CHANGES

My early years were spent in a housing project on Chicago's south side.  A concrete landscape dominated by tall crime-filled brick towers!  Anyone who's seen the tv show "Good Times" would get an idea of the surroundings: Gunshots every night! Rapes in the stairways because the elevators never worked; and the occasional body being carried out!  This was my grim reality, but things changed for the better!  My family was fortunate enough to get out in the 1970's:  Part of my family moved to a nice area on the south sid, and my nuclear family moved to the suburb of Harvey Illinois.

Harvey was the ideal little city, and I was in an excellent place on centrally located Vine St.  No more gunshots and the rest of it!  In Harvey you had nicely cared-for homes, lots of businesses --big and small-- and an overall wholesome community!  I quickly made friends while branching out to enjoy my new surroundings:  Little League Baseball; Comic Book Stores; Ice Cream City with the excellent submarine sandwiches; Safe Bike Riding; Anello's Pizza, Dixie Square Mall, and the little yellow igloo-shaped ice cream shop nearby where you could make your own sundaes; Jack N The Box, and a city full of actual GREEN GRASS!  There was just so much to do and take advantage of, and crime was no longer at the forefront of daily living!  I could actually breathe and grow...

On Vine I pretty much had the perfect situation!  A couple of blocks one way and I was at the YMCA, couple of blocks the other way and I was at the hospital!  Local doctors that were easy to get to -- no more trekking from the projects to a "safe street" where cabs would be willing to come!  I could go 1 block and I was on Harvey's main street, 154th, which led into downtown. ..The Harvey Theater, jewelry stores, banks, restaurants (L&G's), and Scott's 5&10 where I could actually  indulge in new "hobbies" like baseball card collecting.  My friends Parrish and Hiram would sometimes even jump on the bus with me, and we'd go to nearby Homewood to shop at the coin store to build our coin collections.  Life was wonderful in Harvey in general, and on Vine St. in particular.  Close to Jimmy the Greek's Store, David Berg's with the great chili dogs-pizza puffs-and New Orleans Hot Links, Jerry's Store with the excellent ham and cheese sandwiches, Alderman Drugs, Chicken Unlimited, Regal Drugs (where they had more baseball cards) and right at the corner of 154th & Vine eventually came the outstanding Holmes' Fishery.  Damn they had good perch and peach cobbler! Actually one of my last memories of Vine and Holmes' Fishery came years later, after the sun stopped shining on Harvey and the shadow of crime enveloped everything.

During the 1980's, my high school years, Harvey did a complete 180!  Businesses closed and street gangs and daily crime opened shop!  My friend Hiram and I were on our way home one night.  There was snow covering the streets as we came up on Holmes' Fishery.  Right when we got to 154th and Vine we saw 3 men standing across the street, near Major Motors auto store.  One of them started running in our direction, when one of the others pulled a gun and started shooting!  The running man got hit, and went down right across the street from us...but then he got up and kept running!  The shooter let off a few more shots, while Hiram and I did a 360.  We walked until we saw an opening, and then we took off down an alley like bats out of hell!  We were planning to get some peach cobbler that night, but the best laid plans of mice and men often go astray.  Changes...