ls were taken
Living in a suburb of the Chicagoland area has always given me the opportunity to explore and venture into the city without actually living there. I’ve been able to see places that people coming from other counties, states, or areas of the world can only see when visiting once or twice, or maybe only through a photograph. For the longest time, I feel as though I’ve taken that for granted.
Whenever I would go into the city with my family when I was younger, we would drive. More often than not we would go to touristy areas like Eataly or ice skating at Millennium Park, or to a relative’s house. However, now that I live in the actual city and (to both my luck and my disadvantage) right next to a CTA stop, I’ve discovered the city through a new lens.
In high school when my friends and I would ditch class to go downtown, I never considered visiting areas rich with culture like Chinatown, Little India, or Pilsen. I didn’t even know Pilsen existed until I got here. Like Sullivan quotes Hemon in his “20 Reasons Aleksander Hemon Will Never Leave Chicago”, I was a “highly muggable suburbanite patrolling Michigan Avenue… oblivious to the city beyond the shopping and entertainment areas” (Sullivan). Coming to DePaul has opened my eyes to a whole new set of experiences. I’m trying new foods every day, meeting people from all around the world, and learning more about myself in the process.
This all stems from the glorious, heavenly public transportation known as the Chicago Transit Authority — CTA or L for short.
In high school the closest I got to knowing the CTA was that I knew I could take the blue line from Oak Park to the Loop, and walk everywhere after that, or take a taxi. I didn’t know there was a spindling, tangled system that spidered out like a web to reach all corners of this beautiful, expansive city. I didn’t even know how to work my Ventra pass for the longest time.
But as the days of Immersion Week continued on, I realized how many lines I’d taken before without even knowing it. I had taken the red line from my uncle’s house to get to Loyola to visit. I had gone on the pink line once to get to Ogilvie. I’d been to Addison before to go to a cubs game. The CTA had helped me craft so many memories and I hadn’t even realized it. And as the next few weeks trickled by, I only made more and more. I went to Paulina on the brown line just to buy flowers from Jewel Osco. I went to a magazine launch party in the infamous 1821 Lofts on the West Side of Chicago, taking the green line at one in the morning with my best friend, and then weaving through dimly lit alleyways just to get there. I went all the way to the end of the red line — both ways — something I never thought I’d do before.
I learned how to ride the CTA properly, how to walk with confidence, and I learned how to get myself from one area to another, all while making memories which I decided to map out, because I will never forget the golden moments this dirty transportation mode has brought me.
This map helps those who are interested learn about all the places I’ve been in Chicago. I believe this is important because as a suburb grown girl, I always tell outsiders I’m from Chicago. However, I don’t think I have the right to claim this title unless I’ve actually been to areas of Chicago that narrate the lives of the culture that thrive here and of the people that call this place their home.
Although I still have yet to go to areas like Pilsen, Evanston or Bridgeport, I’m slowly earning my badges by taking the CTA nearly every day and going to places I’ve never been before.
Although not every posting on my map is correlated with a picture, I do take an overwhelming amount of photos on my adventures. Whenever I travel I enjoy compiling videos and photos in collages or short films so I can remember my adventures better. My memory isn’t that strong and I can tend to forget details very quickly, and since I’m not good at keeping up with journals, I turn to photography and videography.
Pulling out my phone to snap a quick picture or shoot a short video is really convenient, and my Google photos drive consists of tens of thousands of pictures. I’m not photo savvy and film is definitely not my major (I’m majoring in industrial organizational psychology, something most people have never heard of) but I enjoy using After Effects to piece together aspects of my life in an aesthetically pleasing way.
I’d say my map is pretty simple, but I don’t think I can nor do I want to include more. If I included the actual locations of the places I’ve gone and put them on the map, I think it would take away from the importance of the CTA that my map truly focuses on. The point of my map is to prove how heavily I rely on the CTA to strengthen my bonds with people, create new connections and to discover more about this wonderful city. If I include walking and bus routes I have taken, not only does it make the map too busy, but it shows that the CTA is less significant, and only a small fraction of what helps me get to certain places, when that is, in fact, not the case.
In listing things based solely off of the CTA stop I believe I emphasize how many opportunities can await someone even one stop over on the red line. A lot of my stops are listed more than once and that just goes to prove that I could get off of the CTA at Belmont every week and still find something new to do. Just tonight I got my nose pierced off of the Belmont stop, something I didn’t think I’d be doing, but the convenience, the service and the pricing sold me and ushered me to do something out of the ordinary for me.
What influenced my map the most was the visual aspect of where I’ve gone. Like I said before, I take a load of pictures and videos wherever I go, which is my way of journaling or keeping track of my daily activities. Although I perceive other things, I can often forget stuff like smell or sounds because I’m so focused on my photos, or the people I am with, or just other things I have to do that day. Though, I always notice that whenever I go down an alleyway or get off at the Lake stop it usually smells like pee, which always makes me laugh. Like number five in “101 small ways you can improve your city”, I believe I have mastered number five, which is sharing the beauty of my city.
I’ve had dozens of people come up to me and tell me that they stalk my Instagram because of the photos I share. I never share just one photo when I post, but at least a collection of five or six, because I get so excited about the pictures I take of the places I’ve been.
In its entirely, the Chicago L has shown me all sorts of parts of this city that, if it did not exist, I would not be able to truly grasp. I love taking the CTA and public transportation. I used to be scared of it, but I’ve grown to adore it and even though I don’t always have a destination in mind, I enjoy taking it at least once a day. I find comfort in the CTA, knowing that there is always something new waiting for me no matter where I get off, and as I pass stops I’ve been to once or twice before, I recall memories I’ve made with friends and family. It’s sort of like my way of taking a stroll down memory lane.
The journey of my map only recounts adventures over the past two or three years, but I believe I will spend the rest of my life in this city, and the map will only become more dense with memories and events. I had to add an event late Tuesday night after I got my nose pierced, and I don’t think I’ll ever stop finding the CTA as a source of comfort and a way to bond with my friends.
No matter how many times I will get off at a popular stop like Belmont or perhaps a stop I may revisit like Paulina, I will always find something new and something I can create with my friends. I love going to university in the city. When I visited my friend at Tulane, it was so boring and you stayed on campus nearly every day, never leaving. When I came back home and visited my friends at Wheaton College and Benedictine, I found myself feeling suffocated and silenced, the sounds of the bustling city, the annoying construction right outside my window, and the CTA roaring past every two minutes no longer ringing in my ears constantly. The city, I feel as I’ve always known, is where I thrive, and the CTA is how I do it.
Maybe the CTA isn’t the most glorious form to get to where you want to go, but I like the view and imitating the man who comes on over the speakers to announce the next stop, so I don’t mind it all that much.
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