Recently we spent a few days in Chicago visiting my son and his great family. Here's a photo with Luke, one of their 3 kids. He has a few disabilities but thankfully great parents and siblings who are helping him reach his maximum potential. He is truly lovable and making steady progress.
The photo was taken at the Chicago Conservatory, a spectacular botanical collection housed in a gargantuan greenhouse. Well worth seeing when visiting Chicago.
Unfortunately this great city is having it problems. While we were there the major media focus was on a black teenager killed by the police. What wasn't being mentioned, but what all the residents know about, is the deteriorating financial situation and the horrific violent crime going on in the south and west sides. My kids tell me that no one would intentionally drive on any side street in any of these neighborhoods, even in the daytime with the doors and windows locked.
Deterioration is what seems to be happening in most of the big cities in the Northeast and Midwest. A few years back we tried to travel down memory lane when we were in Philly, where I went to med school. We tried to go to the student apartment building where we lived, which was in the ghetto, but not very dangerous. Emily walked the streets, in the daytime at least, without fear. The neighborhood was now so obviously hazardous that we did not dare to go to our destination.
President Johnson's war on poverty, started over 50 years ago, does not seem to have succeeded very well.
The photo was taken at the Chicago Conservatory, a spectacular botanical collection housed in a gargantuan greenhouse. Well worth seeing when visiting Chicago.
Unfortunately this great city is having it problems. While we were there the major media focus was on a black teenager killed by the police. What wasn't being mentioned, but what all the residents know about, is the deteriorating financial situation and the horrific violent crime going on in the south and west sides. My kids tell me that no one would intentionally drive on any side street in any of these neighborhoods, even in the daytime with the doors and windows locked.
Deterioration is what seems to be happening in most of the big cities in the Northeast and Midwest. A few years back we tried to travel down memory lane when we were in Philly, where I went to med school. We tried to go to the student apartment building where we lived, which was in the ghetto, but not very dangerous. Emily walked the streets, in the daytime at least, without fear. The neighborhood was now so obviously hazardous that we did not dare to go to our destination.
President Johnson's war on poverty, started over 50 years ago, does not seem to have succeeded very well.
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