In my post about going back-and-forth with CNN, I quote myself saying this, as a preface to explaining why the city needs every warm body it can get:
"Chicago had 3 million residents in 1950. Now we have 2.7 million residents."
I wasn't thinking, or, rather, thought I was writing to somebody in Atlanta. But my writing about it expanded the audience. Slapdown came quickly, from a reader named Nate.
"'Chicago had 3 million residents in 1950. Now we have 2.7 million,'" he wrote, quoting me. "And you're one of the ones that left. Taking the 'we' out of it."
Ouch. True enough. I try to admit when I'm caught in a deception.
"I generally try not to include myself among Chicagoans — stolen valor — but sometimes I mess up," I replied. "I'll correct."
And I did, changing it to "Now Chicago has 2.7 million residents."
Only then I realized I hadn't written that for the post, but was quoting something that I had already written to CNN. So I changed it back — as a value, quoting accurately, even quoting myself, surpasses not being caught putting on airs.
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“Moving outside of the city of Chicago is not a decision we reached easily,” Bears president and CEO Kevin Warren wrote in a letter to season ticket holders. “This project does not represent us leaving, it represents us expanding.”
Expanding ... into Arlington Heights. While indeed leaving Chicago, in the sense they won't play there anymore. But they still won't be the Arlington Heights Bears, correct? The name "Chicago" they intend to keep, apparently.
Allow me to savor this moment.
As someone who has had my chops busted for 25 years for not living in the city, I'm not sure how to feel about this apparent development. Is this helpful to my cause? With this move, I've got the Chicago Bears behind me, arms folded across their chests, hands tucked in armpits, nodding in agreement. I can reply: "It's good enough for the Chicago Bears, it's good enough for me, so shut the fuck up!"
Or is it just harmful to them without necessarily benefiting us scorned suburbanites? Chicagoans love lording their residency over those whose pillows rest over the city limits. If the Bears go on some White Sox-like swoon, will the general weakness and inauthenticity of the suburbs be blamed?
Bank on it.
Unless it doesn't. The New York Giants play in East Rutherford, New Jersey. I almost said, "And nobody holds that against them." Honestly, I'm not that well versed in New York Giants fandom. Maybe their fans howl location-based derision from the stands. Maybe they wave signs, "You made me schlep to East Rutherford for THIS?!?!?!"
Unless it doesn't. The New York Giants play in East Rutherford, New Jersey. I almost said, "And nobody holds that against them." Honestly, I'm not that well versed in New York Giants fandom. Maybe their fans howl location-based derision from the stands. Maybe they wave signs, "You made me schlep to East Rutherford for THIS?!?!?!"
Or maybe, because the Giants went to the Super Bowl five times and won four, they could play at the American Girl store in Montclair and that would be okay with fans.
I shouldn't dip my toe too far into sports — I couldn't name a current Bears player if you put a gun to my head. But next time someone gives me grief about living in Northbrook, I can say, "Hey, at least I sometimes work in Chicago. That's more than" — whoever the quarterback of the Bears might be — "can say."
Which means I'll have to learn a player's name. Someday.
I don't care where the Bears play as long as zero tax money is involved in building their overblown & overpriced stadium!
ReplyDeleteAnd that includes the state preventing them from getting a law passed allowing them to not pay the full tax rate of Arlington Heights!
Plus they also need to pay off the remaining bonds on Soldier Field, as the crooked McCaskeys are the ones who demanded it be rebuilt as the Toilet Bowl!
Could be worse, dude. You could be living in Cleveland.
DeleteMoved here 33 years ago, at age 45, to marry my college sweetheart. Found out early on that the Browns were like a religion here. This is Browns Town. They played in historic old Cleveland Stadium, on the lakefront, which seated 80,000 for football games.
That is, they played there until their greedy shmuck of an owner moved them to Baltimore, where they have been enormously successful for almost thirty years, and became big winners in the NFL. The city of Cleveland bitched loudly and long, and threatened legal action. Bitched enough to be awarded an expansion team, with the same name and colors.
The old stadium was torn down and a new one was slapped together on the same spot. And it immediately began falling apart. So did the new team. They have been a laughingstock, and the joke of the NFL, for a quarter-century now. Stink is too good a word for them. Worse than the hapless Cubs have ever been.
So now their current billionaire owner, a corrupt and dishonest carpetbagger from Tennessee, wants to move the team out of their crumbling dump when their lease expires in a few more years. He bought a huge chunk of land, the former site of a now-demolished auto plant, in an inner-ring suburb. He envisions a multi-billion-dollar Dizzyland on that spot. The usual bells and whistles: a domed stadium, retail, apartments, concert halls, yadda yadda yadda. The whole megillah.
A sports-themed and owner-operated mini-city, like the Braves built twenty miles from Atlanta. On the taxpayers' dime. The Ohio legislature already gifted him with half-a-billion. The rest is supposed to be funded by Joe and Jane Shmoe, who don't want this boondoggle, and who can't afford the tickets anyway. Or the team-controlled parking lots. Or the cost of tailgating in a team-owned space. And all this mishegoss would be ruining nearby neighborhoods on game days and concert days. One of which would be mine.
But there has been pushback from the city. Oh, and did I mention that the land is adjacent to the AIRPORT? Imagine trying to catch a plane on the Sunday after Thanksgiving, when a game is scheduled. Or before Christmas. Or on any given Sunday. Or on a weekend when Taylor Swift shows up to sing. The FAA says a dome would interfere with air traffic. The highway people say Dizzyland would mess up ground transportation. A rapid transit station would still mean a mile-long walk. But what billionaires want, billionaires usually get.
Be happy you are not living in Cleveland. For so many reasons. Am I pissed off about all this? Damn betcha. Maybe I won't live long enough to experience this nightmare scenario. Really, really hate the Browns now. Go Lions.
NFC North fan, daughter of an avid Bears fan. Born in Chicago, raised in the boonies (McHenry County), moved to the suburbs in 1972. Worked in both city and burbs. Still visit our beautiful city often. (Just because I don't live there doesn't mean it's not mine.) A Super Bowl in Chicago in 2031. How cool is that? It would be even cooler if my Packers are in that game. And if my team can't do it, the Bears, Lions or Vikings would make a great choice.
ReplyDeleteAs long as the McCaskeys own the Bears, it probably won't make much difference where they play. However, I can't imagine suburbanites being thrilled over the traffic jams which will occur when the Bears are playing.
ReplyDelete"Chicago Bears" is a brand now, not a location. Also FWIW, the population of Chicago in 1950 was 3.6 million, not 3 million.
ReplyDeleteWith the bears stumbling to bitter defeat last night on national television I came right to EGDD thinking I could find some respite from the hand wringing and clutching of pearls by commentators and a fan base desperate for success .
ReplyDeleteNo need to learn the latest failure of a quarter backs name or any of the others players for that matter. they're all bums.
I believe the bears own a trademark on Chicago Bears and im not sure the move is written in stone, yet
Sports fandom is a high form of tribalism and fanbases remain angry for decades when their team leaves town . in New York they've had their heat broken over and over by various franchises in several sports.
Im from Toronto - well I visited once and our countries share a boarder- so you can claim residency of wherever you want . its very fashionable all the kids are doing it
In all honesty, I wasn't aware they had lost when I wrote this.
DeleteThink back a few decades. I don't assume anything. But I would guess you and Mrs. Steinberg moved from Lakeview to Northbrook way back when for the usual reasons. (If memory serves you lived somewhere in the vicinity of Halsted and Barry or Halsted and Oakdale. You used to write about it.) One of your reasons may have been the budding notion of feathering a nest. You thought it might be pleasant for any resultant children to grow up in a house with a yard, etc. Have their little pals close by. Be able to ride bikes around the neighborhood and camp out in the yard and catch fireflies in a jar and roast weinies. The normal drill. Northbrook was an easy straight shot downtown on the train for you. Why not do it? Entire generations of young people have followed that obvious blueprint: Graduate from college, take first "real job" in Chicago, find that first apartment (preferably around Wrigleyville or Lakeview or Bucktown, etc.), drink with your buddies, meet and court a potential spousal unit, marry and spend a few (not too many!) early years in the city until it's time to...settle down. Hello Northbrook! Hello Elmhurst! Hello Vernon Hills and Arlington Heights and Palatine! You didn't "leave" Chicago. You were already transient. You probably had an idea you'd land in the suburbs after a few years. One way or another. You (thousands of young adults) were but passing through. Chicago was a rite of passage. You'd have funny stories about the time you spent in Lakeview or Ravenswood, etc. YOU should NOT be included in a population loss stat. Folks stepping over the border to Indiana, certainly. Count them. But not that earnest young Ohio college kid, with the firm hand-shake and freshly shined Florsheims, who lived in an apartment for a few years. Count families moving to the southwest and northwest suburbs. Orland Park and Buffalo Grove didn't mysteriously populate themselves with a handful of magic beans. Nope.
ReplyDeleteActually, my oldest was about to send him to kindergarten, and there was nowhere he could go to school that didn't feel like child abuse.
DeleteGraduate from Ohio State or Michigan State or Illinois, take that first "real job" in Chicago, find that first apartment (preferably around Wrigleyville or Lakeview or Bucktown, etc.), drink in the bleachers with your buddies, meet and court a potential spousal unit, marry and spend a few (not too many!) early years in the city until it's time to...settle down. And hatch out a kid or two. And then look around for a house in the suburbs, because the young'uns are NOT going into a Chicago public school. Good-bye, North Side. Hello, boonies. Fixed it fer ya.
DeleteI nominate Caleb Williams as the name of a current Chicago Bears player, which happens to also be the name of a novel written more than 200 years ago by William Godwin, the father of the creator of Frankenstein. You can look it up!
ReplyDeletetate
I have little respect for teams that play outside of the city limits and call themselves of that very city. it seems like a cop out, an insult.
ReplyDeleteIronically, they all do it for bigger stadiums and more money all while getting public funds to boot.
The rich get richer...
Does it actually matter? I am, admittedly, not a football fan. The last Superbowl I watched was .. ahem .. 1985. I don't understand why everyday people, working folks, are so enamored of a "game" owned by immensely rich families who don't necessarily live here and played by immensely rich athletes who surely don't live here. Do they imagine that those owners and players actually give a RRFRA about the town and residents they purport to represent? Maybe it's fantasy. Maybe it's an unattainable dream. Maybe it's projection. There's a lot of that now. So I guess it really doesn't matter .. as long as NO taxpayer money is used to sustain and expand those rich owners and players.
ReplyDeleteThey are allowed to identify as "Chicago" unless they start putting ketchup on their hotdogs.
ReplyDeleteI stopped watching sports decades ago when as a teen when I discovered many teams were operating under fake names. A lie is a lie. To lie daily while stoking rivalry and hero worship, abusing players, employees and communities all to increase owners' personal wealth, under a false symbols... Oh, our fearless leader just flashed in my brain!
ReplyDeleteI am a Northbrook resident – and a Green Bay Packers fan. I guess that says it all.
ReplyDeleteNow that the antisemitic owner has passed on, allowing the rest of the McCaskeys to avoid hundreds of millions in capital gains, the family should sell the team to a billionaire who will bring in other investors to pay for the stadium.
ReplyDeleteHere's a name to learn: Caleb Williams.
ReplyDeleteYes learn that name you're going to put it on a list with Mitch trubisky ,Justin fields, and too many others to list here failed bears quarterbacks
DeleteI don't think we should be worrying too much about the play of the Bears quite yet. We've only had our second game in the history of the franchise that was not attended by Virginia Hallas Makaski. we're way behind her terrible record. it will take time.
DeleteI hadn't watched a game in years but decided to join male members of the family on the couch last night? Are there any other team's jerseys covered with initials of dead people? Also the Viking helmets were way cooler. Who won? I wasn't paying attention.
ReplyDelete