Wow! I’m still all shook up, Dear Readers. This past Wednesday I had a brush with Mother Nature- and she plays hardball.
It all started out so innocently- with a lunch date at R.J. Grunts with Fred Nachman, an old friend from New Trier High School.
He is a serious amateur photographer whose work has appeared in several publications and on numerous websites.
Fred is also the author of There Used to Be a Synagogue Here: Former
Chicago Temples, a collection of 100 images from his almost 400 photographs of these buildings as well as commentary on their history and significance.
And he is an AMAZING sports photographer, as well. Take a look at this.
That’s PNC Park in Pittsburgh. Is that off the cover of Sports Illustrated or what?
We get together every so often so reminisce, talk about upcoming events and share sports stories.
And on this day, he had hopped a bus to Grunts and I had walked over there.
(Can you tell this photo is by Ellen Ross?)
I got there at noon. The wind was really picking up but I didn’t give it much thought.
Lunch was fun, the busboy bagged my leftovers and Fred and I said good-bye at the corner. He was headed downtown and I started my way up north.
I got a couple of blocks and then I knew I was in trouble. The wind had assumed gale-like proportions at the lakefront and I was in the epicenter.
I was being tossed around like a beachball and finally, out of sheer desperation, I grabbed on to a green mailbox and hung on for dear life.
The roar of the wind was that of a freight train. I was absolutely terrified to let go. I knew I would be blown into the street and hit by a car.
I clung there for about five minutes. A long time with branches whizzing by your head. Finally a guy walking a black and white Boxer mix fought his way over to me.
“Are you okay?” he shouted. “Do you need any help?”
“I’m okay,” I yelled back. “There’s nothing you can do.”
And there wasn’t. I thought I’d just gut it out.
Reluctantly he left me there. (The dog was reluctant too. He didn’t want to abandon my leftover hamburger that he had been sniffing the whole time.)
I waited for the wind to die down and made a break for it. I got exactly one short block and WHAM!
I was thrown to the ground with a body slam worthy of the WWE.
As I was sprawled out on the street, I saw a guy jump out of his cab of a semi truck. He looked really worried.
“Let me help you, ma’am,” he said.
And he lifted my up, and with his arm around my waist, he carefully walked me to the shelter of some buildings on Lakeview.
I was really dazed but I do remember that his red shirt said “Carl.”
So thanks, Carl. I needed that.
Carl’s truck was blocking traffic so he had to split. I was sore but nothing was broken (my lunch had broken my fall) so I thought I’d be able to make it back home.
Wrong.
At the next corner, the wind was so fierce that I grabbed onto to a stop sign and was blown off my feet.
How long I was on that thing, I have no idea. I do remember thinking that if the sign itself sheared off the top of that pole, I was going to end up like Jayne Mansfield.
Finally a cab turned the corner and saw me.
He slammed on his brakes and fighting the wind, he inched his way over to me.
By this time, I didn’t want to let go.
He gave me his arm and together we fought our way back to his cab. He wrestled open the door and gently deposited me inside.
“It’s dangerous out there!” he said. “You shouldn’t have been walking.”
He drove me home and then asked if I needed him to get out and take me into my building.
I didn’t, but I thanked him from the bottom of my heart. (With a tip to match.)
I got home just in time to find out the storm had shut down all the electrical power on my block. Everything was blown so that meant I was walking up to my apartment.
Thank goodness I live on the eleventh floor. (But I never live higher than I can walk.)
The power stayed off for the next three hours.
Which gave me plenty of time to think.
The Windy City? Make that “The Kindest City.”
And hey there, Donald Trump. Get this. The guy with the dog was Hispanic, Carl was black and the cab driver was Lebanese.
Here in Chicago, Good Samaritans come in all colors.
One last thing…
In my youth, I was in two productions of “The Wizard of Oz.” Once I played the Scarecrow. (Typecasting because I was skinny.) And once I was the Wicked Witch of the West. (Typecasting because…?)
Much to my chagrin, I never got to play Dorothy.
Until now.
Ellen, I was blown away by your story. Aren’t you glad you survived so that you could write about it? Hope you’ll be able to nurse your remaining wounds, physical and otherwise, and continue to enlighten your readership on the Wizard of Oz, Jayne Mansfield, Hulk Hogan, Donald Drumpf, etc., etc.
To your friend, Fred, awesome picture of PNC Stadium. More than ten years ago, my family went on a road trip during which we hit four or five stadia over the same number of days. After driving much of the day, we were running late that particular evening (it was dusk), so we dropped off our teenagers before parking. Thus, we were still looking for our seats when Barry Bonds, then in his steroid-enhanced prime, hit a monstrous double that just missed leaving the ballpark and landing in one of the three rivers (not sure which one). It was the only pitch he saw that entire evening that was even remotely in the strike zone.
Finally, it would be out of character for me to not call attention to the Supreme Effort some friends of mine made to create a timely bipartisan political crossword puzzle. Emphasis on timely and bipartisan, to counteract the many cross words that we’ve been hearing this season. Hope you’ll give it the Ross stamp of approval in your response.
Thanks for the get well card, George. I’m on the mend but I probably need some of those Barry Bond-approved steroids to play through the shoulder pain.
As to the new across the aisle crossword effort, it has gone through my approval process and I’m just waiting for my clerk to write up my decision. Ellen Bader Ginsberg
Wow, what an ordeal- Dylanesque! Glad you’re ok!
Thanks, Gary. And you’re so right. You don’t have to be a weatherman to know which way the wind blows. An Artist who don’t look back.
Will the wind ever remember
The names it has blown in the past?
Thanks for the plug. The PNC Park photo was taken on June 15, 2015, the night the Hawks clinched the Stanley Cup. We, however, were watching the White Sox on the way to an 11-0 trouncing by the Pirates. We left during the 5th inning.
Your question is a good one, Fred. It won’t remember our names but I’ll call it Maria. Glad you took the bus home. The world can’t afford to lose anyone as talented as you. What an eye. Thanks for gussying up this- and other- posts.
Hang on Sloopy
CYa next Tues
Looking forward to it. Keep studying!