Darien

This entry is dedicated to the small town of Darien, IL.

When I say "small town", I mean relatively small. Not like one of those rural hick towns where everyone knows everyone else and you marry your cousins. But compared to most other suburbs in Chicago, it's pretty small any way you look at it. It has a population of about 20,000, less than 10 square miles of jurisdiction, and does not have its own high school. If those numbers don't mean much to you, consider that neighboring Downers Grove (where I grew up) has about 50,000 people, and Naperville (just down the road) has well over 100,000 now. Each of those suburbs is large enough to need 2 of its own high schools (I think Naperville actually has 3, if Neuqua Valley counts).

As far as my personal relationship to Darien goes, it's not the place I was born (Hinsdale), and not the place I grew up (Downers Grove). Not the place I live now, either (Palatine). In fact, out of my 24+ years of life, I think I have only spent about 3 years really living in the town of Darien itself. If you include the time I was at college, then I count Darien as my place of residence for no more than 7-8 years.

So, some of you may be wondering why I'm writing a blog about a place that few people outside of the area have even heard of, and carries little significance in my own life, in terms of traditionally important milestones.

Well, despite those things, I have to say here that the Village of Darien is actually a very cool and special place in my mind, for a number of reasons. And now I will try to explain why it is so special and cool.

First of all, whenever you enter Darien at any major intersection, you are greeted by the welcome sign: Darien - "A Nice Place To Live". Written with quotes and everything like that. Now, most people don't pay much attention to the mottos on those signs as they're driving, and I have to admit, I never noticed it myself for a long time. It wasn't until my 2nd year of college, when I was dorming at ISR 3-South and a bunch of us on the floor were all talking about where we were from. When I said I was from Darien, one of the guys was like "Hey, I know that place, isn't that 'A Nice Place to Live'?". From then on, every time any of us from Darien introduced ourselves to new people, we would have to explain that we were from "A Nice Place to Live".

Anyways, I gotta say, I really like that motto. I mean, it's not like I know a lot of mottos. Maybe the only one I can think of (other than Darien) is "Worth - The Friendly Village", because it's written in huge letters on their water tower and it, too, is a good motto. But yeah, I don't know if anything can top "A Nice Place to Live" when it comes to quality of motto. Short, simple, to the point. Yeah, it sounds like a 2nd grader came up with the idea, but hey, who wouldn't want to be in "A Nice Place to Live"?

The town itself, while small in area, has a lot of good stuff around. 2 places I always took for granted, until I moved to a place without either one nearby, were Wal-Mart and White Castle. Having the Castle, in particular, automatically puts Darien among the most elite suburbs of Chicago as far as I'm concerned. (Actually, I think our White Castle is technically in DG territory, but that's ok, it's all the same.) Wendys, KFC, Pizza Hut, Barnes & Noble, Kohls, Gap, Bath & Body Works, XSport, Burger King, Best Buy, Old Navy, and more stores are all at that same intersection too.

Of course, the most important factor in determining any town's coolness would be the people it has. As we already know, Darien had me gracing its land with my presence for a few years, which is a huge plus for any town or city. The magnitude of this fact alone must not be overlooked or underestimated.

But what really set this town apart was 5 of my best friends who went to U of I with me representing D-town. Not that we were the only ones from Darien who went to U of I that year, but we were more or less the ones that mattered. Eventually, we crossed paths and came to intermingle with the thugs from other places like Glenview, Cedarville, Princeton, Wheaton, Gurnee, and more. But the "original 6" of Darien was, and still is, a legendary group.

And I guess what brings me to write about Darien now, is the realization that almost none of us are in Darien any more. Thankfully, most of us are still in the general Chicagoland area, but the fact is that our addresses no longer all end in 60561, and our phone numbers don't all start with (630) now. A rundown of where we are:

Me - Palatine
P - Waukesha, Wisconsin
Vas - Paris, Texas/Czech Republic (?)
Rod - Downtown Chicago
Chras - Soon to be Downtown Chicago
Anuj - Only remnant keepin it real in Darien. Assuming he comes back from India.

So with everyone moving on to other places these days, I figured I better record our history in Darien before our legacy is forgotten and it all gets lost in the waves of time. After all, I feel a certain attachment to the town, as if it's almost a part of my identity. I don't know about the other boys, but I feel a certain sense of pride to say that I hail from the great village of Darien and that I'm a part of the "Darien crowd", because there's not a lot of people who can say that and thus it sets me apart in a way. Yeah, I understand that makes me a real loser, but oh well.

Sadly, it looks like the end of our era is here. But I hope the Darien spirit will live on in all of us, and through those who wasted their time reading this blog.

If anyone feels like reading more about Darien, go to this URL:

http://www.darien.il.us/

You'll have to cut and paste it into a new browser, cause I don't want the webmasters to notice their traffic tripling today from 2 hits to 6, with my page as the referral for the extra 4 visitors. But it has some history of the town and also some of the demographic statistics I listed above. I didn't know that Darien was only incorporated in 1969 and was named after Darien, Connecticut.

Okay, enough talk about Darien for one day.