The “Desperate Housewives” aren’t the only ones wreaking havoc in the suburbs.
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I, too, have been a ‘Burbanite for the past month while living in Oak Park with my cousin Nora and her family.
Note: Some may contend that Oak Park is not a true suburb because the “L” goes there and it doesn’t have that catatonic quality many other suburbs share. I’m not going to argue with you. Since I’ve only lived here for two years and I don’t have a car, the only other non-urban experience I’ve had in the greater Chicago area is a couple of field trips to IKEA in Schaumburg.
Regardless, I did spend the last four weeks revisiting that precollege era where parents drive you and your pals to the mall.
Let me just tell you: I’ve been thinking of myself as this hip young professional living a fabulous urban life with no interest in family or settling down. Shockingly enough, I totally dug the Oak Park lifestyle.
Dare I admit it, but I could actually see myself enjoying this suburban existence at some point in the not-so-distant future.
I moved back downtown over the weekend, but already I miss being in a house. Unlike the apartments I’ve been living in since college, there were so many rooms that I could just walk through and put things in.
I always woke up on time there, too, because somehow knowing that everyone else in the house was getting ready to go to work or school inspired me to not be such a snooze-button bum.
Most surprising was how much I loved hanging out with Nora’s kids. I’ve always loved them, but being around to see some of their triumphs and heartbreaks was very rewarding.
I even saw myself adopting some protective instincts toward them. Sometimes in a retroactive way that is a true testament to how far I’ve come in the catty-girl department since my own junior high days.
When one of the girls in my 12-year-old cousin Charlotte’s 7th-grade class didn’t invite her to a slumber party, I found myself yelling about what an evil snob this girl was and plotting how Charlotte and I could do something cooler than the sleepover. And if I had seen this junior high diva who excluded my cousin, I would’ve busted out all the insults from my list of disses I learned from Lindsay Lohan and Hilary Duff.
I also fit right along with all the Starbucks-toting zealous parents in the stands at one of my 9-year-old cousin Judd’s basketball games. Every time he scored I got a kick out of telling all the people sitting by me that Judd was the best player on the team.
Probably the most inspiring thing I saw, though, was watching Nora and her husband Art retain their own personalities amid their responsibilities to their kids and jobs.
They are the consummate hipster couple. They always have dinner reservations at Avec or Japonais. Nora puts the wine-connoisseur guy in “Sideways” to shame with her cellar full of reds and whites. Art always has sage advice about understanding men–i.e. reassuring me that it’s OK for 30-year-old men to be obsessed with fantasy football. (Shoot, the day after my birthday party last year, they called me to see which of my guests had hooked up. These people are not your typical mom and dad.)
It wasn’t perfect. They had arguments. They did like 5,000 loads of laundry. Some days all they did was work, run errands, cart the kids around, help with homework and pass out from exhaustion.
But watching all four of them made me realize that it might not be the end of the world to eventually trade in my solo, urban chic life for the love and support that families have.
I don’t think I’ll be taking up permanent residence in the suburbs any time soon, but it is nice to know that if I do wind up in the land of chain restaurants and soccer games, that I can hold my own.
And maybe–just maybe–I’d like it.
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