There are very few things that I regret in life.

Sure, I’ve made my fair share of mistakes, but I usually try to learn from them and not regret them. However, every time I go to downtown Chicago, I recall how much I love and have always loved Chicago.

When I was in grade school and we had a day off from grade school for a holiday, my friend Adrian and I would hop on the bus and go downtown and enjoy a day of sightseeing and just wandering around downtown Chicago.

In high school, I used to compete in chess tournaments in the ballrooms of downtown hotels. Between games, I loved walking around downtown just sightseeing. I especially enjoyed window shopping even though I didn’t have enough money to buy anything.

But one day, I saw something that absolutely amazed me: a chess set. But not just any chess set. This set of chessmen was designed using Chicago icons for the pieces! The chess set was not very functional for tournament play because instead of using the Staunton design, if memory serves me correctly, the rook was the Water Tower, the knight was the Picasso, the queen was Miro’s lady, the king was the Sear Tower, and I forget the rest of the pieces.

This chess set combined my two loves at once. The pieces were made of brushed stainless-steel set on a marble chessboard. I was in such awe of this chess set that I didn’t even bother entering the store to ask how much it cost. I just knew I couldn’t afford it. Well, I regret not entering the store and touching the pieces and not asking how much it cost. Maybe I could have scraped up enough money to buy at least the chessmen.

Over the years, I fondly recall that chess set and every time I go downtown, I look in all the store windows with the hope of finding that chess set. And this time I will buy it regardless of the price!

I realized a long, long time ago that I was born to be a writer. Whenever I read a story in grade school, I often had questions about what the story meant and why the story was written that way. I especially loved the English composition assignments that required us to write about personal experiences. I loved those assignments even if we had to present them in front of the whole class. I was a shy boy who stuttered and spoke broken English with a Mexican accent, but once I wrote a masterpiece of an English composition assignment (in my humble oppinion), I wanted the whole world to hear it!

I also went through what I like to call my Russian phase when I read a lot of Russian novels. For months, I read nothing but Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Pasternak, and Chekhov. On those overcast, cold, rainy days, I would say to myself, “What moody and introspective day. Perfect for curling up with a samovar of tea and reading a Russian novel” while listening to Prokofiev.

However, I avoided Russian poetry because as a poet I was still in the “Roses are red, Violets are blue …” phase back then. I realized that the only way I would ever write the Great American Novel would be by imitating the Great Russian writers. So I transformed myself into David Diegovich Rodrigoevsky! (My mother actually playfully would tell her Polish friends that she was Carmen Rodrigowski and I followed suit when I became a Russian novelist. Now that I think of it, I have never met a Polish Carmen!) I began calling my girlfriend Catherine, Katya. When she offered me food, I would tell her, “Nyet! I have a novel to write!” and continue typing away on my electric typewriter. I tried writing with a quill, but the feather kept tickling my nose. Needless to say, I have yet to complete the Great American Novel. But I have lofty ambitions. J