"While I've lived in L.A. since 1985, I'll always consider Chicago my home town and have much affection for it. My parents and sister still live there so I try to visit as often as I'm able"
About this Quote
The most telling word here is always. Wood isn’t just offering a biographical footnote; he’s staking a claim in the ongoing identity negotiation that comes with living in Los Angeles, a city famous for reinvention and, in the popular imagination, selective amnesia. By anchoring himself to Chicago, he signals continuity, loyalty, even a certain Midwestern moral ballast: you can move, succeed, and still refuse the clean-break mythology.
There’s a gentle defensiveness in the specificity of 1985. It’s a long time to live anywhere, and he knows the implied skepticism: after four decades, can you still call somewhere else “home”? He answers by shifting the definition of home away from real estate and toward relationship. The parents-and-sister clause isn’t sentimental garnish; it’s his evidence. Home, in this framing, isn’t where your career unfolded, but where your obligations and intimacies remain legible.
The subtext also nods to a common cultural tension: L.A. as the place you go to build a life on your own terms, Chicago as the place that built you. His “much affection” reads like measured affection, not boosterism. He’s not mythologizing the city; he’s asserting a durable emotional infrastructure that resists being overwritten by professional geography.
Contextually, this is the kind of statement writers make when they don’t want their work reduced to an “L.A. writer” label. He’s protecting his narrative of origin, and quietly reminding you that success doesn’t have to come with apostasy.
There’s a gentle defensiveness in the specificity of 1985. It’s a long time to live anywhere, and he knows the implied skepticism: after four decades, can you still call somewhere else “home”? He answers by shifting the definition of home away from real estate and toward relationship. The parents-and-sister clause isn’t sentimental garnish; it’s his evidence. Home, in this framing, isn’t where your career unfolded, but where your obligations and intimacies remain legible.
The subtext also nods to a common cultural tension: L.A. as the place you go to build a life on your own terms, Chicago as the place that built you. His “much affection” reads like measured affection, not boosterism. He’s not mythologizing the city; he’s asserting a durable emotional infrastructure that resists being overwritten by professional geography.
Contextually, this is the kind of statement writers make when they don’t want their work reduced to an “L.A. writer” label. He’s protecting his narrative of origin, and quietly reminding you that success doesn’t have to come with apostasy.
Quote Details
| Topic | Family |
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