The Merriest Springald in Our Pandemic: Part III - Wesley Invites Over COVID-19 Refugees

Fear is a survival characteristic, but it makes us vulnerable to the impulse—or demand—that we surrender control to somebody else." J.D. Tuccille in Reason

"The current outbreak is thought to have started in a food market in Wuhan, China. But uncertainties remain: Researchers are still not sure which animal started the outbreak. DNA evidence suggests it’s likely related to bats (which also were the origin of the SARS coronavirus outbreak in 2003). But there’s also new, unconfirmed evidence, that the illegal pangolin trade may be implicated."  VOX

“To be clear, there is nothing good about twice as many people having this virus, or worse, dying from it, no matter how long the increase takes,” Governor JB Pritzker

" Wellington, Come on back!"  Governor JB Pritzker


Recap Parts I-II

Wesley Dioneo is the only son of Chicagoland real estate tycoon, Martin Dioneo and his society maven wife Allyson.  Martin Dioneo caught the COVID-19 virus from his Laplander personal trainer and is on a ventilator in Chicago's Northwestern Medical Center.  Allyson is holed up in the couple's massive east Lake Shore Drive apartment building a score of yards from the iconic Drake Hotel.

Allyson has sent Wesley Dioneo to the family get-away home at Stop 30 lake Shore Drive in Long Beach, Indiana. Wesley is a senior at St. Ignatius College Prep and had been since the school shut down on March 16, 2020.  Ally immediately sent Wesley to Long Beach, where he can be safe.

PART III:  Wesley Invites fellow COVID -19 Refugees over to Stop 30 after Easter is Cancelled

Imagine that you are an eighteen year old male, you come from  great wealth and privilege, that your father is leaning heavily on Death's Door with a virus that began because some goof wanted to dine on an exotic bat in Red China and that you have been living in isolation at a vacation home on the shores of one of the planet's most beautiful inland seas - a fresh water sea, mind you and that you are a person of great personal charm, intelligence, wit and Ambition - imagine.

Well, Wesley assessed all of his plus column blessings against the force of State and municipal executive orders, the skewed evidence of the dangers the virus COVID-19 might pose, the maternal apothegm hung around his neck upon stepping aboard the 509 South Shore Line eastbound train from Millenium Park  to Carroll Street Michigan City, " Behave and have fun, but no parties." and determined after two weeks of isolation that enough was a feast.

Wesley said to himself, "  The Nardo Bros.  are lonesome and Halib keeps texting me. We can social distance right at home."  Wesley text messaged his three pals, the Brothers Nardo, day students at La Lumiere and Halib Samer, teh smartest student at Marquette High School. to come over and Supe Smash Brother Ultimate the hours away and quaff some of Dad's Czech beers.

Declan  and Brian Nardo lived in Long Beach year around  with their parents and three sisters.   Their Dad Sal Nardo was a Machinist with Areclor Mittal in Burns Harbor and their Mom was a grammar school principal in Chesterton.  Halib Samer lived in a ranch house  near the Botanical Gardens with his mother.  Halib's Dad was killed in a car wreck in 2016 and his Mother worked in HR at Franciscan Hospital and grieved mightily.

Halib was accepted for admission to University of Michigan where he planned to study biology.  Halib was a master of the intricacies involved in staying alive in Smash Brothers and ran teh Marquette High School Friday Smash Brothers after classes set-to that attracted scores of would be Smash Brothers winners. Halib took down most comers.  He could not beat Amy Briddlestone.  Not only the prettiest member of the student body but the most aggressive and deadly Smash Brothers paddle smith.

Halib was madly in love with Ms. Briddlestone.

Wesley was plagued with text messages from the fetching young Amy, Marquette HS Class of 2022.  Amy made nice with Halib, in order to get close to the yummy and brilliant Wesley.  There was no way that Wesley would have anything to do with Amy of a 'relationship'  nature, because Halib was a friend.  Wesley had developed a code thanks to his Grandpa Bosco.  From his earliest memory, Wesley learned the lessons of human obligation from a man who lost toes walking that rigorous walk out of the Frozen Chosin in 1950.   Wesley wanted to aspire to be just such a man and no Amy could ever part him from that path.

Wesley asked his three best friends over and they would eat pizza, subs, ice cream and quaff Czech beers, while trying to destroy one another in Smash Brothers Ultimate.

Wesley called Northwestern and talked to Dr. Jay Standring, MD - Notre Dame & Loyola Med.  His Dad's temperature was still scary high and struggled to breathe on his own.  He was off the ventilator.  Wesley prayed.

An hour later called the Nardo Brothers and Halib Samer.

Coming in Part IV - Four men and six ladies violate the Executive Orders.

The Merriest Springald in our Pandemic - Meet Wesley Dioneo, Class of 2020: Part II

"I'm the public face of this city.  "I'm on national media, and I'm out in the public eye. The woman who cut my hair had a mask and gloves on so we are, I am practicing what I'm preaching." Mayor Lori Lightfoot on violating her Executive Orders.

Part One: Recap

Martin Dioneo, a top Chicago real estate Developer, is felled by the Coronavirus and placed on a respiratory ventilator in Northwestern Medical Center in March 2020.  His wife, socialite activist Allyson, waits out the virus in their massive East Lake Shore Drive Home and sends the couple's only son Wesley, a senior at St. Ignatius College Prep to the family vaction home in Long Beach, Indiana.  There are no schools, businesses, barbershops, saloons, or eateries open and citizens hunker down where they can.  Wesley will invite ten friends to his home to tell their stories and drink Martin Dioneo's supply of Imported Czech beers. 

Martin Dioneo had one son, Wesley.  Wesley was tall and lanky and had a slightly smirky quality about him that disarmed even the most hardened cynic.  Wesley had good genes from a his second generation Italian American Dad and his Midwestern Methodist WOKE mother Allyson -  the family conscience. Born in Long Grove, Illinois to Chuck Percy Republicans, Malcolm and Libby Coldtiquer.  Mal had been a co-pilot on a C-87 that flew Gen. George Marshall anywhere he wanted to go in the continental United States. Libby worked at Bell & Howell in Wheeling, Illinois. Libby worked with the future Illinois Senator Chuck Percy, when he was that camera and lens manufacturer's legal wunderkind.

The Coldtiquers were major players in the Illinois GOP and Planned Parenthood. No family should have more than one kid.   "Plan for one and act on the rest," was Libby's mantra.  Allyson was Libby's girl and trained the offspring t o speak her mind even when not asked or needed and to be always assertive.  Mal was always a co-pilot and let Libby turn Daddy's little girl into a force of nature who would dominate her peers from Campfire Girls to League of Women Voters to Mayor Lori Lightfoot's task force on Sexually Transmitted Diseases. Allyson was a crowd.  Her opinions and thoughts were always backed by wealth and privilege.  Marrying a titan of Chicago's real estate Olympus helped metastazize those impressive waves utterance.  WTTW included Allyson Dioneo to every panel on women, wrongful imprisonment, LGBTQ issues, legal Weed, fashion and philanthropy and don't get her started on the late-Cardinal Francis George.   Thank Gaia for Chicago' s new Catholic Ordinary, Allyson could now attend Christmas and Easter services ( well not this year anyway) at Holy Name.

Allyson Dioneo was what one might call an attractive female, were one not WOKE.

She attracted a young energetic DePaul University  School of Business MBA who bore a striking resemblance to a young Tony Curtis. Allyson set her hooks for Martin Dioneo after their second abortion together.  They had three over a period of six years, while lived in Old Town tear-downs and later  Lincoln Park brownstones.  Martin was bothered by the abortions more because for his traditionalist mother and father, than by the loss of tissue with his DNA.  Allyson worked the same doctrinal charms on Martin as she did upon Joel Weiseman and Phil Ponce.

When Martin could afford a plot of land and air-rights on East Lake Shore Drive, the Dioneo's could add a third member to their living space.

Wesley Bosco Dioneo was born on October 14, 2002.  He was a beautiful baby, an adorable infant/toddler,  a fiesty pre-schooler and an able, affable and athletic elementary and high schooler.  He was the kid that Moms and Dads wanted their kids to hang-out with, if not become.

Wesley mattered.

He was captain of soccer team, a reliable substitute on the basketball teams up until senior year when he called it quits, a witty and skilled forensic debater and a constant A Honor Roll member who was not interested in NHS in the least bit.   Wesley could care less about the service requirements.  He was a scholar, a leader and his character rejected the notion of do-gooder play acting at soup kitchens and old folks homes.

Wesley was not a cynical smart-ass.

He was genuine, direct and honest.

In fact, he was very much like his Dad and Grandpa Dioneo. Old Bosco Dioneo was a Korean War hero of the Chosin Resorvoir.  He lost three toes to froistbite and carried a few ounces of Chinese and Russian metal in his back, legs and fore arms.  He refused to accept the Purple Heart, because, in his words, " I was never hit.  No Chinaman could shoot me."  Bosco had been raised a few doors down from Saint 's Mother Cabrini's Columbus Hospital - it is a hipster real estate development now. What is not?

Bosco Dioneo was a lumber man and taught his grandson Wesley to respect the beauty, the smell and the sacred nature of wood.  He taught Wesley to carve, as well as cut lumber like a man.

Wesley was tall, lanky and as darkly beautiful as Sandro Botticelli's St. Sebastian.   Like a Chicago Medici, the son of Martin Dioneo could afford to commission painting of himself, but that called too much attention away from who was Wesley Dioneo

His peers and class mates knew Wesley Dioneo and that loved and respected him. He liked girls and respected them, in the old world manner of his grandfather.

When COVID-19 felled his father and his mother exiled Wesley to a  Long Beach self-quarantine, The girls of Saint Ignahtius, Mother McAuley, Marquette Catholic and La Lumiere School called Wesley with sympathy - real and feigned.

Wesley had three close males friends  The Nardo Brothers, who attended La Lumiere School and Halib Samer, the son of Lebanese immigrants who went o Marquette High School in Michigan City.

Wesley invited seven girls and his three buddies over to tell their own stories and punish Martin Dioneo's supply of Czech beers.

Wesley was a good kid.

The Merriest Springald in Our Pandemic: Wesley Dioneo Has the Gang Over for Tales and Tall Boys. Part One

“For the vast majority of you already taking precautions, your lives will not change very much,” Governor J. B. Pritzker March 2020


In this sore affliction and misery of our city, the reverend authority of the laws, both human and divine, was all in a manner dissolved and fallen into decay, for [lack of] the ministers and executors thereof, who, like other men, were all either dead or sick or else left so destitute of followers that they were unable to exercise any office, wherefore every one had license to do whatsoever pleased him. Many others held a middle course between the two aforesaid, not straitening themselves so exactly in the matter of diet as the first neither allowing themselves such license in drinking and other debauchery as the second, but using things in sufficiency, according to their appetites; nor did they seclude themselves, but went about, carrying in their hands, some flowers, some odoriferous herbs and other some4 divers kinds of series,[7] which they set often to their noses, accounting it an excellent thing to fortify the brain with such odours, more by token that the air seemed all heavy and attainted with the stench of the dead bodies and that of the sick and of the remedies used. Giovanni Boccaccio Decameron  1492

Along the  Northwest  Indiana shoreline sits a rosary of beach communities hugging the evaporating shores of Lake Michigan, which has burglarized the sandy real estate, as is its wont every thirty years.
This year was special as the Great Lake flung iits doors open to an air-borne global pestilence - Covid 19. In one of these beads of the affluent rosary sat the get-away home of Martin Dioneo.

Martin Dioneo operated a real estate realm that included most of the prime suburban properties on the Chicago metropolitan necklace - Barrington, Winnetka, Wilmette, Hawthorn Woods, Glencoe and many holdings in Beverly touching on Longwood Drive, Hyde Park along the Midway and Evanston near Sheridan Road.  Martin Dioneo rubbed shoulders with the John Bucks and Jim Carlins, but was quite a few pegs below their august places on the urban corporate taxonomy.  Martin Dioneo was beyond comfortable, but retained his working class sensibilities honed to the heel of his moral blade, as opposed to the point.   He respected a working man, but what do his damnedest to avoid actually putting spade to soil.   Martin's father had been a lumber man and very successful one in Bridegport and later Evergreen Park, Illinois.  It was lumber that allowed Martin to make his foray into the cut-throat world of urban and suburban real estate development.  Martin  Dioneo was felled by a bug that originated in Wuhan China, because someone wanted to eat a bat.

Martin was a member of the East Bank Club, until he had his apartment building
on East Lake Shore Drive fitted out with the latest and greatest physical fitness equipment and a personal trainer from Lapland in Finland to bully-rag and encourage him through his ever changing regimen of workouts.  Gaelbu , Martin's Sami trainer from the great state of Ustjoki, travelled to Paris over the Christmas Holidays and was infected with the Covid 19 bug and brought the affliction home to Martin Dioneo - Et in Arcadia, Ego!  Also, in high-priced real estate along Chicago's Lake Front.

In  early March of 2020, Martin Dioneo was in the isolation unit of Northwestern University Hospital.

Martin's wife Allyson sent her son Wesley, a senior at St. Ignatius College Prep to their vacation home at Stop 30 in Long Beach, Indiana,  to wait out the plague. 

Wesley Dioneo was a very popular young man who had only just been accepted to begin classes at Yale in the fall of 2020. 

While Martin struggled for breath on the ventilator at Northwestern Med Center, and Allyson hunkered down on East Lake Shore Drive, Wesley could be trusted with the keys to the family vacation compound in Indiana. 

What to do?



Coming up next - Wesley operates the garage doors and lets in a half score of privileged young people for beers and home-made stories.