Big Horrible House on the Prairie

Today’s post brought to by: 4 trains, 6 hours , 3 heavy bags and lots of swearing, to end up back at square one

Grateful for: Terry, John and Erik

Trying hard to accept: how incredibly lucky I’ve been

To paraphrase Charles Dickens, it was the best of days, it was the worst of days.

After reluctantly saying goodbye this morning to John, Terry, their wonderful home and their gorgeous neighbourhood, all my stuff and I got the train downtown. So far, so good.

Then another train to Oak Park, way out west.

And I mean way out west. It’s the second to last stop to the end of the line at Harlem.

In terms of places you do not want to hang out in this city, way down south is number one. Way out west is number two.

A fact reinforced to me several times on the 45-minute ride past housing projects, lots and lots of abandoned lots and a guy who spent the whole time shouting “Fucking train. Why you goin’ so slow?”

Gotta say I agreed with him.

So why did you give up gorgeous Edgewater and monied Andersonville to go out there? I hear you ask.

Because every street is chocka block full of Frank Lloyd Wright prairie-style homes and I wanted to stroll round the streets and admire them all.

Oh and Ernest Hemmingway was born there but I didn’t know that till today. And frankly I don’t really care.

Oak Park is the weirdest place. You go through miles and miles of increasingly dodgy neighbourhoods till you get to this architectural oasis, before the train continues onto Murderville.

Well I got my chance to wander the streets of Oak Park alright after I took the wrong turn trying to get away from the train station pronto and ended up walking for 40 minutes away from my Airbnb.

My subconscious was obviously onto something.

Despite being beyond tired and hungry I did notice the enormous glorious prairie-style homes everywhere. They were super super gorgeous.

But once again you’ll just have to imagine/Google it because I was in no mood to start snapping shots. And my phone was almost dead.

In tiredness and hunger desperation I got lovely Marcus from Uber to take me to the right place.

Phew!! I thought as I finally got to Candy’s ‘home away from home’.

Yeah, if you consider home to be sharing a small dark basement, a bathroom the size of a pantry (and not the butler’s ones) and a living area with, it turned out, 6 international students going to the high school across the road.

Clearly Candy’s onto a homestay bonanza. Probably doesn’t pay tax on it. I should dob her in.

I rang the door bell. No answer. Walked round the back, tripping over broken TV aerials and ranch slider doors in bits all over the deck.

Emailed and rang Candy. No response. Sat on porch in cold for 20 minutes.

Finally a Japanese teenage boy opened the door and, in broken English, led me down the death-trap stairs to small basement bedroom.

Then he left. Good, I thought, as I quickly stuck in the wifi password, charged my phone and emailed John and Terry to see if there was any slim chance their place was available for 3 more nights.

Then a woman appeared. “Are you Candy?” No, she was Can’t Remember, Don’t Care, from Brazil.

Turns out there were 4 others from random countries all sharing the same space as me.

I went upstairs to find the kitchen and met Candy’s gold-necklaced, fat-faced, sneering son whose only comment to me was to ask me to take my shoes off. Oh and to show me the breakfast provisions – but hang on, opps we don’t have any cereal.

“Yeah I’m just going downstairs”, I said, “I’ll take my shoes off then”.

“We. Don’t. Allow. Shoes. Inside. Take. Them. Off”, he ordered (future career as prison warden, me thinks).

I said: “I will them off when I get downstairs in a minute”.

I thought: Words starting with f, ending with k.

There was crap everywhere. Making a meal in a caravan would’ve been easier than in that place.

Back into the dungeon (with shoes still on), I found out that alas, John and Terry had another guest. But they kindly invited me back for the afternoon till I found somewhere to stay. Nicest people ever.

Desperately searched for Airbnbs in Edgewater under $100/night and struck gold. Someone sure is looking after me. Big time.

Model-like Erik from Miami has an apartment a couple of blocks away from John and Terry’s for $60/night, and bonus, the other guests left today so I get the whole super stylish pad to myself.

The train ride back to downtown reinforced my decision to flee Oak Park. Two guys were having a screaming match with the word nigger used more times than I thought possible in one sentence.

On the train from downtown to Edgewater we were entertained to the most wonderful soul version of The Beatles’ ‘Come Together’ by a woman who sang like she was in the shower with no chance of anyone else hearing her.

Finally got to Erik’s at 5pm. Almost fell on him, poor bugger, I was so glad to see him. He’s so friendly and damn good looking and with exquisite taste. And unfortunately for my marriage prospects, gay.

Another stroke of luck. The laundromat is a 4 minute walk from Erik’s so here I am keeping one eye on my washing and one eye on the iPad.

Carted clothes down here in Aldi bags, of which there are 59 in the drawer.

The 102 year-old Chinese guy who runs this place has been so kind to me, patiently showing me how to work everything and fetching everything I need.

Have killed a bit of time chatting to Juan from Mexico, then LA, then Arizona, now Chicago who works in a car wash further north and travels to work for 2 hours a day on the bus and who thinks Italian and Chinese food is the bees’ knees and who told me I was “smart” when I told him I was a writer.

In Juan’s world anyone who does work that involves sitting down and typing is smart by default.

“You want me to take your photo? Here? Why?” asked one confused Juan. Poor guy’s probably never had such a strange evening down the laundromat.

Have booked myself on a tour of one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s houses tomorrow morning. It’s in south Chicago and not on an L line so it’s buses the whole way.

Least there’s no chance of screaming matches on buses. I hope.

La cocina. Say no more.

“Help yourself to whatever you want” said Erik. No chance of getting dehydrated here.

Check out the wet room (!!) and rainhead shower(!!). Check out that range of expensive body washes, each one more delicious than the last. I used all 4 in one shower. You know the guy’s got taste when you smell the towel as you’re drying your face and it smells like expensive perfume.

Stylish sofa or what?