| Radio was the big communicator, back when I was a | | | | awhile. We weren't too dumb.Fighting in Chicago was a |
| kid. Whole families huddled around the speaker of that | | | | prerequisite to boyhood. When we would walk down |
| hulk. Our minds, working like a cotton picker on a hot | | | | the streets, past the alleys, fear was constant, as all |
| summer day. We had imagination. Vivid, plentiful | | | | the really bad boys lurked down that alley way. No |
| thoughts, moving throughout the story which was being | | | | place for the faint of heart. We all thought we were |
| broadcast.The characters, were like people we | | | | tough guys back then. Maybe we really were?No |
| somehow knew. People who lived right down the | | | | drugs back then, at least, none of us every heard |
| street from us, in the three story apartment building. | | | | about them. Our parents made vague references to |
| That apartment building, was a warehouse of eclectic | | | | drugs, in retrospect, but, really, they didn't even know |
| personalities, popping from every floor, and every | | | | what they were. Although, Pops knew what beer was. |
| door.Old cars, now relics of the past. New, when we | | | | He knew all about that. All the World War 2 guys |
| were young. Cool cars too, metal so thick, you could | | | | drank beer. Because, they really were tough guys. We |
| hurt your hand just bumping into it. Lasted a long time, | | | | didn't know that you could be tough, and not drink, and |
| and made moving about the big city of Chicago much | | | | smoke cigarettes.Life in the alleys of Chicago, was not |
| easier than taking the trolley, bus or "EL", short for | | | | only for tough guys. It was an avenue for commerce |
| elevated train.Oh yes, want to get the scare of a | | | | as well. The coal man came with the truck, and |
| lifetime, ride the "EL" around one of those sharp | | | | shovelled coal down a shute into your basement, to |
| corners, thirty feet off the ground. Steel wheels | | | | keep your furnace going. Thats right coal. Black smoke |
| grinding against steel tracks, making sounds so shrill,the | | | | billowing from everyone's buildings.Men selling rags, |
| devil himself, would cringe. I know my Mom's hands | | | | singing a song that was well known to us. "Rags, |
| were crimped for a week, when I would grip her hand | | | | Rags, everyone needs rags, Ragman coming, come |
| so tight around those curves.People wearing clothes | | | | and gettem" Gosh, they sold everything in those |
| that made them all look like gangsters. Suits way to | | | | alleys.Milkmen, with horse drawn carts. Oh now, we |
| large, cuffs on shirts that could hide a deck of cards, | | | | loved those horses. They were huge with covers over |
| and a pair of dice.Litter blowing everywhere, down | | | | their eyes. As kids we didn't know what those were. |
| windy streets, sweeping dicarded cigarette packages, | | | | We really didn't care as long as we could pet the |
| and paper, and dirt, like a hurricane unleashed. It is the | | | | horses.The milkman was kindly, and chipped off |
| Windy City, after all.Another memory comes to mind | | | | chunks of ice, from the big blocks in the wagon, which |
| now, tennis balls being bounced off the lowest step of | | | | kept the milk cold. We absolutely loved that. Ice, who |
| building's porches. Thump, thump, and crowds of kids | | | | would think that a little thing like that would be so |
| leaping over one another, trying to catch the ball, as it | | | | important to little kids. I will always be gratefull to that |
| bounced high into the air. No kid would even care to | | | | man for his kindness.Scissor and knife sharpeners. |
| watch that now, much less participate. We did it for | | | | They all had a song. Singing loudly, I admired them so. |
| hours. Boredom played tricks on the mind.Did I mention, | | | | They were the best kind of entepreneurs. Business |
| the best steps to bounce a ball on, were the steps of | | | | men, who set their own pace, in a world of frantic |
| Peterson's store. To us, it was the candy depot. | | | | motion.There is so much more to those days. So |
| Apothecary jars, filled with candy of every description. | | | | many memories that were the best kind of life |
| Hands full of candy for pennies. Kids drool when I tell | | | | experiences, back when we was kids in Chicago.Part |
| them how much candy, they could have bought back | | | | two, tomorrow night. Look for it under my pen name/ |
| then with two dollars.We learned young, that after long | | | | Native American name, Luksi Humma, in the search |
| hours of the thumping noise. People were inclined to | | | | bar on the left menu. |
| buy you some candy, just to make the noise stop for | | | | |