We had a splendid weekend spending time with our friend Fiona, who is visiting all the way from Edinburgh, Scotland. Our time included an overnight in Champaign, Ill., where we joined friends to see Mavis Staples, who is carrying on the Staples Singers tradition with a joyous, infectious energy.

Our visiting friend got a crash course in the volatility of Midwestern weather as we drove home on Saturday afternoon. Vicious cross-gusts left overturned semis scattered in both directions and brought us to an hour-long dead stop on I-57. As we arrived in Chicago, there was blizzardy snow. And then, a couple hours later, sunshine, and then on Sunday, 60 degrees. Fiona has been a good sport.

First Church of Deliverance.

On Sunday morning, I dropped Beth and Fiona off at the First Church of Deliverance on South Wabash in the heart of the historic African American Bronzeville neighborhood. We befriended the choir director there years ago, and he made it clear we were welcome anytime. When we have out of town visitors who want to experience something uniquely Chicago that isn’t the top of a skyscraper or hot dogs, Beth likes to take them there.

That church is on the National Register of Historic places. Of course, it’s more than that. It’s a center of gravity. Beth has sought out these places wherever we’ve lived. There’s nothing like them. I’m not religious, but the power of righteousness is the power of righteousness, and when the gospel choir sings, it penetrates the soul. You float.

Bronzeville is still proud — there are magnificent historic stone homes as well as charming clapboards, and there are signs of renaissance. On the drive there, though, we were struck by the condition of the roads — bad. Just a million signs of benign neglect of public infrastructure, neglect, a history of housing segregation, local governmental ineptitude and corruption. And of course, of our collective messed up history.

As I pulled up to the curb, a well-dressed gentleman approached the car and greeted us. He escorted Beth and Fiona into the church, and I drove off. When Beth and Fiona returned, they talked of the typical experience at First Deliverance: Gracious, friendly, and welcoming to all comers. They also said that the sidewalk they took to catch the 29 bus home was so jagged it was hard to navigate. Good sidewalks, roads, enforcing care of abandoned lots, sound public schools — that’s basic stuff that everyone should expect from local government everywhere. Apart from the physical value, it says that the broader community and government cares enough to bother.

A clip from MLK’s last speech.

Yesterday was also the anniversary of Martin Luther King’s last speech — the “I’ve been to the mountaintop” one in which he seemed resigned to his imminent death.

That came soon enough, 48 years ago today. That speech is worth reading or listening to. I hope you will.

In the middle of an especially nutzoid presidential campaign it’s easy to get caught up in talk of top-down solutions. To be sure, what leaders do at that level matters. But perhaps it’s more about us pushing a boulder up a hill — which is exactly what Martin Luther King, Jr. was doing. He was there in Memphis, after all, to support striking garbage workers. Real change starts from the bottom up. The “leaders” will eventually follow if we make them.

DJ Mermaid weighs in on the candidates.

by DJ Mermaid

You have listened to CNN, read the newspaper and watched state primary coverage. You might want to hear someone else’s opinion, though. That is where I come in.

Being 9 — almost 10 — I can’t vote in any election. I do, however, have the right to say what I think about the politicians running for the presidency. I am trying to think of a good and bad thing about every candidate. I ask that you do not re-tweet this post — if you disagree with my views please say so politely in a comment here.

Since my name is DJ Mermaid all the candidates will be living things in the ocean. I am going to start with the Republican side:

• Donald Trump — Mr. Great White Shark. I seriously don’t agree with his views on anything. I believe that his policy to send out Mexican or Latino- Americans that are illegal lacks any logic if he wants to get re-elected or run again in 2020 (even though illegal people can’t vote now, when they get their citizenship they can).Same with deporting Muslims that want to settle a home in America. I don’t believe there is any logic in this action. Why? By kicking these people out, he is losing a MAJOR percent of votes. This is not logical or rational. He doesn’t know if they are good or bad but he still isn’t giving other people a chance to be Americans. DUMB!Trump though is the only one funding his campaign with his own millions of dollars. Sometimes I wonder if logic has been stamped out of us?

  Trump doesn’t have anything about people with disabilities on his website because he thinks anyone that’s different is strange.

• Ted Cruz — Sir Stingray. I think that Ted Cruz is a shining example of a Republican candidate. Why? Like Donald Trump (see above). (Cruz also wants to kick out illegal (he can only kick out illegal ones, he doesn’t have the right to do it otherwise) immigrants. A piece of DJM wisdom right here: never kick people out unless you are positive they are illegal. Ted Cruz does not have anything on his websites about people with disabilities or how he could help them.
• John Kasich — Sir Barnacle. This is maybe the most logical choice for the nomination. Why? Kasich doesn’t have such a fiery personality but still wants to do things like a Republican. He wants to balance the budget and eliminate taxes. He doesn’t seem to want to deport people right away. I don’t see anything addressing people with disabilities on his website and that is a concern.

 

The Democratic party might have a different view of things, so I am going to cover them next:

• Hillary Clinton — Madame Superb Starfish. I love this candidate and her views on everything from disability rights and upholding the Same Sex Marriage laws to defeating ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) and conquering global terrorism.She also has a history of helping people with disabilities and thinks we have equal rights no matter what our challenges are. She wants to create more job opportunities for people with disabilities and other minority groups. I stand by that view 100% with my head up high. I also agree with her views on same sex marriage. Let’s make America more equal!! Hillary also has a plan for defeating ISIS but it’s not through building a wall. HER plan is to secure government accounts so that ISIS can’t start an online war.I believe though that getting money from Wall Street is not the answer to funding a campaign. I am going to leave Hills to figure that one out!
• Bernie Sanders — Great Old Sea Turtle. Bernie really wants to make college education free which I think is O.K. because I want to get into Berkeley in California and having taxes pay for my education might help. I worry, though, that because we live in a Capitalism society, that education will devalue. Great Old Sea Turtle wants to increase educational and work opportunities for people with disabilities. He also wants to expand social security for people with disabilities.

I encourage you to look at the issues and decide which candidate is best for you

-DJ Mermaid

Michael Thornton in rehearsal for Richard III. Photo: Steppenwolf

The special tour for people who have visual impairments before Gift Theater’s production of Richard III at Steppenwolf’s Garage Theater last Sunday was one of the most well-thought-out audio touch tours I’ve been on – and I’ve been on a lot of them! Here’s how it went:

1. The play’s director Jennifer Thebus spoke to us about why she was drawn to the play, her decision to cast Michael Patrick Thornton in the lead, her decision to go minimalist with costumes and set design.
2. Mike Thornton, who plays the lead, joined in and started his part of the pre-game show talking about his high school English teacher, the man responsible for turning Mike on to Shakespeare. That teacher went on to get a Ph.D., and he’s the Shakespeare scholar who adapted Richard III for the production we’d be seeing later that afternoon.
3. Martin Wilde, the man who’d be sitting in the balcony describing scene changes, character entrances/exits and other movements into my headset during the performance, took two or three minutes to describe the simple set design. Preparing to audio describe the play took much longer – he’d already been at two live performances and had been given permission by the cast to videotape one as well to practice at home.
4. My friend Judy Roth had met me at Steppenwolf ahead of time to see (she can!) how these special tours work. She knows my Seeing Eye dog Whitney, so I took the dog’s harness off and handed Judy the leash to have both hands free to touch the few things on stage.
5. Evan Hatfield, the Director of Audience Experience at Steppenwolf, led me onto the stage, but with so few things up there, he added a bonus….
6. I got to feel some of the stuff on the prop table! The prop table is exactly what the name implies: props are carefully placed on this table offstage so actors can grab them efficiently on their way onstage. Aha! Something actors have in common with those of us who are blind: We like to keep important items in a particular spot so we can find them easily.
7. Actors (I counted — I think there were 14!) lined up on stage, and one by one they were asked the same set of questions by Evan. Height? Skin tone? Hair color? Any facial hair? Make any physical decisions to convey character, help tell your character’s story? Answers to that last question were intriguing. One had decided his character would have a slight limp, and the woman playing one of the princes had the same answer that the woman playing Lady Anne had –both were playing characters who were unsure of themselves, so they shifted their weight from one foot to the other to signify feeling off-balance. Actors weren’t asked to describe their costumes — we’d been told earlier they’d all be in simple outfits in shades of black and grey, and each would wear pearl earrings and a ruffled collar.
8. Each actor recited a line from the play so we’d recognize the voice later.
9. Actors involved in the final fight scene stayed on stage then to review the choreography. Touch tour participants are usually ushered out of the theatre for this, but staff members who were concerned about Whitney’s reaction to the violence during the actual show wanted us to stay and check it out. She passed the audition.
10. Cast members who love dogs came down to meet Whitney then, and I took her harness off so they could play with her. Pet therapy, both for Whit and for the actors!

I was not as lucky as Mike Thornton was in high school. My English teachers were not charismatic. None of them turned me on to Shakespeare. Sunday marked the first time I’d ever attended a live performance of a Shakespeare play.

I did a fair bit of research ahead of time. I read A Rose for the Crown, historical fiction set during the War of the Roses that led to Richard III’s coronation. I read the Richard III sections of A Theatergoers Guide to Shakespeare and Tales from Shakespeare, and even downloaded the play itself –although all I red there were the “explanatory notes.”

I read some reviews, too. The Chicago Tribune review of the Gift Theater production at Steppenwolf was helpful in explaining how Thornton, who uses a wheelchair, would also be using a walker and an exoskeleton device to portray King Richard. The exoskeleton is a state-of-the-art device called Rewalk. It was provided by the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, a sponsor of the production. When Mike was talking to us before the play, he was surprised he hadn’t heard much controversy over Gift’s decision to have him use a walker to stand up in order to seduce Lady Anne. Isn’t that blatant ablism?” he wondered. He credited the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago for providing the robotic exoskeleton he uses in the coronation scene and did his best to explain how he makes the exoskeleton work.

“Do you look scary when you cross the stage in it?” I asked. “Or powerful?” When he didn’t answer, I turned around to ask Martin ( the guy who’d be talking into our headsets). He didn’t hesitate to give his answer: “Powerful.”

The audio/touch tour had started two hours before the play. It was so stimulating that I wasn’t sure the play could live up to It.

It did.

The whole experience was so exhilarating, the dialogue so intense and dynamic, the stage so full of characters speaking in that unfamiliar, well, Shakespearian way, I guess, that by the time Act One was over, I was exhausted.

I left at intermission.

Let me be clear here. My leaving early had everything to do with my limitations, not the production’s. I routinely seek out plays with few characters and one act. That’s because, otherwise, it’s hard for me to keep up as well as I want to. And my previous experience with Shakespeare was nil — even in my sighted days, I’d struggled to understand the plays we were required to read in high school and college. All to say, given my history with a Shakespeare play? This Richard III production was a rousing success. It was my first, but not my last.

Gift Theatre’s production of Richard III runs through May 1 in Steppenwolf’s Garage Theatre, 1624 N. Halsted St. in Chicago, and Sunday’s matinee on April 3, 2016 features American Sign Language (ASL). Tickets available at 312.335.1650 and steppenwolf.org.

There I am lounging on the ruby red couch shaped like lips — Stella mentions it in her guest post.

Three cheers for the Chicago Cultural Accessibility Consortium! Thanks to the CCAC and the Contemporary Museum of Art Chicago, the Chicago History Museum, Gift Theater and Steppenwolf Theater I was able to take advantage of not just one, not two, but three different special audio touch tours for people who are blind or visually impaired last week. So many tours, so little time…I can’t write about them all!

Later this week I’ll be publishing a post about the sensational audio/touch tour I went to on Sunday afternoon before Richard III at Steppenwolf Theatre. Today, Stella De Genova, a blind blogger who was on the same Pop Art Design tour I took at Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago last Wednesday has generously offered to write a guest post for Safe & Sound from her point of, ahem, view. Stella was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa (RP) in childhood. RP is an eye disease where vision declines slowly over time, and even after being declared legally blind in her late twenties, she has continued to paint pastels using magnification under controlled lighting. You can see her work online at art by Stella DG.

by Stella De Genova

I have to be honest, I’m not a big contemporary art fan. I’ve only been to the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago (MCA) one other time with my son to visit the David Bowie exhibit. You don’t have to be a contemporary art aficionado to enjoy David!

My favorite art museum is the Art Institute of Chicago. I’ve wandered the galleries there since I was in high school. It’s hard for me to maneuver on my own now, but I still go there accompanied by my husband or a sighted guide, which the museum offers.

We immediately think of Andy Warhol’s Campbell Soup screenprints when we think of pop art, but as I found out on our MCA tour last week, there is so much more. Pop art and design evolved from the 1960’s and ‘70’s, possibly the most eruptive, empowering, fast-paced and far from mundane decades in our modern history. The art of this tumultuous era reflects its surprise, brilliance and lighter side.

Pop Artists took everyday objects and ideas and turned them into fun and functional art that in many cases, could be mass produced. Since it stems from commonplace objects and people that most of us are familiar with, it was an easy form for those of us with visual impairments to experience. Even the exhibit pieces we were not allowed to touch were easy to imagine, thanks to the colorful descriptions given by our tour director. Susan Musich, Programmer for Education and Interpretive Practices at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago led our tour and explained that the idea was to take minor form and turn it into major function. She described Warhol’s Jackie Kennedy, Chairman Mao and Campbell Soup prints. She also talked us through the concept of bringing the outside in with Warhol’s “cow’s head” wallpaper, a sculptured cactus coat hanger, lights that looked like rocks and the “Protone” sculptural lounge, made out of a bendable plastic-foam material that resembled huge blades of bright green grass.

We walked through an array of chairs and sofas that were shaped like feet, the top of a Greek column and a pair of vibrant red lips. We weren’t allowed to touch these actual art pieces but the MCA commissioned furniture makers to create facsimiles for patrons to touch, sit on and experience. I got to touch and sit on the chaise lounge that resembled the top of a Greek column. I know columns are made out of concrete or marble and so I expected the chair to be hard but instead, it was firm but soft – like a leather cushion. I got to sit on the sofa that was in the shape of a set of giant red lips, too. This had a nylon feel to it and was very soft and quite comfy.

Thanks to Blind Service Association for putting together this tour and thanks to MCA and our guide, who was not only respectful of our needs and wants but certainly made our day at the museum enlightening and fun. I may still lean more toward the traditional fine arts but this tour gave me a real respect and affection for pop art and design, and I dare say, I will be back to visit the MCA again.

When Beth and I saw Bonnie Raitt last week at the Chicago Theater, I looked around and had a laugh—it was all 55-65ish people like ourselves, grayer and more, ahem, prosperous-looking than when we all first listened to Bonnie decades ago. But something in the air felt the same (and it wasn’t pot smoke).

The warm-up band—the California Honeydrops—was fantastic. A rootsy mix of horns and great vocals and harmonies. And then Bonnie came out. She looked exactly as she’s always looked, which is to say cool, naturally sexy, and kinda tough in a good way. And she’s 66.

Sweet Home Chicago at the Kennedy Center tribute to Buddy Guy.

When she did a number from Luck of the Draw, Bonnie noted that the album had come out 25 years ago. Which just doesn’t seem right but it is, and that’s just how it is now. And I remembered Beth and I seeing her at the Assembly Hall in Champaign, Ill., back then in, gulp, 1991. Her then-husband Michael O’Keefe joined her on stage for a duet, which completely stoked the crowd. And I remembered running into our friends Karen and Jim, who extended their condolences—my father had recently died. I remembered how bewildering that all still was, and how much their kindness meant.

Back at the Chicago Theater: When Bonnie did a Sippie Wallace tune from her very first album (1971), I was reminded of my sister, when she brought home a new album from college during a holiday break. She and her dorm pals had discovered this cool girl singer named Bonnie Raitt who played a mean slide guitar. Kris played it for me, and I was hooked as a teenager, way back then. And I remembered how much good music my big sister introduced to me.

Then Bonnie did a song that was written by a member of NRBQ, a band that warmed up for her when I saw her with my friends Mike, Susie, and Pick at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C. back in the 80s. And I remembered all the good times we had back then, camping along Skyline Drive, and just sharing home-cooked meals.

She closed with this favorite. Perfect.

And during Bonnie’s final encore, well, I went into full teary-eyed nostalgia mode.

Pick and I go back to 1978. We met when I was a college student on a D.C. internship.

And I’ve known my friend Kenwood since we were freshmen in college—we became roommates as sophomores and have been fast friends ever since. Let’s say we have stories.

When I graduated from the University of Illinois in 1979, I was one of the lucky few who had a job waiting for me—in D.C. with the same organization where I’d interned. I was a green kid away from home, lonely, and living in an expensive place on a very modest salary. Pick took me under his wing—and his friendship helped keep me above water. We hung out together, and eventually, when he decided he wanted to save a few bucks by taking on a roommate, we moved into the euphemistically named “Country Club Towers” apartment building.

One thing, though: Only a couple weeks after we’d moved in, my old buddy Kenwood would be visiting. He was on the tail end of a months-long motorcycle journey. He’d been on the road, camping and rarely sleeping in a bed, and when he arrived, well, that’s how he looked.

He announced his presence by pulling his motorcycle onto our apartment’s first-floor patio. I wasn’t sure what the neighbors would think, but I was more concerned about how my new roommate would take it all.

Pick didn’t blink. Kenwood ended up staying a few weeks, and somehow, the Culpeper, Va.-born gay guy—and the Mossville, Ill., country boy with long hair and bug splatters—hit it off splendidly. They even sang some hymns they both knew from childhood churchgoing days. Who knew?

Over time, the three of us adopted a song from Bonnie’s Home Plate album called Sweet and Shiny Eyes. It’s a simple little tune written by Tom Waits that recalls a road trip with friends. Over the years, we’ve been known to sing this song and drink a toast to one another on our birthdays.

So yeah. Music is pretty damn amazing. If you’re keeping score, in a two-hour span in a theater in downtown Chicago, I was transported to my hometown when my sister was still alive and introducing me to cool stuff from college. To my college dorm room in a triple in Hopkins Hall. To Washington, D.C. where I met friends from exotic places like New York and North Carolina and Virginia. To our lives and friendships in Champaign-Urbana.

Thanks Bonnie.

And here’s to great music, and all my great friends.