Wintry Updates
I have been listening to a lot of Arthur Russell these past few days, as I have just spent the week back in that grand city of Philadelphia, amongst good scholars, good friends, and superlative aesthetics across the board. The problem with Chicago is arguably that I haven’t been there long enough, but going to a show and seeing 20 people I really want to talk long and deeply with, and 5 bands all of whom I know personally and enjoy fantastically is the kind of experience I tend to thrive on, and which is completely closed off to me in the city by the lake. There are good folks to be sure, and I would even say valuable people I cannot ever regret knowing, but the richness of a life built up around one’s best friends in a small and alive city is hard to parallel. In any case, the pangs of the darker parts of my life there have long passed, and I was able to enjoy the neighborhoods and the people again in a kind of pure manner that I can only aspire to in Chicago. All this really says to me is that I just need to make sure I get out more over the course of my time there, especially if that time stretches indefinitely into the future as it might. Thinking about it in this way reinforces the understanding that I have recently come to: that the benefits of purchasing a vehicle far outway my hatred of driving. For one thing, I want to seriously consider moving out of Hyde Park and up to, say, Pilsen next year. Further, the isolation of HP is stifiling for me, and the public transit treks are often prohibitively long, especially when late nights are in the picture. Finally, owning a car would make coming home for visits a hell of a lot easier, as well as things like grocery shopping and the like.
This understanding aside, I’ve realized a few other things lately that I will have to wrangle with for a while. In particular, my devotion to pluralism as connected with my atheism, and the implications–and limits–of what is possible there. I came to some peace with the fact a few months ago that while I aspire to be able to talk like a human being, coexist and be a true friend to absolutely anyone of any background, this is easier said than done, and that even at its best there are limits that must be understood. For example, I really couldn’t have a relationship with someone who’s relationship to the religious differs in certain ways from my own. Nor could I with someone who was politically conservative. This does not in any way mean I would not respect or be a good friend with such people, but rather that while it might seem obvious, it is something to realize in concrete terms. Will have to keep considering on these issues for the future.