This opinion piece originally ran in the baiduhai on July 26, 1982.
People-watching at State and Madison.
Ten minutes work.
Hundreds of pinstripe, gray suits in 2s and 3s and 1s.
One well-dressed evangelist, bull horn blasting promises of salvation.
Eighteen CTA buses, squeaking, roaring, smoking and belching brake air.
One radio street blaster on high volume.
A one-legged man, walking proud and alone.
One information booth in the middle of the sidewalk, ignored.
Thee ice cream carts at the curbs — selling, selling, selling.
One pretzel cart, unattended.
One pretty girl tying her shoe and spilling her purse.
One blue-and-white police car sitting empty, windows open.
Hundreds of retired ladies dragging big plastic shopping bags and gabbing.
One ambulance hurrying past, red lights flashing.
One perambulator holding big packages and a sleeping red-haired baby clutching the strings of two round, red balloons.
Two policemen on big brown sweaty horses talking.
One cyclist walking, the bicycle squeaking and clicking.
Four pairs of white shoes, one left shoe untied.
One newspaper hawker hawking “Final Market.”
One yellow sheriff’s prisoner bus, empty, turning left.
Two young men pushing brooms, dodging pedestrians.
One Swedish woman asking directions.
Seven begging pigeons, waddling and cooing.
Nine people on circular benches, eating, laughing, reading.
Two young men pushing two heavily laden dollies through traffic.
One empty folding chair.
One gray-haired lady offering religious tracts.
One smiling blond lady, sniffing a handful of long stem red roses, giggling.
One seeing-eye dog stopping at a red light.
Fourteen shutterbugs learing left, right, up, down and at each other.
One man opening a package of breath mints.
Seventeen people checking pockets and purses for bus money and tokens.
Eight couples holding hands and walking close.
One pinstriped suit, no head, reading a newspaper, walking fast, avoiding all people and obstacles.
Two young girls giving away free cigarettes.
Sixteen folded umbrellas and a blue sky.
Twenty-three impatient taxis, changing lanes, honking.
One bent elderly man shuffling across the street in the middle of the block, cars stop but none honks at him.
One child reaching up high to mom on the left and dad on the right, towing both in a flying-wedge.
One red-and-white beer cooler, blue jeans and jogging shoes jogging past.
One knee-high child silently pointing at an escaped silver balloon soaring higher and higher.
One window washer 10 stories up, hooking ropes and dripping water.
One light missing in the corner temperature display sign.
3:24 — the time at the corner.
My bus is here.
Robert Richardson is a freelance writer in Chicago.
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