illinois kinkazoid hello i live in illinois does anyone else live in illinois? let me know if you do cuz i always wondered where most of you are from. 010617 ... aeon flux i live in illinois, sadly. 011021 ... Dafremen Let's not even GO THERE people. 011022 ... blue birdmad trading the caddy for a mic illinois_nazis 011022 ... . : * p s y b o r g * : . The s is silent gawddamn it!! 011101 ... dreamy stars illinois is not so bad 040222 ... her royal highness the quirk i was born in illinois. decatur to be exact. but now i hail from north carolina. big change. 040222 ... misstree it's amazing how this state can grow on you. with chicago as its crown, thinking itself so ubiquitous, but once you get down to central or southern illinois, it's just another place like indianapolis or st_louis... a big city to take a day trip to, somewhat removed from your world... i have long theorized that midwesterners are the way that they are because they are largely farming stock, and because they endure the hot hot summers and the bitter cold winters, and what would be the use of railing against it? and, though we may be the flatlanders, i have seen so much beauty and variation in this state... the sanstone cliffs of starved rock... the gullies and gorges to be found everywhere... forests so untouched, you wonder how anyone made it across the state through them... vast fields of prarie grasses and the delicate fireworks of wildflowers, and the stands of trees like gathered sentinels... and the wildlife is no less varied... bursts of birds of every color... more than once i have seen red foxes in the wild, and occasionally coyotes, and enough deer to stock a royal hunting ground to be found in any forest preserve... and that's not to mention the vast rippled rows of tilled fields, the most telling of the yearly cycle... in the spring they are boundless potential, are they the ubiquitous corn, or soybeans, or any of three dozen other breadbasket beauties? cows graze the uneven lands, where tractors find little love, and half-derelict barns are enough to catch the eye and imagination as they pass... yep. illinois has grown on me. now, it's time to get the funk outta here. 040223 ... RedDragon You've got to be a professional writer...or paste-r. You can't get more perfect than that description of IL. 040223 ... misstree aw shucks... not a professional writer, though i did get paid for reciting poetry once (though that's another_story)... it's just me and words, we got this thing for eachother... and me and this state, though i don't often really rave about it... i've grown up in this state, only left it for a few months, always been a camping nut, and i honestly do think it's gorgeous... though i would expect, or at least hope, that any other could have the same enthusiasm about their own home... and midwesterners are a special folk, close to my heart... people say "hicks" and i think of all the rural dwellers that import themselves to this little island for a job or a drink, but cherish their peaceful homes, not minding the drive... i tell ya, in the chicago suburbs, if you drive a half hour, you've gotten nowhere... here, you're a world away from civilization... and don't get me started on the islands in the corn, kankakee and decatur and springfield and shampoo-banana and the quad cities if you want to get almost foreign with it, and bloomington-normal... and that's just central illinois... each of these little communities has their own size and flavor, and each puffs itself up a little bit, thinking themselves the supplier of culture for all the tiny towns that surround it, but just in case it forgets, there's always the seas of corn waving placid to remind it who really runs the state... but in these smaller cities, the word "community" still means something, the smaller the town the harder to get lost in it... dangit, you got me tangenting again... humble and sincere thanks for the compliment, even the little bit of backhandedness brought a smile... and my pleasure to be able to share a bit of chest-swelling about this ostensibly nondescript state with someone whom i assume to be another resident? regardless, sumup, veryglad you liked it. *grin* 040223 ... silentbob i live in iowa 040224 ... her royal highness the quirk misstree, i do believe you've hit it on the nail. i haven't been back to illinois for nine years, but reading that made me want to return. i'm not sure if i want to return just for the sake of being there again, or if it's longing for a less complicated life. one of these days i'm going to go back and visit... go look in on Johns Hill, look up Jenna, go back to Veech Ln and that silly green house I used to live in. 040228 ... rain i miss champaign, illinois. i'm in california now. though, i know that once you leave someplace for long enough, it's never the same when you go back... 040309 ... white_wave i'm in california too. where are ya at? 040309 ... silentbob i'm sending a burning lovesong there 040310 ... emem just me in a little illinois city. although i hear from others that rockford is big. i'm not sure about that one. we are close to chicago, maybe too close. the "government officials" of this city, i think, design everything in this place to be like our neighbor chicago. i mean nothing wrong with chicago, but why would we want to be like them? we ain't chicago, rockford! anyway.. thought this would be somewhat interesting.. feel free to correct me if i'm wrong oh am i the first one to blathe about illinois this year? cool if i am .... i guess 050113 ... emem oh yeah i find it quite entertaining that the illinois nazis drove a pinto. 050113 ... silentbob Artist: Sufjan Stevens Album: Illinois Year: 2005 Title: Come On! Feel The Illinoise!: The World's Columbian Exposition / Carl Sandburg Visits Me In A Dream Print Correct Oh great intentions I've got the best of interventions But when the ads come I think about it now In my infliction Entrepreneurial conditions Take us to glory I think about it now Cannot conversations cull united nations? If you got the patience, celebrate the ancients Cannot all creation call it celebration? Or united nation. Put it to your head. Oh great white city I've got the adequate committee Where have your walls gone? I think about it now Chicago, in fashion, the soft drinks, expansion Oh Columbia! From Paris, incentive, like Cream of Wheat invented, The Ferris Wheel! Oh great intentions Covenant with the imitation Have you no conscience? I think about it now Oh God of Progress Have you degraded or forgot us? Where have your laws gone? I think about it now Ancient hieroglyphic or the South Pacific Typically terrific, busy and prolific Classical devotion, architect promotion Lacking in emotion. Think about it now. Chicago, the New Age, but what would Frank Lloyd Wright say? Oh Columbia! Amusement or treasure, these optimistic pleasures Like the Ferris Wheel! Cannot conversations cull united nations? If you got the patience, celebrate the ancients Columbia! I cried myself to sleep last night And the ghost of Carl, he approached my window I was hypnotized, I was asked To improvise On the attitude, the regret Of a thousand centuries of death Even with the heart of terror and the superstitious wearer I am riding all alone I am writing all alone Even in my best condition, counting all the superstition I am riding all alone I am running all alone And we laughed at the beatitudes of a thousand lines We were asked at the attitudes They reminded us of death Even with the rest belated, everything is antiquated Are you writing from the heart? Are you writing from the heart? Even in his heart the Devil has to know the water level Are you writing from the heart? Are you writing from the heart? And I cried myself to sleep last night For the Earth, and materials, they may sound just right to me Even with the rest belated, everything is antiquated Are you writing from the heart? Are you writing from the heart? Even in his heart the Devil has to know the water level Are you writing from the heart? Are you writing from the heart? 050929 ... emem pinto 061125 ... silentbob do i live in illinois or do i live in chicago? technically both, though it doesn't feel that way. 090609 ... unhinged yeah, chicago isn't really illinois. it's like it's own island or something. 090609 ... amy part of that there urban_archipelego. i would be a not-quite marine species, comparatively speaking. 090609 what's it to you? who go blather from