My first day of teaching is today. Only thing in my way is a 15 minute bike ride to the train station, an hour on the train, and about 25 more minutes on the bike on the way to the school. Oh, and here’s hoping there are bike racks out there.

After two days of loading/cleaning, two days of driving, and one day of incomplete unloading, we’ve finally made it to our new home in Chicago. Our apartment is pretty amazing. Just a beautiful, big place that I can’t think of many ways to improve. (Well, wider doors so we could easily get the couch in would be nice, but I digress.)

Eric came with us on this trip, and we are incredibly grateful for his help, just like when Ryan Mo helped us move to Atlanta. Eric is a machine when it comes to this stuff (as was Mo). It has to do with the fact that his parents own a furniture store and he’s loading a few trucks in his day.

The neighbors around here are already proving to be fantastic. They’ve been friendly and helpful. Chicago is great. More later.

circa 1999

Well I suppose you can say it’s official. I just got confirmation today that I’ll be starting my first teaching job this fall at McHenry County College in Crystal Lake, IL, a good ways outside Chicago. I’m so happy to finally be realizing one of my major life goals. I know it sounds silly to a lot of artists who look at teaching simply as a means to making their work, but artmaking and teaching hold very similar weight in my life, so this is extremely big news.

I’ll be teaching the Beginning Photography course in the evenings on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which is entirely B&W darkroom-based. This couldn’t be more up my alley. As a matter of fact, I was so energized by the actual interview, I went home and started work on the syllabus. I’m pretty much done with that, so I need to begin work on the assignments at this point.

The program, facilities, and especially the other faculty sound like they’re going to be top-notch, so I’m looking foward to getting to work.

We found a place to live today. It’s on the cusp of Andersonville and Edgewater Glen here in Chicago. Stacy and I have spent the last three days looking, and fortunately, Apartment People came through for us today. We ended up with a 2 bedroom apartment, a private garage and fair proximity to the Red Line straight into town.

And tomorrow I might have a job interview of sorts outside the city. I’m pretty excited. In less than a month, we’ll be Midwesterners (I think)!