Luana Lienhart says 30 percent of her clients don’t realize they’re in abusive relationships.
Category: Chicagoans
‘Eye of the Tiger,’ Berwyn musician’s biggest hit, started with ‘Bam! Bam bam bam!’
Songwriter Jim Peterik’s work, which also includes “Vehicle,” first hit the Billboard Hot 100 when he and his bandmates were still in high school.
For Chelsea Rectanus, 30, owning a used bookstore is ‘as great as the romance would lead you to believe’
“It’s not all roses and garlands and angels singing from the rooftops or anything like that, but it’s good as it’s cracked up to be.”
Being a straight go-go dancer in gay nightclubs can be tricky, even dangerous
“I don’t even pretend to know what women go through on a daily basis, but I feel like I have a peek,” Ben Krane says.
Life is sweet for a Chicago candy maker
“When people hear about my job, they often ask me, ‘Is there really candy everywhere?’ And the reality is yes,” Stacey Espinosa says.
The peculiar difficulty of being an AirBnb host on Chicago’s south side
“People are afraid of the south side. It’s ridiculous. I educate my guests,” Afri Atiba says.
The U. of C.’s Game Changer Chicago Design Lab explores health and social issues through video games
“We’re trying to see what games actually do, beyond the question ‘Do violent video games make people more violent?’” designer Ashlyn Sparrow says.
Do millennials get Seinfeld?
A Chicago high school history teacher’s “club about nothing” aims to pass down an appreciation of the 90s TV phenomenon to the next generation.
Illinois’s champion tree climber is also an arborist
“If you’re climbing properly on a tree,” Nagan says, “you never fall; you swing.”
A metal detectorist makes a living helping Chicagoans find lost jewelry
“Seventy percent of my calls are ‘ring tosses,’ where the spouse throws a ring in anger,” Jim Evans says.
What humans can learn from bees, according to Chicago’s bicycling beekeeper
“Beekeeping teaches you to let go of the black-and-white world and participate in the natural world, which is not predictable,” says Bike a Bee founder Jana Kinsman.
A longtime Playboy editor on working for Hugh Hefner
“It wasn’t about the models for me. The mystique of the world I was living in was the writers,” says Barbara Nellis.
For a blind climber, ascending walls is ‘moving meditation’
“For that brief moment, nothing else in the world exists,” Shawn Sturges says.
Dan Pittatsis, an Uber and Lyft driver, sets his own hours
“To me, this isn’t even working,” Pittatsis says. “I would never, ever under any circumstances work for someone else ever again. I’m done.”
How Denzel Henderson overcame disability and depression to become a motivational speaker
“People are not out here living to their full potential,” Henderson says. “I only have the right side of my body and I’m still trying to do better.”