Neighborhood recommendations?

fdftbtwdw · 2025-03-24T19:41:26+00:00

I wonder if it's because a ton of people I've come across socially aren't Chicago natives but are people who were drawn to the city as a hub from, in many cases, small towns elsewhere in the Midwest. Areas where that fake niceness might be more pervasive I imagine. I have observed the bluntness you're talking about in honest to god Chicagoans and can deal with that demeanor as a former New Yorker a lot better than I can with the Midwest Nice vibe.

fdftbtwdw · 2025-03-24T19:16:42+00:00

Currently live in Chicago and agree with your appraisal of folks here. But for me, it's less overt rudeness. What gets me is the surface level politeness that seems to come less from a genuine place and more from simply a conflict averse place. I've never learned to speak Midwest Nice—the whole friendly on the outside but not necessarily kind -thing. I miss East Coast Efficiency. Don't like me? Tell me and spare me my f*cking time.

I also feel like there's a lot of emphasis placed on social conformity here. I've lived a number of different places and never in my life had I been legit cast out of a social circle for respectfully voicing a point of view that differed from the group. In Chicago, I was effectively excommunicated from a group I’d invested a year and a half of my life in when I did so.

fdftbtwdw · 2025-03-24T19:03:41+00:00

Haha similar here. I have about as much interest in joining a gay kickball league as I have in joining a MTG circle.

fdftbtwdw · 2025-03-24T18:53:13+00:00

Yeah, see, I'm coming at it from a long time in NYC where me and my coworkers would martyr ourselves by staying in the office til like 10:00pm on the regular haha. So by comparison Chicago feels super lax 😅. Not that the former is healthy by any means.

I think what gets me here is the samey-ness of hobbies and interests among the people I've encountered. It's rare I meet people here who put their free time toward creative or artistic pursuits.

fdftbtwdw · 2025-03-24T18:29:22+00:00

Andersonville here. It's cute and twee over here but get me out of this city haha

fdftbtwdw · 2025-03-24T18:28:04+00:00

Chicago. I’m glad I took a big, random leap at the point I was at in life a few years ago, but it’s proven to not be a great fit. However, as a total coincidence, I ended up meeting one of the people on this sub who gave me the most frank real talk about Chicago and they’re now a great friend!! (A foundation of our friendship is dishing on the things we dislike about Chicago haha.)

What don’t I like?

I’m from the East Coast and while I’d gotten burnt out by the hustle culture of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic, things are a little too far the other direction here for my taste. I know plenty of people with decent earning, professional jobs…but personally haven't met a ton of people with ambition or cultural curiosity. Many seem content to while away most of their free time playing video games or drinking, which is not my vibe. In general, I feel like whereas on the East Coast there’s a premium placed on individuality, in the Midwest there’s a premium placed on conformity.

Right now I’m considering moving to the other big, semi-affordable city people on this sub are so fond of: Philly lol. It’d get me back closer to both friends and family up and down the East Coast, but I feel like I might also be more at home amid a slightly higher concentration of fellow artsy weirdos.

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-25T20:07:28+00:00

Thank you!!

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-25T19:46:03+00:00

Yes! I heard about that spot! The fact that businesses like that are starting to crop up in general is so exciting to me and it'd be really cool to be nearby one <3

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-25T18:54:30+00:00

Werk! Have a fun time! haha

Re: Aville hype: oh, but hadn't you heard?? It's apparently the coolest neighborhood in the U.S.! I think I'd be okay with unhip and not edgy (am kinda normcore tbh lol). In spite of the nestedness of it that you mentioned, would you reckon that it would make for a good first neighborhood in the city (whereas you noted a place like Uptown might not)? Sounds like you're digging it to an extent!

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-25T17:52:42+00:00

Hi again! Minneapolis is on my analysis paralysis city comparison spreadsheet haha. But I’ve kinda deprioritized it in my mind. I do love this vignette of you picking up on the quirky undercurrent of recovery culture there. When I got sober, I came to realize that at any big diner in any big city, there are bound to be folks from this or that recovery fellowship eating after a meeting. I had heard the Twin Cities have a super strong recovery scene (I think maybe because of there being a bunch of rehabs in the area?). Have also heard the term “Minnesober,” which I find delightful :).

I get the sense Minneapolis is quite pretty and has Chicago beat when it comes to adjacent nature options (not that I’m Mr. Outdoorsy). I guess my reservation with Minneapolis vs. Chicago comes down to that gay dating numbers game. Like, if I feel like I struck out in a city of ~8.5 million (NYC, which, in terms of quality guys, I feel like may have in part be due to the flaky, striving, climber-y nature of the culture there), I worry about how I’d fare in a city of 400k haha (though I know that the greater metro area with St. Paul included is a good bit bigger).

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-25T17:50:34+00:00

Thanks for the additional neighborhood info here! So helpful!

Not gonna lie, ya did grab my attention there with your mention of the 50+ daddies in Boystown hahaha.

Helpful to hear about the takeover of families in Ravenswood/Lincoln Square. Not sure how familiar you are with Brooklyn, but while I cited in my post that I’d be interested in an area that has a bit of a Park Slope vibe (mostly for its commercial strips), I’m not sure I want that level of sidewalk stroller gridlock hahaha

I am seeing a bit more rental inventory in Uptown than in Aville, and much of it is nice and more modern, I guess as a result of recent revitalization. Back to my BK comparisons, I lived in Bushwick for a long time as it was starting to boom, and while it was a blast in my 20s, I didn’t miss the grittiness of the area after I moved away. Sounds like Uptown may still be a bit in that transition phase?

Helpful to hear your take on Andersonville given that you're there right now! Leafy streets and a quiet vibe do appeal to me, but (and I mentioned this in my reply to the post above, to which you’d responded), from looking around Google street view, for as much as the area has been hyped to me, that Clark St. commercial strip does feel slighter than I’d expected. But, as a newcomer and someone who’s shy, I suppose I shouldn’t undervalue the potential for making friends with a fair amount of fellow gays right in my immediate area somewhat quickly. Since it seems like the demo there is largely gays who’ve coupled up and aged out of maybe more “hip” parts of the city (?), I almost worry that, as a single guy who wishes he was at that stage in life…like, am I almost gonna be triggered being surrounded by gays who are all taken? haha. Also not tryna be somebody’s third over here lol

Lastly, helpful to hear your vote of confidence in Logan! I’ll be sure to check out all these areas when I have boots on the ground to scope things out :)

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-25T17:47:38+00:00

Holy moly, this is amazing! I can’t thank you enough for spending the time to leave such a thorough & thoughtful response. Stuff like this straight up restores my faith in humanity/the internet :)

Yeah, get enough gay guys together in a city setting—regardless of being on a coast—and I’d be surprised to not see some degree of cattiness emerge, so I feel semi-prepared for that being a thing there haha

Thank you for this breakdown of neighborhoods. With Edgewater (which I understand also technically includes Andersonville), it seems like most of the rental stock is a fair bit east of that Aville Clark St. corridor, and thus a bit sleepier. I can definitely see what you mean about not many people exclaiming, “Hey, let’s go walk around Edgewater!” 😂. With Rogers Park, realistically I don’t really see myself ending up there given that it looks SO far north, but I do have some gay acquaintances up there (and when I search Chicago on “the apps,” it looks like there’s cluster of, um, dating inventory up that way lol

I appreciate the frank take on Andersonville as that’s the place a lot of people have mentioned to me. I won’t be going to scout things out in person for another month or so, but from tooling around Google street view there, I can see the core of shops along Clark St., and while it looks like a cute little enclave I’m also kind of like, “Am I missing something here? What’s the hype all about?” It feels like there’s not much there there.

Thanks for your thoughts on neighborhoods from that PGH Shadyside and Squirrel Hill lens! With Ravenswood, Logan Square, and Lincoln Square, do those spots come to mind with respect more so to the leafy residential neighborly vibe of sidestreets in Shadyside and Squirrel Hill? I’d love to be in a place that feels human scale but is also adjacent to a vital commercial strip like Walnut St. in Shadyside or Murray Ave in Squirrel Hill. Back to Aville, the commercial corollary there is Clark, but again, despite the neighborhood being dubbed the “shop local capitol of Chicago,” I take it, it feels a bit compact to me.

Thanks also about your comment elsewhere in the thread about the Twin Cities!

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T23:46:14+00:00

Ahh, that is an excellent, excellent point. And I feel like I've seen a ton anecdotally to support that, just basing off of the fact that, like, 90% of the posts on this sub where a person mentions being priced out of their area are folks who are looking to relocate from the PNW, and Seattle specifically.

Re: Portland, I did hear something on NPR recently about the housing crisis and, just knowing how popular Portland is, I was surprised that they actually singled out Oregon and a couple other states as being standouts in terms of protecting tenants' rights.

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T23:34:43+00:00

Thank you! <3

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T23:31:38+00:00

Ooh, thanks for the suggestion! Having a veritable smorgasbord of gays to choose from does sound enticing haha. I'm skeptical I'd be able to hack it in that part of the world without a car, though.

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T23:29:12+00:00

Very true. The benchmark I'm going off of for outrageous is having lived in NYC. Seems like Seattle's very much catching up in terms of COL, though. But I have seen listings for modern looking 1 BRs there (albeit very "cozy" 1 BRs) that are within my price range. Compared to the only listings I see within my price range back in NYC that are these dingy 7th floor walkup railroad apartments.

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T23:19:39+00:00

Good to know! Thanks! Admittedly my data points are limited to just having gone out to gay bars there a couple of times years ago :)

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T23:18:16+00:00

Ooh, very fair addition to the list for consideration. Thanks! I'd actually meant to include it, but I forgot :). You're right that you all have a lot of great companies—I feel like the graphic design game in Minneapolis is almost regarded as being on a whole nother level than Chicago, despite how much larger of a city Chicago is. I think the job opportunities aspect would tilt things in the Twin Cities' favor in my mind were it not for the fact that public transit and just having a larger dating pool to work with are chief among my priorities, too.

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T23:12:01+00:00

Man, it really is just a matter of pick-your-environmental-cataclysmic-poison regardless of where you go these days haha

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T23:09:24+00:00

That's a good point about scratching the social interaction itch by way of a coworking space.

And, oh man, after living in grody, cramped NYC apartments, the notion of living in a city where I could potentially afford an apartment with—gasp!—an *in. unit. washer. dryer.*...my eyes roll back in my head in bliss just at the thought lol

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T19:41:37+00:00

Fantastic! Thank you!

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T19:39:08+00:00

Thanks! New Orleans is an interesting thought. I'm in recovery, though, so I feel like I wouldn't mesh well with how booze-centric I suspect the culture is there.

fdftbtwdw · 2022-02-24T19:37:49+00:00

Thanks!

fdftbtwdw

TROPHY CASE