GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #471: ANOTHER ONE GONE

I live near the viaduct between Elmhurst and Berkley. I've mentioned that before, but I've noticed a lot of activity in the area of late. Construction workers doing their thing. Judging from the similar activity at the viaduct on Butterfield Road, I figure they're adding lanes to the interstate. One day while driving home I saw they cleared out the wild area where the residences stop. You know, the area where we all flung our dogshit when I was a kid.

It's a shame that's going away. I always kind of liked that giant valley between the interstate and the homes. It also sucks for the wildlife. I can't tell you how many times I've seen deer and coyotes shuffling along back there. It's how they travel from town to town without actually getting onto the interstate. Other animals are back there, too, and I can only assume their homes are going to be taken away.

It should be mentioned that Icky Sticky Poo Land was a part of this unofficial wildlife trail. It seems that progress and civilization exists solely to eat up the land I loved as a kid. "You can never go home." I guess that's true. It's a bit hard for me to see it since I've lived in Elmhurst my entire life. It's like looking in the mirror. You can barely tell you're getting older. You know it intellectually, but you have very little evidence of it until your hair starts going gray. But run into someone who hasn't seen you in 20 years? They know exactly how much you've really aged.

People who left Elmhurst and came back twenty years later? They wouldn't even recognize it. It's kind of weird to think about, but I'm not going to go too heavily into it because I think I'm going to talk more about it when I hit GF #475. It's been a while since I mentioned Gramps, and he'll figure into it then.

Shit. I guess they're going to have to knock down those giant walls on the interstate to add lanes. It'll be like the old days. For a while, anyway.