Deep-Dishing Again OR Take Me Back to that Same Old University

Back at the turn of the millennium (being able to say that will never get old), I had to choose which institution to attend for my collegiate education.
For a variety of reasons, one of which I will admit was the unique color scheme, I chose...

Note: During my tenure someone may have climbed this to hang signs from the center on multiple occasions.
There is no direct evidence that person was me.

That's right: Good ol' NU. Known for a variety of exceptional academic, science, and arts programs. Also for its usually bad football team.

After 4 years at NU, I lived two in Chicago, then left and haven't been back for 7 years.

...Until now.

Well, hi there, Chicago. Have you been there this whole time?
I guess you have, actually...

Any guidebook can tell you about Chicago. And any tour guide can show you around downtown far better than I could.

But I'm still going to show you highlights. Starting with my favorite buildings in downtown.

Ah yes, the famous Something Towers.
Built in Some Year, these towers are blah de blah, blah de blah...

What's that you say? Why would I like these ones? Well I'll tell you, demanding fictional person.

It's not the weird 60s-idea-of-the-future condos (though those are cool). It's the parking garage. See, the bottom of those is an open-air parking garage where the cars pull into spaces facing off the edge of the building. And the only thing separating those cars from plunging into the river (or the street) is a single chain.

I can't explain it, but for some reason that always entertained the hell out me, picturing someone getting home late, forgetting to put the parking brake on, then a big gust of wind (remember: Windy City) pushes the car off to run free in the river…

Yes, obviously the engineers were smart and took this into account. But it still entertained me.

Like the river.

Known for being dyed green on St. Patrick's Day.
...And having Chicagoans make jokes about dyeing it blue the rest of the year.

Everything made sense to me the time I learned Chicago came from a Native American word meaning "Stinking water." That's right: It was a swamp. (Depending on who you talk to, it still is. Ba-dum CHING!)

Coming from the Golden State and growing up surrounded by natural beauty, it's poetic to me that mankind has built such a city on such ugliness.
There are several jokes there, but I'll just make this one:

Speaking of ugliness... I appreciate the effort, Sheraton,
but nobody's buying that your building was here during the 1900s.

Now before we head up to the north shore, I would like to point out something that was kind of awesome:

We happened to be there during an air show, and headed down Navy Pier, where we got to see a Navy ship...

Ready to kick some alien ass in an entertaining-but-financially-unsound movie.

...And had several flybys by some sort of crazy blue contraption calling itself an angel. They had some sort of name…

...Oh that's right! The Awesomest Pilots Ever.

Ten-year old Gavin was squealing with joy while I took these pictures.
Probably why so many came out blurry.

Moving father north, up LSD (no, not the drug), through Wrigleyville (some people wanted to see Wrigley Field) and ever onward on the lake shore, we came to Northwestern.

And at Northwestern, the Theatre building.

Believe it or not, this is the front entrance...

...See?

I spent most of my four years in this building. Someone was rehearsing somewhere in the building, so we managed to get in and find it blessedly free of those obnoxious things called students. (Not me. I was NEVER obnoxious- Okay, yes. Yes I was.)

It was...Weird. Things were the same, but not at all.

Even the theater I'd spent two years in during acting class was… Just a black box theater.

With a garbage can.
Somehow it breaking the sense of mystique seems appropriate.

Back when I was in college, this was going to be my life: Theaters and lights and performing and drama and other such things.

To a certain extent, I still find theater spaces like cathedrals or chapels: Stately and venerated.

Which is weird, because I was part of a really bad production
in this theater that should be the opposite of revered....

In a way part of me had always felt like I was still a student at NU, that for some reason that part of my life (you know, the part everyone says is the BEST YEARS OF YOUR LIFE) was always there, unchanged and easy to revisit.

But not so much. Time marches on, and so do grand old Institutions. And so does the town. I recognized only a handful of names on the faculty list, and wandered through the empty hallways like a ghost in an old home.

Which is why I was glad to go back. Because while some things stayed the same…

Like the serene beauty of the Shakespeare Garden...

...And the quirky humor of the student body.

...Things change. When I left college and Chicago, I didn't even know the woman who became my wife. My beautiful wife, the woman without whom I can't imagine exploring and living life.

And while I showed this amazing woman around my old college, a thought occurred to me:

I like it when life changes. It's what makes it so damn fascinating.




....And yes, while there we had deep dish Giordano's pizza. That, for one thing, was still just as amazing as ever.