December 2013

Uptown!

    My, my, it is hard to believe, yet 39 years ago Beverly and I were assigned to do our intern year while living in our new Chicago home.

    Home? Well . . . .

    I'm uncertain how many of us made the move, but we were assigned the 8th floor of the Kemper insurance building. This was not the cubicle--that would come quickly enough. This was the largest area on the floor perhaps with two or three other couples on the whole floor.

    Because we moved from Salina to Chicago--burning our bridges before leaving Kansas--we had far too much stuff. We did not take seriously the admonition for interns to bring just the basics. Remember the mythology: The first night in 5th City all of your belongings would be placed on the street and whatever was left in the morning would be what you really needed. Geez, eventually we took up more than our share of the basement storage room--later to be called the "Help Yourself" room. I mean, after all, we came to 5^th City in an 18 foot U-HAUL with bicycles hanging on the back end.

    After a few days bunking out in the 5^th City seminary, off we went to 4750 No. Heaven with our hide-a-bed, dresser, and sound system still in tact. Next, we went to find something to make "the walls!" A nearby yard goods store had reams of gunny sacking--it seems some of it may still exist in our basement now. We bought 100', took it back to our nest and did the best we could. Like Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz it wasn't like Kansas, but it was like HOME after living through a tornado.

    Maybe two weeks later, we were assigned to a cubicle at the south end of the 6th floor. This was a tiny room about 12 X 12--to be generous. Do you remember the 18' U-HAUL? Yes, we were living 3' deep. Then, we discovered the basement’s "Help Yourself" room. The storage area was not “the overnight street in 5th City,” but it was useful for the same reason.

    The 6th floor women's toilet and shower was at the south end of the hall--just a few feet from our southern cubicle. The men's toilet and shower was a half-block away at the corner of Sheridan and Lawrence. A middle-of-the-night walk was almost a Journey to the East and where was HH went we needed him. It was difficult keeping Beverly from smiling. She was lucky for her proximity of relieve and cleansing. 

    Our next room assignment was stacked file cabinets, desks and gunny sacking. We had a curtain for a front door.

Because of all of our creative nest construction, plus the quartering of the Emerging Generation on the 3rd floor, this made for an interesting relationship with the Fire Inspector.

    By now, the building was filling up fast. People used their ring fingers to tap on the elevator glass door to call the elevator operator, and occasionally the effort was made to chase the German cockroaches from the kitchen to the upper floors. What a relief it is. Do you remember getting sail-cloth shower curtains?

    Obviously, the times had changed from the time when the Kemper Insurance Company hired hundreds of secretaries serving in large employee pools on many of the Kemper floors. This fact could be ascertained by the number of file cabinets and desks left for us to use as apartment framing. After these accoutrements were long gone, there were a huge number of electrical floor outlets left as souvenirs.

    Our son, Wesley, not noted for his patient demeanor, was running through the hall ways and tripped on a raised outlet cutting open his knee. Those in charge of the Emerging Generation cleaned and bandaged him.

    Several days later, Beverly noticed him walking backwards on his way to the nearby school. When she inquired about this unusual mode of locomotion and heard his explanation that he couldn’t bend his knee, she discovered a very painful and highly infected leg.

Beverly rushed him to the hospital just down the street where she was required to explain in her best Kemper Protective way what happened and where. Soon Wesley was healed enough to continue his campaign, along with his companions, to discover ways to the crawl space above the ceilings in the first floor banquet room.

The Eternal Reality continues to give us memories.

Bill, Beverly, Jana, Julie and Wesley—may he Rest In Peace.