(Please note.. this was going to be an essay... but has turned into Chapter 1. Taking a break now)
It was our first time of living together, and having our own place, and living in the big city of Chicago. We both worked downtown for the last year, and were tired of the commute. So we started scoping out neighborhoods, and apartments that we could afford.
We spent a week printing out the apartment listings we could find on the Chicago Reader's website (Which was at it's web infancy at that point, but was the city's quintescential website for finding apartments.) We then spent a day calling all the apartment landlords to get more information of each apartment and set up viewings. We learned very early in the process, to cut off the landlord's spiel, and say "We have a big dog." This cut our list of opportune apartments by about 50%, and saved a huge amount of time on the phone.
We trimmed our list down to about 8 apartments we wanted to view. They were all on the North Side, which we had already predetermined to focus our search on, for the public transportation options.
Having never done this before, we both agreed "We're not going to take the first place we see." (Both Jim and I are kind of implusive, and if you ask our friends that, they will probably respond with "Uh... KIND OF?!?!?")
So, our first viewing was a 3 bedroom apartment on the 4400 block of Dover, advertised for $850, with a parking spot available at an additional charge. We drove down, found easy parking, and went and met the landlord out side the nice stone 6 flat. He was a funny older gentleman, who explained to us that he used to be an English professor, and was giving us a history of the building...
Upon walking up to the building, I noticed that the building next door was under construction, as there was a number of about 10 to 15 construction / cleanup workers hanging out in front of the building.
The landlord opened the door into this gorgeous building, and then pointed out the security doors / buzzer / mailboxes, and then knocked on the door of the first floor apartment.
A woman on the phone answered the door, and swung the door wide open, paying no attention to us at all, and then walked back into the main room.
The landlord then explained to us that the current tenants weren't leaving on good terms, so just to ignore them. That definitely set the mood for the tour of the apartment.
It wasn't a true 3 bedroom apartment, but rather, a 2 bedroom, with a 1/2 bedroom that would make a good office / den. (Which was inviting to both of us, since we had decided that I would need an office for my computer equipment.)
The bathroom was kind of run down, with an old style tub, and a makeshift shower head manually attached. But the place was BIG. I can't honestly say how many square feet, but it was large.
The odd gentleman then showed us the kitchen, and the back bedroom, and took us to the basement to show us where the storage lockers were.
Walking into the basement, both Jim and I felt like we were walking into the basement where Buffalo Bill kept his victims in Silience of the Lambs, which was kind of cool for both of us.
However, I digress....
The landlord, then handed us the application to fill out, and pulled us aside once we were away from the building, and assured us that "Don't worry about a credit check, I'm only going to call your employers to make sure you have jobs that you say you do. Also, if you want to agree today to the apartment, I'm willing to knock $100 off the rent, and give you the parking space for free. "
We both raised our eyebrows, and I asked him why he would be willing to lose money on us?
He then informed us that he would rather rent to two gay men living together, than any other combination of people, because we tend to complain less about things, and take care of them ourselves.
Jim and I thanked him, and told him that we would be back in touch by the end of the day, as we still had other appointments to keep. (Not to mention that we both agreed not to take the first place we saw)
We then spent the rest of the afternoon, driving around the northside, as far up to Evanston, with a couple stops in Roger's park.
The places were nothing near as large as the apartment on Dover, and all more expensive. None of them included parking, or even had it available.
Two of the places, we drove by and blew off completely judging from the neighborhood, or building alone. There was no way were were going to move into a high-rise, or a building directly on a busy venue like Ashland.... etc.
(Sidenote: It was amazing to see that out of the apartments we did decide to walkthrough, 100% of them were currently occupied by gay men. Which we found to be really funny, since we weren't really near boystown much at all.)
After we viewed the last place on our list. Jim and I stopped in a bar to have a beer and talk about every place we saw.
It became instantly clear.... The first place was the best place, and only place we liked.
We called the landlord, and told him we would take it, he told us to fill out the application, and meet him back there in an hour.
We filled out the form at the bar, drove back to Dover, and handed it to him, he said he would contact us in a day, to confirm everything checked out, but reassurred us, as long as we weren't lying about our jobs, it would all be good.
That's when I noticed that the construction workers were still on break outside of the building next door, some 4 hours later. I mentioned it to Jim. He laughed and said something to the point of, "I noticed them to... they aren't construction workers.... they live there"
"Oh...." was my initial response.
We walked back to the car, and got in. I don't remember who mentioned it first. But one of us said "Maybe we should hang down here for a few hours, and come back and check the neighborhood out around 11:00 at night?"
We both agreed it was a good idea.
We drove around, killing time, grabbing some dinner and a beer or two, until 11:00 hit, then drove back by. Luckily, the neighborhood didn't change much. It wasn't perfect, but it wasn't unsafe.
We felt confident in our decision, because this was by far the coolest, and largest place we could get for the money, and by no means, in the worst neighborhood we visited.
(I'm now realizing I just spent WAY too long talking about that... so let's flash forward with some key points...)
- We move in
- We love the apartment
- We love living together
- We realize the construction workers next door, do indeeed live there, with about 40 others.
- We realize that we should have waited until about 3:00 AM to do our driveby of the place.
I will never, ever, ever, regret moving into that apartment. It was perfect for us.
The neighbors in the building was great, the neighborhood was great, the rent was GREAT! We had a parking spot. (Which we used all the time, because we both became hooked on public transportation).
The block of 4400 N Dover at that point was an incredible experience. There were Blacks, White's, Hispanics, Chinese, Vietnamese, Koreans, Irish, Germans, Jews, Catholics, BBQ'ers, Vegan's, Doglover's, Catlover's, Young / Old, all living on the same block, in the nearest harmony you could ever ask for.
For me, as a 26 year old gay white male from the heartland of suburbia white bread america... I found it to be thrilling.
The rest of the neighborhood was still a little rough around the edges. However I never felt scared.
Don't get me wrong, there were plenty of times that I would cross the street to avoid a crowd of people screaming at each other outside the stores on Montrose. I also learned, during a panicked walk home down Wilson, that I would never walk by the Wooden Nickel after sundown.
These are the things you learn in the city. Be aware of your surroundings.
It wasn't unusal to hear a gunshot in the distance every now or then, or to have a police helicopter shine it's light across your window as they are checking out the activities at the school playground across the street, or possibly looking for a suspect running thru the graceland cemetery.
I fell in love with living in the City. Something that you never would have told me was possible years before this.
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