Edgewater International Women's Day Crawl on March 8

I've recently joined my local Chamber of Commerce as a Board member.  (I was on the board of a different organization (The Edgewater Development Corporation) that merged with it, and they invited me to join the board of the combined organization.)  

I'm excited, because they (or I should say WE) do a lot of good work supporting our neighborhood and the businesses that populate our neighborhood, and that's a major feature of this part of Chicago.  I recently went to a visioning session for the Chamber, and we've got lots of plans going forward.  I want to be a part of the work to make my neighborhood a better place than when I got here.  And this is tangible.

One of the events they do (errr.. we do-- I'm going to have to remember this) is coming up, celebrating International Women's Day and the many woman-owned businesses in our community.  


This event is coming up Sunday March 8, and will offer fun and interactive (and often tasty) activities for participants.  It's a fundraising event, and some of the money will go to Loom Chicago, which is a non-profit that offers studio space, materials and workshops for women in the Chicago refugee community who can knit, crochet, weave, and sew.  

One of the women of Loom Chicago

These women can then sell these beautiful handmade products and make some money.  It's fiber arts social enterprise!

From 11 am -2 pm, participants can walk along the Broadway corridor and tour women-owned businesses, chat with owners (and Edgewater Chamber members), sample food and liquor (must be 21+ for liquor), interact with local women entrepreneurs,  and basically have a lot of fun!

Some of the women-owned businesses on the Crawl include:

Farm Bar
Chicago Mosaic School
Edge of Sweetness
Bark Bark Club
Ethiopian Diamond.

(other businesses will be added as well!)

Also, some of the women-run businesses providing hands-on activities include:

Smackdab
Greenstar Brewery
Work + Shelter
Loom Chicago.

The chamber anticipates 100-150 Edgewater residents, foodies, families, friends, and women-allies eager to experience the neighborhood and chamber members to participate in the neighborhood crawl.  All in all, it looks to be a great afternoon!

The International Women’s Day Crawl is open to the general public, all genders and all ages (must be 21+ to partake in liquor tastings). ​Tickets are available for purchase​ ($35 for general admission and $30 for chamber members) to participate in the crawl, help boost women-owned businesses in the neighborhood and give back to your community through the good work of Loom Chicago. 

For more information, please visit ​https://www.edgewater.org/events/international-dinner-crawl/ 

Hope to see you there!

Murders nearby- is it time to panic yet?

It's the stuff of crime show television:  In the last few days, there have been two homicides in a nearby area, and it was recently revealed that they were done with the same gun.

Read the article here:  http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/ct-met-lakefront-bike-path-shooting-20181002-story.html

Map courtesy of Chicago Tribune.

On Chicago PD, the hinky perp would be caught and dispatched with within 44 minutes (not including commercials)  On NYPD Blue, it would be revealed that the killer was leaving dictionary notes pinned to his victims. On CSI, the gun would be traced to a wealthy industrialist with a wayward stepson.

A possible photo of the suspect.

  But this is real life.  I have been on both of these streets, riding my bike.  My son played baseball this summer at Loyola Park.  My friend and her family lived one block away on Lunt.  My wife and son go over to that part of the bike path all the time to play Pokemon Go, which is probably what the 24 year old was doing when he got shot.  I don't know if they had met that guy, but they may have interacted.

Is It Time To Panic Yet?

There doesn't seem to be a motive for the murders.  Nothing seems to have been stolen, and there is a potential that these murders are hate-related- one guy was observant Jewish, the other victim was gay.  The Tribune has a non-descript photograph of the suspect, (Hoodie and glasses)


I am not in full blown panic mode, but I am nervous.

I know, you are saying, "But you live in Chicago, murder capital of the world."  (Which by the way, is not true.  For 2017, Chicago ranked 9th in murder rates, according to the FBI.  I don't live anywhere near St. Louis, the true holder of the title.)  And in Chicago, most of the violence is gang v. gang-related, and it's happening 20 miles (and worlds away) from where I live.

According to the article above, two southside neighborhoods have the lion's share of the murders in Chicago and a shocking 100 murders per 100,000, which makes it 9 times more likely to be murdered in those neighborhoods than in mine.  They are deeming this statistic "murder inequality."    I hope that the term for not being subjected to this kind of risk does not become "Murder privilege."  Because I truly believe that everybody has the right to not be murdered.

Which is the point.  These murders are on my stomping grounds.  And it makes you realize how fragile our social contract really is.   I felt this same way after our scare in Barcelona-- we have a social contract that trucks won't run over pedestrians, that people won't kill other people on the bike path, that you should give up your seat to pregnant women on the train, etc. etc.

On the plus side, apparently neighborhood people are banding together and organizing dog walking parties, so no one is doing it alone.  Someone is offering to drive people to the market.   The police are saturating the area.  I have a friend who is a cop who says that all vacation time has been suspended.  The social contract is expanding.  and that gives me a small modicum of hope that this guy will get caught, and our immediate worries will be over.  Of course, there will sadly be a next time.

RISK REDUCTION TIPS Loyola University, which is just south of the murder spots so far (and just north of me) released these tips to help reduce your risk. See the full set of tips.  I've taken away the references to Campus Security, but otherwise they are great tips. Walk or jog with a friend whenever possible. Stay in well-lighted areas, away from alleys. Tell someone where you are going and when you will return. Do not listen to headphones or talk on the phone while out alone, this minimizes your ability to hear an approaching threat, it also advertises to a would-be thief that you may have a desirable item to attempt to steal. Be wary of unsolicited strangers. If someone approaches you on the street, keep moving and try to avoid additional contact. Carry a whistle or a body alarm. This can serve as a reminder to exercise caution and can alert someone in the area that you need help. If a person threatens you, follow any demands and run away as soon as it is safe to do so. Once in a safe place, immediately notify the Chicago Police Department via 9-1-1 or 312.744.8263. Investigative follow-up will be dependent on the amount of detail a person can recall. It is important to remember as many identifying characteristics about the offender(s) as possible. This can include the license plate of any involved vehicle, physical characteristics of the person, their clothing, any weapons used, the direction of flight, etc. If you see something you believe to be suspicious, immediately contact the Chicago Police Department.

Pivot Arts Festival 2017/ Review of Ubu The King

Pivot Arts Festival is a celebration of innovative performances in theater, dance, music, puppetry, site-specific works, and spoken word.  The festival takes place in Edgewater, Uptown, and Rogers Park, and sees as very important the collaboration between artists, communities, and businesses.

Pivot Arts works year round, producing a monthly series and occasional artistic colloquies, as well as artistic projects, but their raison d'etre is the Pivot Arts Festival, a 10 day multi-disciplinary festival that combines all kinds of performances in all kinds of venues, and includes a community parade.  This year is the fifth year!

I've missed the last couple of Pivot Arts Fests, even though they've been literally under my nose.  I  came pretty close to missing this one as well (and this year they held a parade on my street!  Somehow I missed the parade!  That might be the story of my life!)

From the Rough House Website

I'm happy to report that I didn't miss it.  Last night I saw one of the Pivot offerings,  Rough House Theatre's show Ubu The King.   The show was held at the FLATs Studio on Wilson. (Just west of the Wilson Red Line)  (Flats Studio is a great program which takes unused storefronts and apartments in FLATS buildings and puts art in them!  Find out more here.)

The show itself was great.  True to Ubu's spirit, it was rough hewn and ribald and had some crazy inventive words in it (For those that don't know, Ubu Roi was a play that caused a huge sensation in Paris when it opened in 1896.  The first line is "Merrrdre"  which gets translated as "Shitttrs!"  After the first word was uttered at the world premiere, there was a near riot, and the play had to be stopped for almost 30 minutes.)

Ubu by Rough House Theatre.  photo by Joe Mazza.

The play then proceeds with a whole bunch of scatalogical humor, a rough lampooning of Shakespeare's MacBeth, about a super lazy good for nothing guy (Pere Ubu) who through cowardice, luck, and sheer cruelty becomes the King of Poland, thanks in part to his shrewish wife Mere Ubu.  It's kind of a cruel play about a cruel guy, as written by an overly bright and vicious middle school student about his terrible (and very fat) physics teacher (that's where the play started!)

Alfred Jarry

The author Alfred Jarry is a favorite character of mine.  He was a French surrealist, and he lived the part, carrying around a gun and riding a bicycle through Turn of the Century Paris.  One of my favorite quotes of his is this "One can show one's contempt for the cruelty and stupidity of the Universe by making of one's life a poem of incoherence and absurdity."

Jarry later invented pataphysics (well, he expanded on it) , a kind of mock science/philosophy that some folks have described as "a branch of philosophy or science that examines imaginary phenomena that exist in a world beyond metaphysics; it is the science of imaginary solutions." (Thanks Wikipedia!)

 As Jarry once wrote, expressing some of the bizarre logic of 'pataphysics, "If you let a coin fall and it falls, the next time it is just by an infinite coincidence that it will fall again the same way; hundreds of other coins on other hands will follow this pattern in an infinitely unimaginable fashion."

Ubu the puppet.

Jarry died young of tuberculosis, aggravated by drinking and drug use.  He drank ether and absinthe like it was going out of style!

As you might imagine, Jarry and his craziness his particularly appealed to me when I was a college student, just learning about this guy and this crazy artist filled world of turn of the century Paris.
(I've been in the play Ubu twice!)

This is my favorite translation of Ubu.
The line drawings are great too!
Buy it on Amazon

The Rough House play was performed by a troupe of 5, and they all did a great job of presenting myriad puppet characters.  I loved the style of characters, who were performed Bunraku style, and were roughly hewn stuffed dolls.  The dolls get thrown around, stuffed into killing machines, stabbed, beaten, thrown about some more, and it's great fun.  I also really loved the innovative use of furniture in the show.  The set was framed by three ladders tied together, which held the lighting system, but could also be climbed on.  Two drawer cabinets (chest of drawers) on wheels were also used, and the shelves pulled out to make set pieces, hold puppets, and folded around to use the stage.  It was very well realized!  If you have the chance to see the show, I'd highly recommend it.  Find out more about Rough House here. (Rough House also helps produce the quarterly puppet slam that I have participated in, Nasty Brutish, and Short)

Improv and ice cream will be performed
by Storytown on June 11 at Lickety Split

Sadly, you won't be able to see Ubu at the Festival, because the Rough House run has ended, but there's a lot more going on in the festival, including dance, improv comedy, theatre, spoken word, an arts crawl, and the festival will end next week on June 11 with family friendly improv at our local frozen custard shop Lickety Splits.  Some of the performers include Barrel of Monkeys, the NeoFuturists, Same Planet Performance Project, Ayako Kato and Synapse Arts, and Storytown.

To find out more about the festival, to buy tickets, and to donate so that stuff like this will happen more often, please visit the Pivot Arts website http://www.pivotarts.org

True Nature Foods to leave Edgewater, join Heartland Cafe

Great article from a few days ago in the Chicago Tribune about our neighborhood organic grocer True Nature Foods joining forces with the Heartland Cafe.  They are pulling up their roots and transplanting them 1.5 miles to the North.  This movement is brought about almost entirely by the upcoming opening of Whole Foods.

While I am sorry to see them ago, I can't say I blame them.  Whole Foods is a juggernaut, and from a competitive standpoint has organic stuff cheaper and better displayed.  It's hard to argue with that.

When we first moved to the neighborhood in September I was excited to see the store.  I stopped in and  asked the owner Paula (quoted in the article) how they were going to deal with Whole Foods impending doom.  She said she thought they could co-exist.  I thought it might be possible, because True Nature is very much a community, and will still be a community when all is said and done.  But that community will be shopping at Whole Foods also.  I was afraid it would be too rough a road for them.

Their move to the Heartland is a good fit, and will serve both as a locus for organic/vegetarian community and as a service to an under-grocered community.  I think it could really work well.

As it says, there will be a hole in the area.  I'm hoping a bike shop moves in.

Let's hope that Whole Foods doesn't want to expand into Rogers Park next (they are not so far away in Evanston, but just far enough)

Here's a great quote from the story:

"If the spirits call me to another place," she told herself, "I'll know." 

It was the depths of winter when Tom Rosenfeld called. Companio had known Rosenfeld for a decade, since she started stocking apples from his organic orchard, Earth First Farms. In 2012, he bought the legendary Heartland Cafe in Rogers Park and has since worked to spruce it up while staying true to its hippie roots. 

On the day he phoned, he asked Companio to come to dinner there, saying only that he had a crazy idea. 

She went, thinking he wanted to talk about apple butter. What he proposed instead was that she move her entire operation—stock, staff, co-ops, everything—into the Heartland, as a partner in the business. 

She didn't hesitate. Deal.