Mail bag

     A heavier than usual load of reader mail Monday. While prudence dictates that most go unanswered, I responded to more than I probably should. The faux "I'm just discovering the world" tone of the first email moved me to reply. This guy has been sending me right wing fictions for a decade.
    

Dear Mr. Steinberg,

     I always look forward to your column in the Sun-Times, and thoroughly enjoyed the recent offering on the blockbuster film Barbie.
     Yesterday I saw 'The Sound of Freedom' and think it should be on many 10 Best Films of the Year lists. I hadn’t heard much about the film and was taken aback by the content and the message therein.
     I texted a friend about it and he said he wouldn’t see it because of QAnon.
     I can’t say I’ve ever heard of QAnon and googled same. I’m still a bit in the dark about this American political movement and theory, as I am sure others are.
     Please see the film and write an article about your observations as well as those you have on QAnon.

Thank you,

Dick N.
Rogers Park

     My reply:

    I appreciate you reading my column, but that doesn't make me in any way more open to the way QAnon has cynically seized the real problem of child trafficking as a figleaf to cover their shameful and toxic conspiracy peddling and anti-rationality. As for seeing the film, I will instead quote Kierkegaard: "Happy is he who didn't have to go to hell to know what the devil looks like." Since you profess to "still being a bit in the dark" about of QAnon — I don't see how that is possible, it's been around for years — and say you respect my opinion, allow me to fill you in: anyone parroting QAnon is either mentally ill, a chronic liar, irredeemably stupid, or some combination of the three. Thanks for writing.

As the Teletubbies said, "Again! Again!" 

     You are one of my favorite ex-Chicago authors and bloggers. (As I am an ex Chicago resident since 2005.) However you also seem to not have an actual clue as to how life goes on before and after Covid to the great majority of actual Illinois, Cook County, and Aldermanic Ward residents.
     My friends and relatives do suffer from these residencies. Their choice for now.
It might be more elucidating, and interesting if you, yourself spent more time within the City Limits, and then used your fine writing skills to report and reflect back to your readers.
I am a long time fan, (and ex Northbrook resident for one delightful year: 1970) but just wonder why you are no longer in the actual mix, of Chicagoland.
     — Mary C.

I chewed on that a bit, then tried to answer with all the candor I could muster:

Mary:

     Thanks for reading my column, for liking what I do, generally, and for your on-point suggestion and intriguing query.

     I suppose the honest answer to your question of why I don't spend more time in the city is a mix of the isolation and slow decay of age, lingering COVID, both tamping down society and affecting me personally — I was laid up with it most of July — not to forget my characteristic laziness, plus a lack of need. My most popular columns tend to be about some inane social subject — shopping at Aldi's — while columns that involve spending the morning crawling around Lower Wacker Drive with the Night Ministry get a chorus of crickets. I still do them, when I can find something, and try to go to the city whenever possible — I was there last Wednesday, at the Field Museum, then walking up the lakefront to the Gold Coast, then across the River Walk. On Friday, I was on the West Side, standing on the corner of Damen and Fulton, watching a Water Department crew repair a fire hydrant for two hours. I'll attach a photo below. That column will run a week from today.
     Until then, thank you for your patience when my column strays from your vision of what it should be, one that I share with you. That said, while I don't have many rules, as a writer, one I do adhere to is that I should always be who I am. This is who I am right now, for good or ill. Lately I've been quoting to readers dissatisfied with that person a sharp line from Shirley Jackson : "If you don't like my peaches; don't shake my tree."* But in this case, your remarks have such obvious merit, that doesn't quite apply, so I'll just say is that I agree with you, and will strive to do a better job of capturing the Chicago scene.
Best,
Neil Steinberg

There's more, but you get the idea.

* Reader Charles Troy points out that the line predates Jackson, and is found in a 1914 Irving Berlin song, "If You Don't Want My Peaches (You Better Stop Shaking My Tree)."