Here’s the most Chicago thing I’ve ever seen: I was driving down Lake Shore Drive, traffic at a near standstill, and in the lane next to mine, a truck was trying to steamroll a small car in front of it: riding its bumper, slamming the horn—general dick moves. I could see the truck driver’s face. He was angry, yelling. I couldn’t hear what he was saying, but it’s fair to assume it was not nice. What did he want the smaller car to do? What did he think his honking, his middle finger, his rage would accomplish? Finally, the woman in the car had enough. Smack-dab in the thick of the clogged four-lane expressway, she turned off her engine and got out, closing the driver’s-side door behind her. Slowly she lit a cigarette and leaned back in the sunshine, puffing luxuriously while cars inched past and the guy in the truck lost his mind, laying on the horn and gunning his engine. She turned to him with a big, dazzling smile—and waved.
I’m thinking about what it means to be nice, midwestern or otherwise. When do we learn it, what does it look like, what, more specifically, are the policies that help people not only breathe easier but breathe, period?
