Treats

“Oh, the weather outside is frightful,
But the fire is so delightful,
And since we’ve no place to go,
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.”
—Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne, “Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow!”

Theia stands behind the counter in the small store on N. Clark St. Outside, snow and a frigid cold have descended upon the city, driving Chicagoans to head for heat where they can find it. (Or perhaps contend with a layer of slush on the street.)

It’s 8:30 p.m., and Theia finds herself alone in the shop. The single room with the baby-blue walls has seen hordes of customers in the past, but at this hour, a gumball machine and stacks of free newspapers and magazines aren’t enough to draw in a single person (beyond a curious reporter).

It could be the hour. It could be that this section of Lincoln Park is residential. It could also be the product that Theia’s selling.

Ice cream.

“I’m a mother,” says Theia, who wears a brown shirt with the store’s logo, a swirl of ice cream on a wafer cone. “It’s like down time.”

Treats Frozen Desserts, a Chicago-area chain, sells only a handful of products. Its main offering is four flavors of 99% fat-free ice cream, which can be mixed with two or more of some 30-plus toppings to create what the company calls a “Mess.” Beyond this, a freezer stocks cakes, pies, and containers of pre-packaged ice cream, while a nearby refrigerator holds bottles of water.

Absent are penguins.

A 30-year-old mother of two, Theia has been working at Treats for six years. When it’s warm out, she says, the store can see three employees behind the counter at a time; in this season, there’s just one per day, from 2 to 10 p.m.

“The area’s good. It’s close to home,” says Theia, a lifelong Chicagoan who grew up around Austin Ave. and Lake St. and now lives on the Northwest Side. “In my other job, I used to have to leave my home two hours just to make it to work on time.” Now, it’s 45 minutes by public transit, less when driving.

She’s thought of moving to another city, though she’d want to stay in Illinois. Why would she leave Chicago?

“Right now, the prices. Right now, it’s just too expensive for me in Chicago. Four kids, and I’m working at an ice cream shop.”

Treats Frozen Desserts, at Clark St. and Grant Pl. in Lincoln Park. (Click on photo to enlarge.)

As for the job itself, she doesn’t complain. To the contrary. “There’s always something to do here,” she insists. “It’s never a boring day.”

Even when the temperature is near, if not in, the single digits.

A young man wearing a green Patagonia jacket and a blue sweatshirt comes in and asks for a couple of free tastes before choosing his ice cream. His says his name is Michael, and he’s a student at Columbia College.

Michael, 22 years old, offers that he shops at Trader Joe’s and just had a salad and sandwich for dinner, but that he tries to come to Treats at least once a month. In this weather, he notes, “I know there’s not going to be a line out the door especially.”

It helps that Michael lives above the store.

“Has it been busy tonight?” he asks Theia.

“I’ve had a good…” She pauses to think. “…Five customers a hour.” Of those five per hour, she remarks, “Those are, like, the faithfulest customers of Treats. They come in, rain, hail, sleet, or snow.”

“Have a nice night,” she says to Michael before he leaves.

“You, too,” he replies. “What is your name?”

“Theia.”

“Theia?”

“Theia.”

“Michael,” he says back.

“Okay,” she replies.

“So, you’re upstairs, right?” she adds.

“Yeah.”

“Soooo, you know Tom?” she asks, her voice ending playfully upward.

“Tom?”

“Tom. He works for the sushi place. He’s a deliverer.”

“Oh, okay,” he replies. “Yeah. Is he normally smoking cigarettes all the time?”

“Yup,” she giggles. “That’s Tom.”

“Thanks again,” says Michael, before walking out. “Stay warm.”



If Theia could be doing anything she wanted anywhere in the world right now, what would it be?

She thinks about it.

She’s offered some suggestions: Spending more time with her family, traveling somewhere, lying on a beach…?

Lying on a beach, she decides. “In the sun. Out of the snow.”

“But what’s crazy,” she goes on, “I may even miss the snow if I leave. I have a brother that lives in Florida, so he probably knows well. So, when he comes to Chicago, he’s like a kid in a candy store. He goes outside, no coat, no nothing. And I’m like, ‘Boyyyy!’”

Around a quarter to 9, two men walk into the store. “Hi, cousin!” Theia greets the first one.

“Wassup?” he replies.

The second of the two men is Cedric, her significant other. You might guess they’re together if you looked closely at Theia’s gold-colored hoop earrings, one of which has her name nestled inside the ring, while the other has his.

The two men have come to keep Theia company until the end of her shift.

As they chat, the sound of an electric snow blower can be heard just outside the shop. “He’s a good guy! Good guy!” says Theia. “You know I can not shovel no snow.”

Theia has been working since she was 17 years old, and it’s always been in food service. In this job, she particularly enjoys interacting with the local high school students who come in (the Francis W. Parker School is just across the street, while Lincoln Park High School isn’t far away). “We play the dare game,” she explains. “Like, make crazy Messes, like Nerds, cotton candy, and gummy bears.” She takes on a mocking voice: “‘I bet you five dollars you will not eat this.’”

The weather outside is frightful, but the frozen pies are still for sale. (Click on photo to enlarge.)

Theia calls food service “her life.” “I like the different people. To me, different people. There’s never a dull moment in food service.

“I just like to move around,” she continues. “My days go by much faster.”

Shortly after 9, a young woman comes in and orders a cone of cookie dough ice cream. Not long after that, Theia is cleaning the counter and mopping the floor. She’s decided to call it a night early, something she does maybe once a month.

She won’t get paid for the time she’s not here— but there aren’t exactly many customers paying now. Not with the mercury hovering around ten degrees Fahrenheit outside.

“I tell you,” says Theia, with her cousin and her significant other waiting for her to leave the ice cream behind, to head off to warmth somewhere else. “There’s never a dull moment.”

And when she says it, you believe her.

It just goes to show: Contentment, like warmth, is where you find it— even among the cold.

Mumbai on Devon Avenue

“It’s finished,” says Kanu.

He’s standing behind the counter in Al-Mansoor Video, on Devon Ave. at Rockwell St. A TV suspended from the ceiling plays news from an Indian network, received here by satellite.

“Now that it’s over,” he adds, “now we are relaxed.”

It’s about 9:15 p.m. Kanu, who has closely-cropped hair above a round face, stands with a friend by the counter, surrounded by Indian DVD’s of fanciful Bollywood productions and other segments of escapism. The brightly lit store, which has mostly DVD’s and CD’s and tapes, along with phone cards in the back, has no other customers, leaving Kanu and his friend with their eyes looking upward.

Another man walks into the store, and then a man and a woman. They all have dark skin.

“How’s your family?” the woman asks Kanu. “Everyone’s okay on your side?”

He replies in an Indian language.

Everyone stares at the TV.

The broadcast, an Indian version of a CNN or Fox News, has a shot of the Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai. Suddenly, the camera shows a man tumbling out of a ground floor window, as if he had been shot out.

Then, the Director General of India’s National Security Guard gives a new conference in Hindi.

“So, how many people were in there?” asks one of the men.

“I think 20,” replies Kanu.

It’s now 9:26 p.m. on November 28. The screen reads 8:56 a.m., 29 Nov 08.

The woman, like the man who accompanies her, has an Indian skin tone but speaks English with a good American accent. Her dark hair is long, and she wears a nose stud to one side.

She says she grew up in America but— and she insists on being paraphrased here, not quoted— India is still her country, wherever she goes. She adds that she just hopes everyone is safe. (Everyone, presumably, means the people that those around her know.)

The screen shows the tag line “Taj Reclaimed.” The words “India’s 9/11” flash intermittently among segments.

The couple joins Kanu in the back of the store, by the phone cards. When they all return to the front, the couple is smiling and laughing. They’re still smiling when they head for the door and say good night.


“T
his is more than 103 years old building,” says Kanu, pictures of the Taj Mahal Hotel flashing on the screen. “It is ancient building.”

Kanu grew up in the city of Ahmedabad, some 300 miles from Mumbai. In Ahmedabad, he worked in a small barbershop. He says he visited Mumbai’s Colaba neighborhood, in which the hotel is located, just once.

He came to Chicago as opposed to another American city, because, like so many immigrants, he had family here. He got a job at the video store, because he knew the man who runs the place from when they lived near each other in India.

We’re also, ahh, seeing images— if you could replay that, as well— of saluting our martyrs. The ATS chief, Hemant Karkare—

Kanu shakes his head slightly.

—was one of them, ahh, who’s been killed. Two hundred and fifteen policemen, we know, have been killed, ahh, in this battle against the terrorists.

“They killed chief of the anti-terrorism squad,” he explains to a visitor as the TV announcer goes on.

And that’s the funeral—

“Hmmm,” he exhales, shaking his head.

—of, ahh, Hemant Karkare, a very sincere, straightforward, no-nonsense officer…

How do Kanu’s friends feel about what’s been happening?

“Oh, my God. I mean, already it’s really hard to live in India. Even where I live, it’s all same thing like this. I mean, just I told you, like, uhh, a few months ago that there was, like, uhh, 20 or 30 people in a blast over there. A lot of people were killed.”

“What they are doing,” he adds, “also, we don’t understand.”

A phone in the store rings, and Kanu answers it.

“Well, now it’s time to go,” he says after hanging up.

It’s now almost 10 o’clock, closing time for the store. Kanu turns off the TV, puts the remote control down on the counter, and walks to the back of the store to prepare to get on with his evening.

Next Stop, North Pole. Doors Open on the Left...

Santa Claus is standing on a flatbed train car at 95th Street and the Dan Ryan Expressway.

It’s not exactly where you’d expect to find him. But there he is, with his red and white coat, glasses, and white beard.

Flanking him on either side are silver train cars with strips of colored lights, snowflake decals, and an unfolding winter scene beneath the windows. The flatbed car on which he stands, the fifth car of this seven-car train, has a fake layer of snow, along with Christmas trees with ornaments, Nutcracker soldiers, reindeer (the stiff kind), and a sleigh.

Santa Claus greets passengers at the 95th/Dan Ryan Red Line station. (Click on photo to enlarge.)

“I come down from the North Pole,” says the man.

What’s his name?

“Santa Claus.”

(Not exactly the name a reporter is looking for.)

Is it a long trip down from the North Pole?

“It depends on which way I go,” Santa replies. If he goes the regular route, he adds, it takes eight hours. If he flies commercials flights… well, he might have to make stopovers and whatnot.

The train leaves the 95/Dan Ryan station at 2:55 p.m. for the long haul north. In the second-to-last car, a little over a dozen people are aboard for the ride, among them a few children.

They marvel at the extravagant decorations in what, in its alter-ego, is a regular CTA el car: Metals poles covered with red and white swirls; seat padding with patterns of Santa or Christmas trees with bells; red and green ceiling lights; tinsel and wreaths.

Regular advertisements have been replaced with cute ads with winter or Christmas themes (“The Sharp Dressed Gentleman Shops at Snomann Bros. Haberdashery”— Frostye T. Snomann, president; “Need Glasses? Dr. Yul C. Klearly, OD”). Interpsersed among these are seasonal jokes (“Why didn’t the Abominable Snowman get married? He got cold feet”; “What do you call a reindeer who does backflips while flying through the air? A deerdevil”).

A woman named Phyllis rides with two nieces, Trinity, 8, and Trinity, 5, and a nephew, Philip, 3. They’re making a field trip all the way up to the last stop— Linden— and back.

When the younger Trinity is asked what she thinks of the train, she smiles and covers her eyes.

As the train, with destination signs reading “Santa’s Express,” rolls along, a tall elf with a red-and-green shirt and auburn hair dances down the aisle, a plastic bucket of candy canes in hand.

How does she feel, this elf?

“I feel great, happy, rejuvenated…” she replies.

What’s her name?

“Snowflake.”

Snowflake, as it happens, is actually Barbara Hellon, a CTA employee who works most of the year driving trains, working on switching, or helping with customer service. Today, she’s manning this car as part of a two-person— er, two-elf— crew.

"Snowflake" passes out candy canes. (Click on photo to enlarge.)

At the Sox-35th station, passengers on the platform bear inquisitive looks and smiles as the train pulls in. At Roosevelt, when a man and a woman step on board, the woman remarks, “This is beautiful.” As the train snakes under State St. with more passengers, eyes wander, lips smile, and cell phone cameras go off.

“This is North and Clybourn,” announces a man over the PA speakers as the train approaches that station. “Welcome aboard with Santa Clause and his elves.”

The man, heard by many but seen by few, is Steve Hastalis. Hastalis sits in the first car with a microphone, along with an acute knowledge of station names and the ability to tell what kind of track bed the train is riding on by the feel of vibrations.

Which is helpful, since Hastalis is blind.

Possessing a walking cane and a large, handheld device reminiscent of an accordion— but serving as a sort of personal computer with a Braille interface— Hastalis calls out the names of stations all the way up the line, replacing the CTA’s customary automated voice. An ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) Administrative Analyst for the CTA, Hastalis has worked for the transit agency since 1975 and has had the job with this train every Christmas time for at least three years, he says.

He got the position when, a few years ago, he asked who was announcing the stops— and was asked in return, “You wanna’ do it?”

(The answer to that question might be clear by looking at Hastalis’ souvenir Chicago Rapid Transit hat, which dates to at least the 1940’s, when that private company— a predecessor to the governmental Chicago Transit Authority— managed elevated train service.)

Santa and his train crawl back into sunlight as they approach the Fullerton station. From the platform there, a few young adults look hesitantly at the train before boarding the second-to-last car. Once inside, they look curiously around.

Then, for reasons unknown, they get off before the doors close, simply staring at the train as it pulls away.

As it approaches Addison, Snowflake— that is, Hellon— bops down the aisle to the beat of the dance music now playing over the speakers.

Her partner, Jolly (aka Patrice Gray-Johnson), who wears a green jacket with the words “CTA Santa’s Express” emblazoned on the front, shares the responsibility of giving out candy canes. Making her way down the aisle, Jolly reaches a woman sitting near the door who politely refuses the candy cane bucket.

“At least one now,” Jolly insists, smiling. “Put it on your Christmas list.”

The woman relents and takes one. (She’ll later offer it to a fellow passenger.)

A woman and a young boy who have been riding near Jolly at the north end of the car get ready to get off at the Bryn Mawr stop. When they do, Jolly hugs the woman on the platform before stepping back on board.

“This is so cute. I’m so excited!” squeals a woman somewhere around Loyola. “I’m switching cars. I want to see them all.”

She and a friend take a picture down the length of the car, and then Snowflake takes one of them. At the next station, they jump off.


If there’s one thing that is magic about this train, it’s that passengers on this Sunday afternoon can travel past Howard towards Wilmette without having to change trains.

Har, har. Jokes on the Holiday Train. (Click on photo to enlarge.)

In a nearly empty fourth car in the leafy environs of Evanston, Dave Kowalski, Chief Maintenance Officer for Rail Operations for the CTA, explains that the so-named Holiday Train began running 17 years ago. It started as just two cars among four decorated with lights, and ran only on the Blue Line. Aside from entertaining, it also was used as a way to deliver food to people in need, or to charitable organizations that could get it to them. The food came from donations taken up by the CTA, and the recipients would meet the train on the platform.

Today, the train has seven cars and bears 30,000 lights among its decorations. And it still delivers food. On Saturday, says Kowalski, it dropped off 150 boxes of canned goods.

“It makes you feel so good,” he says.

CTA employees spend six weeks getting the Holiday Train ready for service. It began running on November 22 and will continue through December 23, riding at least once on every el line in the system. For the Yellow Line— shuttle service between Howard and the Skokie station, which can only accommodate two cars— Santa will ride in an abbreviated version of the train.

When the train makes a layover at a terminal today, kids can pose with him for photos.

Just how do CTA employees get to work as elves on the train? By having exemplary work records, says Kowalski.

And what about the music that plays over the speakers? The mix of upbeat, and more-classical, seasonal songs?

“I got so many CD’s,” he says.

At 4:23 p.m., Santa’s Express finally reaches the end of the line— and it’s four minutes early.

When this is pointed out to Kowalski, he simply replies, “Christmas magic, huh?”

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Tour the Holiday Train