Exploring Chicago’s Old Town with the Second City

“You know you’ve really made it when Lorne takes you out to dinner,” Margaret quipped, stopping short for effect while the 25 or so of us leaned in. “I’ve slept with him before, but have yet to get an invitation to dinner.”

She was, of course, talking about Lorne Michaels of Saturday Night Live Fame. And I laughed. I was at Chicago’s famed Second City, and the satirical, oft raunchy humor was to be expected.

chicao's second city tour

When I was a teenager, I never once complained that my weekend curfew was 10:30 p.m. during the school year – I‘d arrive home, switch on NBC just as the band was finishing up the opening theme and grab a bowl of ice cream. Saturday Night Live was always my Saturday date, and I grew up watching comics like Will Ferrell, Chris Kattan and Molly Shannon personify the immortal Spartans, Mango and Mary Katherine Gallagher.

My friends surprised me for my 18th birthday with a pack of Marlboro Lights and tickets to see a show at the e.t.c. stage of Chicago’s Second City. The show, Pants on Fire, was politically fueled and so hilarious, I had hiccups that my virgin strawberry daiquiri couldn’t cure.

Touring Old Town

Back home this summer, amidst wedding prep, the city of Chicago has become my escape (and my sister just moved back!). When searching for fun things to do with the Spaniards pre-bodorrio, I came across tours of the Old Town Neighborhood with improv artists from the Second City Theatre.

A gorgeous Chicago afternoon, a tour guide that actually had personality and one of the city’s most emblematic cultural pockets? And for $15 a head, it was a Chicago experience I could actually afford.

Tour Writer and Guide Margaret started by asked where we’d come from, adding insult to injury when she found out that my sister and I are from Bibletown and cracked a few jokes (well deserved, I might add). Shockingly enough, there were 10 of us from the hometown crowd and, much like those in attendance on show nights, we were the most vocal during the 90-minute tour.

Improv tours at the Second City Chicago

Margaret herself is a 20-year Second City student who took an improv class. Having a sound knowledge of the theater and its philosophy, the tour started at iconic 1616 N. Wells just like any tour – with the company’s history and its philosophy.

The Second City came to life at the University of Chicago thanks to a few beatniks who used techniques designed by Viola Spolin, a woman who dedicated her life to helping immigrants integrate into mainstream society. The games Viola played, eventually called Theatre Games, sought to relax participants and teach them how to react to different situations, soon became the foundation of improvisational techniques (and the club’s improv school). The Second City opened in the Old Town neighborhood in 1959 under the supervision of Paul Sills, Viola’s son.

Twin Anchors bar Chicago

The tour wound around a few residential blocks, past balloon house frames, old brick churches and local bars. Margaret pointed out favorite haunts of troupe members past, like Bill Murray, who recently stayed behnd to clean up after a Grateful Dead show in town. Like many Chicagoans or people who truly love the city, you keep coming back. She spun tails of some of the more famous alum like Gail Radner and Chris Farley before asking the audience for their favorite members – and then told stories about them.

We got a bit more hisotrical than I expected as we stood under Saint Michael’s bells, but the history lesson intertwined with humor and anecdotes was a winning combination.

scenes from Old Town, Chicago

Old Town is about as Chicago as it gets (and the same can be said about Second City). Being a stone’s throw from the skyscrapers of the Loop and in the shadow of the Sears (the skyscraper is a Chi Town original), the neighborhood was burned down during the Great Fire, becoming a vibrant part of the Northside.

“LIKE A PHOENIX!” were Margaret’s words. 

The tour ends back at Piper’s Alley, a mecca to comedy lovers, where you can read hate mail all the way up the stairs to the main stage. But as Margaret mentioned, it’s ok to fail in Chicago. It’s ok to rebuild (or build bleachers outside of the Trump and invite people to watch). It’s ok to keep doing what you’re doing and trust that someone believes in you.

balloon houses in Old Town

And it’s totally fine by us that New York thinks they’re better at everything – it was journalist A.J. Liebling who gave us our famous nickname as a nod to the Big Apple’s superiority anyway. Pizza and hot dogs? Fine, we’ll give those to you so long as you let us keep the lake, our sports and the best damn improv theatre in North America.

The Second City Neighborhood Tours are held rain or shine every Friday afternoon and Sunday morning. Expected to walk about two miles, and bring your sense of humor. Tickets are $15 and reservations are recommended.

What’s your favorite thing to do in your hometown?

Postcards from Chicago

For years, I’ve been searching for a Chicago flag patch for Kike. The white bar in the middle, flanked by two celestial bars and four crimson stars, flies everywhere in the Windy City (so, literally). Every souvenir shop, Etsy boutiques – nowhere – has this token that he collects from the far-flung African countries he works in or the other soldiers he encounters.

So, when he asked me to find one for the fourth summer running, I tried again, hopeful that I’d get lucky. My bags are packed and his birthday gift wrapped up – it’s just not the patch he asked for. Still, Chicago’s most prominent colors are always the Cubbie Blue up in Wrigleyville, the white caps on Lake Michgan and the red of traffic lights lit up all over downtown. Here’s my attempt to get Chicago framed using those colors.

The Way to Really Fly.

The L

[Read more…]

My Chicago Soundtrack

I am a Chicago girl, born and bred. I love my all-beef Kosher hot dogs, had a Chicago Bulls three-peat T-shirt, sport a Jewel-Osco card in my wallet. Leaving the Windy City was a choice that almost never came to be, with a job offer on the table and plenty of young friends convincing me that my life was not in Spain.

But I chose to board the plane and to take my Chicago roots with me to Spain, preaching the Cubbie way of life and claiming that there are lakes the look like oceans in the middle of the Midwest. As Spain became more and more like home, I became increasingly proud of where my parents, grandparents and I come from.

Now that I’m back in Chicago for the month of August, every trip to the City of Broad Shoulders has my heart pumping out the songs that bring me back to the countless summers, bitter cold winter afternoons and rides along the rails of the L. Songs that remind me of seeing punk rock shows at the Metro, of childhood shopping trips on State, of what makes this city so damn great. Wikipedia lists over 400 songs about Chicago, and while “My Kind of Town” and “Sweet Home Chicago” would be obvious choices, mine are a little unexpected (and seriously throwback to my love of punk rock days. Lucky Boys Confusion, Fall Out Boy and The Dog and Everything CDs are still in my car!)

Kanye West – Homecoming

While I can’t say Kanye, like R. Kelly, is a favorite Chicago musician, this song echoes through my brain every time I fly in over Lake Michigan and the skyline, which stretches further than my window can hold.

Allister – Somewhere Down on Fullerton

Why I’ve never taken a madcap dash around Chicago like Allister does, this song was the first I ever crowdsurfed to at a show at House of Blues with my friend Amanda. It was her first visit to Chicago, just after our freshman year of college, and I remember the rush of feeling like I was going to get dropped while getting groped. I still have the shirt I bought that  night to commemorate a Chicago band playing to a Chicago crowd as only a great Chicago venue can allow.

Arranmore – Southside Irish

My family first came to America during the mass wave of immigration that gives America its heritage as the Land of the Free. Settling in Chicago, my Irish great-grandfather, who had owned a still-operational woolen mill in Foxford, County Mayo, worked as a tailor. I feel most proud of my Irish heritage, even though I’ve got Scottish, Welsh and German roots. As a kid, I participated in Irish parades around Chicagoland, so this Saint Paddy’s Day anthem reminds me of those mornings, the wind biting my pink cheeks, as we marched through the streets in the name of the Emerald Isle.

Aliotta Haynes Jeremiah – Lake Shore Drive

There have been countless times where I’ve speed down one of Chicago’s grandest avenues, Lake Shore Drive, as twilight was falling. Window open, wind on my face and the lights of the Loop in the rear-view mirror, those are the nights where summer is at its peak and I remember how fun being young is. This song, from the time when my parents were young, brings back summer memories of the Oak Street beach, drinks at Castaways and belting out whatever’s one the radio with girlfriends.

Alkaline Trio – I’m Dying Tomorrow 

I can’t say I remember who introduced me to the local band Alkaline Trio, but I love him for it. Among my favorites is “I’m Dying Tomorrow,” which ask the age-old question: Do I have any regrets?

The Loving Spoonful – Hot Town, Summer in the City

Now that I’ve made living in Spain a reality, I usually only get summers in Chicago. Fine by me, as the city is replete with festivals, concerts and events that play to its patchwork heritage – and one of the things I love best about it. What I love about this song is that it talks about the balance between night and day in Chicago, no unlike a summer in Seville: the days are long and scorching, while the nighttime relief is when everyone comes out to play. This city feels young.

Fall Out Boy – Chicago is So Two Years Ago

The first time I ever heard this song, I was packing up my dorm room freshman year to go home for the summer. “There’s a Light on in Chicago, and I know I should be home,” still rings true whenever I arrive home after a Spanish sojourn. Being able to come back to the place where I grew up helps keep me grounded when I’m away, knowing that there’s always a Portillo’s around the corner and that the Cubbies have still not won the World Series. Ahhh, home.

Hey, Chicago, whaddya say (Go, Cubs, Go was not in my list; too obvious)! What would be on your Chicago soundtrack? Leave me a message in the comments, or leave me a birthday note since I turn 27 today!

Seville Snapshots: Red line, Jackson station

My heart still thunders every time the L thunders past me. The whoosh throws me off-kilter as it heads south towards the Dan Ryan. People filter in and out, not even aware that we’re all clustered in this rank-smelling station on Jackson together.

The tiles are interesting to me, the worn steps as familiar to me as they were twenty years ago. We’d hop on the Blue Line at Cumberland and get off right in the Marshall Field’s basement to the minty smell of Frango samples, often on our way to shop on Michigan Avenue. I actually got lost one wintery afternoon while walking down the stairs of the Red Line on State, befriending a homeless woman named Magnolia as I waited for my mother to find me.

While Madrid’s metro is far superior, the L was the first public mass transit that I ever learned to use and the one I feel a kinship to. Tipsy rides up the Red to Wrigley, ringing around the Loop like Spiderman between the skyscrapers, disappearing into the underground stations and watching the light of a bright summer day get swallowed up as I descend.

Ok, so this isn’t a shot of Seville, but my life in consumed by a perfect summer in Chicago. It’s honestly my favorite city in this wide, wide world and a place I’m lucky enough to have my roots in. While I stuff my face full of Italian beef and free pop refills, I couldn’t resist testing out Camarón during my long afternoons catching up with friends. Maybe next week I’ll sneak a picture of Seville in, but If you’d like to contribute your photos from Spain and Seville, please send me an email at sunshineandsiestas @ gmail.com with your name, short description of the photo, and any bio or links directing you back to your own blog, Facebook page or twitter. There’s plenty more pictures of gorgeous Seville on Sunshine and Siesta’s new Facebook page!

But There’s a Light on in Chicago

And I know I should be home.

I discovered Fall Out Boy my freshman year of college when meeting another band put them on while cruising around the Chicago suburbs one night. I was drinking and loved the punk feel that night. Their song, Chicago is So Two Years Ago, was played on repeat the last week of my freshman year. I was burnt out from school and partying, ready for a little break and to once again become Nancy’s slave.

I mean, I worked two jobs and for my mother, but I was at home. I find this song creeping back into my consciousness as I countdown the days until preschool ends, camp begins, and I fly from Dublin to Chicago on August 1st.

It’s been officially 18 months and nine days since I was last on the North American continent. In that time I’ve gotten work papers, traveled to two more countries, directed a summer camp, technically became a blissful bride, met 154 small humans who have become my babies, seen friends off as they move back home. I’ve done a lot, and I’ve had fun. But I need America.

Jackie’s visit a few weeks ago brought things into perspective. Being first-generation American, she gets to hold on to her Mexicanness even in Chicago. Her complaints about the lack of spiciness in Spanish food proved that fact really quickly, and she pointed out a lot of oddities and annoyances about Spain and Spanish life that, well, I had kind of just gotten used to. I started thinking, maybe I’m over it, or maybe I just need a big dollop of America.

I am not-so-secretly making a bucketlist of things I need to do once back in America. These things include:

Drink a lot of margaritas. I miss them.

Wrigley Field.

Eat as many Chicago-style hot dogs as my stomach can hold. And sweet corn. Gah, Iowa.

Say goodbye to my dear doggy, Morgan, who at 16.5 years is still as stubborn as she was as a puppy.

Travel to Louisville to see my sister (and hopefully wear my ascot at Churchill Downs!).

Lots of dates with mom, lots of beers with dad.

Sit outside and not worry about the heat.

Watermelon.

Driving a car, even if it is Nancy’s van.

Ethnic food.

I don’t think home is calling me too strongly yet, but I need some air. I need a big hug from my mom, too. Mostly, I need to reassure myself that all of this is a good idea, that Spain is where I need to be, and that I want to be there, too. August 1st can’t come fast enough, that’s for sure, but I know the short amount of time back home will be all too fast.

One thing I will miss about Europe? They don’t tip.

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