Down On Main Street

It's day one of my Back-Down-Memory-Lane Road Trip...

I call it that cause I've traveled across the country to see where it started. For me. In the east. Before my family moved to Evanston in 1966 and my life really got started.

I want to see how the places I've not seen in years correspond to my memory of them.

So, I'm standing on Main Street in Manchester, Connecticut. The town where I was born, when my father was a young professor at the University of Connecticut. Back in the `50s.

But actually, my memories of Manchester are more recent than that. Coincidentally, in 1979, at age 23, I moved to Manchester to take a job as a cub reporter for the Journal Inquirer, a local newspaper.

I lived above a storefront in a former dentist office that had been converted into a one-bedroom apartment.

It had big bay windows with a view of Main Street, so I could look out at the passing cars and dream that one day I'd convert my fledgling journalistic talents into skills I could bring back to Chicago. Applying them to local politics. So, I could be like Mike Royko. My hero. And fight the good fight for truth and justice.

I’d been looking forward to showing my wife the building where I lived. And to maybe even walk up its steps and knock on the door to introduce myself to whoever lives there now. But…

“What's wrong?” asks my wife, who can see my disappointment.

"This is not my old building.”

"What?"

”It’s gone. They tore it down for that bank.”

”It’s so ugly.”

”I know. You should have seen it when I lived here. It had big bay windows. It was nice.”

Suddenly, I feel like the mournful guy in that Sinatra song, There Used to Be a Ballpark. 

My wife and I walk along Main Street, stopping outside a hipster coffee shop not far from the bank. 

"There used to be a diner here--a grill. AJ and I used to eat at the grill all the time."

AJ worked with me at the newspaper—that’s where we met.  Great guy. Smart, funny and passionate about politics and sports. We could talk for hours about the news of the day. Ted Kennedy’s ill-fated run for president. The rise of Reagan. AJ’s beloved Celtics. This was Larry Bird’s rookie year. You could tell Bird was destined for greatness.

We’d be in that diner, eating breakfast. AJ’s scrambled eggs getting cold on his plate while he finished his thoughts. I’d lean over to fork up some oh his eggs, and he’d brush aside my hand and gobble down a bite or two. It irritated me to watch his eggs go uneaten but it was distracting for him to simultaneously eat and talk, especially if he was on a roll. And back then we both had so much to say.

We were best of friends. But we drifted apart after I moved back to Chicago. And I hadn’t seen him in years, when I got the news. He died at his home outside of Boston. Cancer.

Like the great Minnie Riperton--I went back down memory lane...

My wife and I head into the coffee shop, order a cup and sit at a table. I notice that no one in the restaurant looks old enough to have been alive in `79. Except...

Three women, hair as grey as mine, sitting by the front door. On an impulse, I walk over and say…

"Excuse me but, ugh, I know this is gonna sound weird. But--how long have you been living around here?"

They give me blank looks of suspicion. 

"I have a reason for asking."

As if that justifies encroaching on their get-together. 

Finally, one woman says—"since 1977."

Great. I start my spiel. Years ago, when I worked for the Journal Inquirer, I lived in the building that got torn down to make way for the bank. And--by the way, is the Journal still in business?

One woman says--"no, it went out of print."

And another says--"no, you're thinking of the Hartford Courant."

And I say—"hold it, the Hartford Courant’s out of business?"

And she says—"I think it’s only online."

I'm too stunned to talk. How is that possible? Back in the day, the Courant was monumental. Everyone read it. They had a local reporter in Manchester.  I lived in dread of him scooping me. Cause I had this editor who gave me so much grief when I got scooped.

One time she came to my desk, the Courant in her hand, and she snarled—how did you miss this?

It was a story which she'd circled in red about the Zoning Board of Appeals approving some guy's request to extend a driveway. 

And I didn’t have that story, even though zoning was on my beat, and I’d been at the very ZBA meeting where the driveway extension had been approved.

In fact, I’d been sitting next to that Hartford Courant reporter, whose article my editor had circled in red.

And she said—I want you to think long and hard about why you missed this story.

And she dropped the Courant on my desk and walked away in disgust.

And I didn’t have to think long or hard cause I knew why I missed the story. I missed it cause I’d stopped paying attention as soon as the ZBA started talking about the driveway. I'd gone into journalism to battle injustice. Not to write about trivialities, like driveway extensions.

So, the first lesson I learned as a cub reporter in Manchester was this—if you wanna survive in this racket, give your editors what they want. 

"What's your question?"

It's one of the women at the table. I realize I’d been lost in thought, and they want to get back to the conversation they were having before I'd interrupted.

"Oh, sorry. Do you know when that building got torn down?"

She scoffs. "I don't know,. What does it matter? People are always tearing things down. Trees grow--they get torn down. Where do you live now?"

"Chicago."

"And nothing's changed in Chicago since 1979?"

Wow. Talk about raining on my Back-Down-Memory-Lane road trip.

"Okay. Well, thank you for your time."

I return to my table, feeling a little chastened.

And I think--old cut-to-the-chase made a good point.  A lot will change in 47 years. Just look at me.

When I returned to Chicago, I got proficient at writing zoning stories. In fact, I wrote a bunch of them. I realized zoning spats offer insights into human behavior, exposing pettiness, greed and prejudices. Or fears about something happening--even a trivial driveway extension--that might depreciate the value of property.

The thing is—back in `79. I thought I knew so much, but, really, what did I know? I was just starting out and had so much to learn.

So, yeah, I learned to appreciate zoning stories. Just one of the many changes I never would have imagined when I was living in that converted dentist office with the big bay windows above the fabrics store down on Main Street.