Chicago Is Us
Some American cities are bigger than life. What I think of as “quintessentially American,” like Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Washington D.C., Detroit . . . you know, cities with history and stories and big emotions.
I love Chicago. I’ve run its streets, seen shows, eaten pizza, had my wallet lifted, wandered museums, stayed in historic hotels, explored its suburbs.
Chicago is a warm steak, oozing just a little red jus, and a dry martini (gin, three olives) in a leather booth. Music in the air like an afterthought.
The Chicago Marathon is a warm, pulsing mass of bodies — runners and spectators alike. It’s my favorite (I’ve run it twice) because there’s something so very “can do” about the way the city turns out. They want you to succeed. The crowd wants you to love their neighborhood as much as they do. The runners are serious without being elitist. Records are set while you follow in greatness’s footsteps.
The wind is a friend and an enemy, pushing constantly across that blue water. I could walk all day along the lake, bundled in a coat and scarf. I say that, but I’ve never been to Chicago in the teeth of the winter. It would probably do this Texas girl in. Chicago is not for the weak.
I feel for Chicago like Carl Sandburg did. His Chicago Poems made me fall in love with poetry because, yes, I understood.
What I don’t understand is an American president who disparages our great city. Chicago’s problems are our problems; we are one and the same. And yet, this: “It’s embarrassing to us as a nation. All over the world, they’re talking about Chicago. Afghanistan is a safe place by comparison, it’s true,” said Donald Trump.

It’s not true. Homicides are going down in Chicago. But his lie is not really the point: gun violence is a quintessentially American problem. To single out a city, to slander it, to create division between them and us, is wrong. That the president, someone who is supposed to represent our country, would do it is doubly wrong.
We should embrace Chicago — they are us — and console and commiserate. Then ask, how can we together make all our American cities as great as they possibly can be?
