And, of course, there are times when we don’t want to be overcome by the smell of the farmer’s fields blanketed in fresh, ripe manure, guaranteed to both enrich the soil and trigger the gag reflex. Times when we jones for a fix of civilization. Fine dining, museums, art galleries, professional sporting events – the Cubs, the Sox, the Bulls, da Bears, and such. Times when we pine for Chicago; a slice of deep-dish pizza and city-life. The amenities, the energy, the excitement, the buzz, the vibe, even the people, as off-putting and odious as people can be.
Truth be told, sometimes we get Country-Cuckoo. To the point where we (almost) crave serenading sirens.
God knows it’s not always quiet in the country. We have railway tracks that bisect the back-third of our property and two or three times a day we hear the chug-chug-chug of a slow-moving train, steel wheels grinding on the track – have these railroaders not heard of WD-40? -- and the plaintive wail of its whistle repeatedly sounded by a heavy-handed conductor. “Good God. Lighten up, Francis!”
Further, we have a one-hundred-acre farm beside us. Heavy-duty farm machinery can churn up an ungodly ruckus for hours on end and, curiously enough, our farmer friends tend to give their fields the business in the middle of the night; John Deere’s intrusive headlights illuminating our bedroom. Oh, and in spring and early summer, impassioned amphibians meet, mate, and generally live the party life in the pond behind our house; they cry out to each other, cry out for each other – a continuous cacophony, an unbearable nocturnal din -- making rational thought and uninterrupted sleep impossible and bringing a whole new meaning to the moniker of Horny Toads.
God knows, during other parts of the day, other parts of the year, it can be disconcertingly quiet around here. So quiet you could, and oftentimes do, hear a mouse. Sometimes the sounds of silence make one crave some of what was lost in transitioning from city life to country life.
Twenty-three years in Moffat and, excluding the cacophonous opening to the Sloan song Money City Maniacs, we’ve heard but two sirens. One emanating from a housing enclave just north of us in response to a bonfire that got out of hand, another sounding off in the distance at the scene of a car crash. City people say that the sirens are no big deal, that you get used to hearing them. But not nearly as quickly as you get used to not hearing them.
In Chicago we stay downtown in the Loop – ironic for someone who otherwise never seems to be in the loop -- on West Wacker Drive, or Upper Wacker, depending on what local is giving you directions. From our vantage point on one of the nosebleed floors of the Renaissance Hotel, we overlook the Chicago River. We see the riverwalk, the stately bridges that straddle the river, the Marina Towers (a.k.a. the twin corncobs featured on the album cover of Wilco’s seminal Yankee Hotel Foxtrot), some very cool architecture, and one of the best-named establishments in the area: Dick’s Last Resort wherein the waitstaff were unaccommodating crusty and crude – intentionally obnoxious -- right up until Dick’s was shuttered in the summer of 2024, leaving nothing but memories...
Unsuspecting customer briefly ponders beer menu. Bartender screams from across the venue: “Make up your fucking mind!”
Unsuspecting patron, shaken, timidly asks passing waitress if it would be okay to sit out on the balcony. Waitress offers withering glance, shrugs him off: “Sit wherever you like, I don’t fucking care…”
Seriously, a complete bunch of Dicks.
The thing about the Renaissance:
The hotel is perfectly located if your purpose is to populate your Instagram account. But situated in the midst of this visual balm is a Chicago Fire Department station that seemingly disgorges a truck or two – sirens wailing like banshees -- every minute of every day.
Until you get reacclimated to the clamor that rises from ground level and echoes up off the architecture, it makes you jumpy, 9/11-nervous, and even makes you pine for nature’s noise, the amorous amphibians. However, in time – in a day or two -- the sirens become but a background reminder that your country-yin is having some kind of fun with your city-yang. And by the time you leave the Windy City behind – mind cleared, heart filled, Visa maxed -- you’re back in balance. Broke, but blessed, having gotten out of the idyllic and back into the fray.
