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Leaving the Cocoon

Before the Blue House, there was the cocoon.

In February of 2010, I signed a lease for a 2 bedroom apartment in a vintage Lincoln Square 2-flat.  After a decade of marriage, and an additional three years of kidding ourselves, I was leaving our cozy, single family home in Northcenter and moving north into single-dad, rental solitude where I would stay for 8 years, until I was ready for the blue house.

This isn’t the post where I delve into the marriage and  dissect how it went wrong. This is the post where I talk about the role that this apartment played in my transition.  In 2010 I was disoriented.  Still technically married, I was unsure how to navigate the new waters of parenthood and child support and being single.  I was sad and angry and in debt.  I needed a shelter – a place for my daughters and I to be safe and figure out how to re-construct my life as I became technically un-married. This apartment was my cocoon.

When I moved into the apartment in 2010, I approached it like a homeowner.  I had been rehabbing our old house for the last 11 years, and I still approached my living space as something I could change and build myself.  I hung curtains and, over time, switched out electrical and plumbing fixtures.  The very first thing I did – even before I bought furniture – was change out the light switch cover in the girls’ shared bedroom. The whole apartment was pretty austere at the beginning: dark hardwood and cold flourescent fixtures.  I switched out the light switch plate to try (in some small way) to make their room more theirs.  It was subtle, and probably more of a subconscious clue, but it was a start.

After I had been there a few years I started hanging the art wall – a scotch-taped menagerie of my daughters’ elementary school artwork. I also started hanging family portraits everywhere. I was starting to assert my identity as someone other than the husband.

This apartment was more than a home to me, it was more like a hideout. A place where I could get shelter, and avoid the social entanglements that came with being a full-fledged, home owning, member of society. I transformed pretty dramatically inside this cocoon. Physically, I lost 40 lbs – I quit drinking for a year and took up swimming. Later, when I had lost enough weight, I switched to running. Eventually that would take me to the Chicago marathon.  I dug myself out of debt, and started on the road to the blue house.

To become a butterfly, a caterpillar first digests itself. But certain groups of cells survive, turning the soup into eyes, wings, antennae and other adult structures 

-Scientific American

So… I’m not sure if I digested myself, but there’s not much left of the caterpillar I once was.  What’s interesting is this: the cells that turn into wings, antennae and eyes were all there in the caterpillar’s body when he entered the cocoon.  But he just couldn’t use them until he had almost destroyed himself completely in the safety of the cocoon.

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Piano that makes you brilliant

This piano was the hardest
possession to sell –
I’m not sure if I made the right decision

This is a Cable console / upright piano that has literally played every feeling I’ve had for 20 years.  I’ve confirmed it can make these noises: joyful, angry, melancholy, exuberant, tearful, giddy, morose, off-kilter, curious, scared, in love, and broken-hearted.  It is especially good for procrastinating when you’re supposed to be doing something with your life instead of playing that damn piano all day.  It’s yours for $100 or best offer if you hire actual movers and promise to use it. -craigslist ad 

I sold my piano for nothing.  This is only fitting, since I got it for free.  The condition was that the new owner would hire professional movers, and that they would encourage their kids to play it all the time.  Those were the same conditions I was given.

I originally came by this piano via a work colleague, Karen F., who had owned it for years and was moving to a smaller home with her new husband.  Her kids had learned to play on it, and she had a sentimental attachment to it.  I was recently married, and planning to have children, so she let me take it for free, as long as I didn’t screw it up and let my kids play it.

This piano was really a part of me – it was always central to my home.  First in my house on Leavitt,it was right at the base of the stairs, and I could fill the house with it.  My daughters would bang on it, scribble on the sheet music, and sit on my lap while I played.

Later in my apartment on Bell, it was my companion through the first years post-divorce.  I didn’t get it immediately when I moved into the apartment.  I had been there almost a year before we had it moved from our house to my apartment.  After we sold the house, my ex-wife had no use for it and – I think – allowed me to have it as an act of compassion.  When I got it, it was like an old friend had moved in with me.  We’d spend many nights sharing a drink (or three) playing through the real book, and Mozart, and Beethoven.
When I re-met the Fabies (that’s a different story), I started writing music on the piano.  It was a new type of music for me to write.  I wrote dozens of tunes on that old piano – slightly out of tune and creaky by now.  We recorded and played those songs, and they sustained my through the first years of my new single-ness.    I didn’t realize it at the time, but the piano became something of an extension of my subconscious.  I’d play “All of me” or “Witchcraft” when I was happy in the afternoon and the sun was shining, and when I was dark and pensive in the evening (after a drink or two) I’d play “Stella” or “Chelsea Bridge”.

I decided to sell it instead of making it fit in the new house after a lot of thinking.  On the one hand, this piano was a piece of my life story.  It was a drinking buddy and a writing partner.   It was there for me whenever I needed it.  I knew to avoid the Bb below middle C because it didn’t sound right.  I knew that the pedals were squeaky.  I kept the lid open, and the bench pulled out so that I could always sit down and play.

On the other hand, I was leaving.  I was exiting the cocoon.  This home I huddled in for some 8 years was going to be empty and I was leaving it for the new energy of the blue house.  I could force the piano to fit – to align to the new energy of the place – or I could cut it loose.  Leaving the last vestige of my old home behind.

My inspiration came from “Toy Story 3”  – the saddest of all the Toy Stories.  It was time to move on from the piano and let it serve another family.  I had kept my promise to Karen F.  My daughter had learned to play “Minuet in G” on that piano.  After she memorized it, she played it on an infinite loop to torture me.  It’s a beautiful tune, but after the trillionth time, it wears on you. I posted it for sale for $100 or best offer, knowing I’d find a parent with small children and give it away for free.

So here’s the best song I wrote on that piano (out of all of them).  It’s called, fittingly, “Home”.

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Downsizing and the theory of relativity

Kallax cubes are perfect for putting things in.
IKEA KALLAX cubes.
My favorite of all the cubes.

It’s funny.  You’d think that moving from a 1000 square foot apartment to a 1000 square foot home wouldn’t be difficult, but then you’d be wrong.

This house is tiny and meticulous.  I’m shedding skin and shedding possessions.  If you are the kind of person that romanticizes tiny houses, or feels like we all need to be a “little more Zen”, I’d like you to meet the reality of my life.

Those of you who know me, know that I’m a musician.  I play piano, bass, guitar, and trumpet.  I have gear.  I have amps.  I have a giant upright bass that takes up about six square feet of floor space and stands about six feet tall. I have sheet music and files.

The long and short of it is that there’s no room.  I can’t have the house with the “flow” and the “energy” and also keep my stuff.  It’s almost like the theory of relativity applies to stuff… energy and matter are related.  You can convert matter to energy by selling your stuff.  Less matter – more energy.

I sold my couch (more on that later), my desk, my dining room table, and a coffee table.  The only furniture I moved to the new house were beds, my kitchen table, and a bunch of those awesome IKEA Kallax cubes.

Selling the piano was the hardest – I’ll talk about that later.  But for the most part, selling was a liberation for me.  Each possession was a reminder of a part of my life that led to now.  My ex-wife picked out my dining room table, and it was a scarred, damaged relic of a failed attempt at a “normal” family home.

I sold “Oaky” the table to an artist in Logan Square for $73 (she was supposed to pay $75 but she didn’t have it on her).  My craigslist ad read like this:

“Oaky” the big dining room table.

This table is big (76″ x 42″) and solid.  It is the kind of table at which you eat stew.  Not a watery, soupy stew but the big thick stew that has potatoes and carrots in it.  This table is also good for making art.  Not the little ninny coloring book kind of art, but the huge-ass, giant, messy art where you climb on the table and you get paint under your fingernails.  It’s got some scuffs and paint stains but each of those is a badge of artistic heroism.  This table has seen some stuff, man.  If it had a name, it would be Butch or Shane or Tex.  It’s a survivor.  $100 or best offer.

Unloading stuff was fun – so far I value the energy more than the matter.

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The weirdest blue house in Lincoln Square

This is the story of how I came to be the owner of the weirdest house in Lincoln Square.  I’ve lived in the city of Chicago since I was 17.  I’ve lived in this neighborhood since 2000, and I can’t think of anywhere else that I could call home. 
I bought this house on July 14th and it is a pretty big life transformation for me.  Or rather, it’s the next step in a series of transformations.  It’s a pretty expensive step, I’d say.
This will be a blog about the house, but it’s not really about the house.  The house is where I keep my life, and my life is full of people and music and other things.  So if you are interested in people and music and other things, go ahead and check in frequently.