Star Light, Star Bright, WHERE ARE YOU??

If asked what is my least favorite thing about the city, I would probably default to "its lack of cleanliness." But in all honesty, while that can bother me from time to time, I've grown accustomed to not letting my pants drag in certain liquids and steering clear of things that I can't quite make out what they are. So I've adapted. And as far as "a high crime rate" goes, I look at it this way: there's crime everywhere. It's just a matter of a higher population in the city, more crimes committed (even if that's not technically true...) and a matter of knowing you're surroundings.

But what really does bug me, and I notice this happening every time I go outside at night, is the fact that I can't see hardly any stars. I love looking at the stars when I'm at home, and that's hard enough--because the massive amount of light coming from the city washes them out even in Oak Park. I remember one time when I was staying with my cousins out in Yorkville (a waaaaay west suburb), I looked up and it was just amazing. You could see so many stars, I was mesmerized. (See, they were used to that and thought I was slightly crazy for standing there for ten minutes with my neck bent entirely backwards so I could see them. But they know I'm from the city and we actually do a lot of things differently than them, but that's another blog for another day.) The sky was just absolutely gorgeous. And, dare I say I was jealous? But I was! Because, like I said, I can't even see stars when I go home.

Also, for the Fourth of July fireworks, my dad would let us up onto the roof of Oak Park River Forest High School (he's the head carpenter, so he has all the keys). Sitting up there for the fireworks was amazing. We saw fireworks from all the surrounding towns--Berwyn, Cicero, Riverside, Elmwood Park, River Forest, Forest Park, various neighborhoods in Chicago--as well as the infamous glow of the city. Sometimes I would look straight up to see what I could see star-wise and noticed a glow coming all the way from the city, even if I was looking slightly west. I noticed that when I was a lot younger, but it never really mattered to me. But now that I live in the city, it's something that bothers me--a lot. I love looking at the stars. It's a type of escape for me, so if I could, I think I'd be a much happier person (Ha).

So, with that being said, isn't there some way that we can tone down the amount of light that the city emits? It would be beneficial in more than one way. I mean, sure, the streetlights are extremely important, but what about other things. Like, do we really need to tops of all the buildings to be lit up every single night? They have their red flashing lights that let airplanes know that they're there, but there's a lot of light that comes off of them that we really don't need. And I'm sure if people sat down and thought about it, they could figure some other things out, too.