!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I've currently got scratches all over my face, the result of plowing headlong into a tree as I was walking to work. Eyes riveted on the sidewalk, my face did an impressive tango with some branches.

What had caught my eye, moments before the tree incident, was a graffito there on the sidewalk.

There's been a lot of graffiti around the neighborhood this winter. I guess the graffiti season has been extended this year due to warmer than usual weather. Which is, in itself, pretty lame. I mean, come on, graffiti dudes--it's hard to take you seriously when you can't be troubled to ply your art if it's a wee too chilly outside. "Well," graffiti dude must say to himself, "I COULD head out and do some tagging, but the wind is awfully biting today. I think I'd really rather curl up with a book and eat some Fritos."

The green gate in front of our house is, apparently, an irresistible canvas. A couple of times a month, my husband heads out to the sidewalk, jaw set with grim determination, paint can in hand, to swab away the latest tag. This ritual cleansing of the mean streets of Chicago, though, has recently lost a little of its urgency. There are plenty of those surly and menacing gang tags on other streets, but as clear as we could figure, the last one we found on our gate read "Joni loves Chachi."

My best theory, really, is that the graffiti amateur responsible for tagging our block spends his afternoons watching 1980's sitcom reruns and PBS until the weather warms up. Back on the block, when he's not reminding us of the glory days of "Happy Days", he's leaving socially responsible messages. Hence the "Smiling Rules!" that caught my eye on the sidewalk this morning. Or my favorite, on the garage behind our house: "Crack Kills!"

Our gate is currently once again clean, and it's cold outside once more. But no doubt our optimistic, enthusiastic graffiti guy will soon be back with more exclamation marks to remind us of global warming or that we should vote in the next election. It's all just a little unnerving.