GO WEST YOUNG MAN, GO WEST!

"Go, West, young man, go west!" While Horace Greeley uttered that grand call back in the roaring frontier days of the 19th C, the old fox stayed East and made a fortune. Still, I hear his voice echoing in my April thoughts. Last week I did go West, and found something I never expected...

Like most of you, I've spent a little time in the Grand Canyon, Big Sur, the Canadian Rockies, Provence and Tuscany. The sights pour over your senses like an ocean of sinful pleasure. You find yourself drowning in inexpressible natural grandeurs. But you never quite expect to find any of this just 20 miles west of Chicago.

One sun-dappled afternoon I traveled west of O'Hare Airport on Irving Park Road in search of an appointment. As whenever I wander more than an hour outside my own community, I proceeded with exact predictability to get myself lost. And no sweet-talking GPS avatar was able to help! Ahh, but what joy getting lost turned out to be. Made me think of an old adage I could never really believe before: "Happiness is being able to enjoy the scenery on a detour."

Twisting and turning on these western roadways, I soon found myself in a series of cozy green hamlets lined with staunch white fences protecting proud paneled homes. Like being snatched up inside a Norman Rockwell illustration where neighbors are chatting over front-porch coffees, and kids are giggling in squadrons of tricycles.

Remarkable.

Or had I just eased into one of those B&W "Twilight Zone" episodes in which Rod Serling is on another relentless search for his lost innocence? For a moment, I think I wanted to think so. But the car clock snapped me back to attention as I realized I was now late for my appointment.

What to do...? Fact versus fantasy! Reality versus remembrances! One look at this lost little world of yesteryear Americana, and I could only do the right thing. I stopped the car...got out to stroll the streets...and felt not a pang of guilt. That terribly important appointment grew remarkably small in the light of this surprisingly large discovery.

And that's what can happen to you traveling just a little west of Chicago....!