The Chicago Journal

The Chicago Journal
The Chicago Journal

Michele Kwasniewski Worked on Independence Day and Big Brother and Then Wrote the YA Novel That Uses Everything She Learned About How Entertainment Really Works

The Chicago Journal Staff on September 5, 2026

By: Roxanne Jeffrey

There is a difference between knowing how an industry works from the outside and knowing it from the inside, and that difference shows up in fiction in ways that are immediately legible to anyone who has been in the room. Michele Kwasniewski has been in the room, many times, in many different capacities, as a film set assistant on major Hollywood productions including Independence Day, Face/Off, and Evita, and as a production manager on television shows including Big Brother that required her to understand not just the technical logistics of entertainment but the human dynamics that make those logistics either function or collapse. When she writes about the music industry in Rising Star, the details feel borrowed from memory rather than from research, and that quality of recall is what gives the novel its particular and valuable authenticity.

Dani Truehart is fifteen, talented, and living a version of her life that has been substantially shaped by her mother’s ambitions rather than her own. The decision to accept her coach Martin’s guardianship offer is both an escape and a leap into an unknown that is at least partly of her own choosing, and Kwasniewski handles the ambiguity of that leap with a precision that reflects genuine understanding of how young people actually navigate the gap between the lives they have been given and the lives they are beginning to suspect they might want. Dani is not naive, exactly, but she is still in the process of learning to read the adults around her with the skepticism that the industry she is entering demands, and the gap between what she perceives and what the reader gradually begins to understand is one of the novel’s most effectively deployed sources of tension.

The producer Redman is drawn with the specificity of someone who has worked alongside many versions of him, successful and dubious in proportions that are genuinely difficult to separate at first encounter. He hears Dani’s first performance and his amazement is real, his recognition of her talent is real, and the offer he makes is real and also not entirely what it appears to be in ways that Dani is only beginning to understand. Martin’s sincerity is a sustained question rather than an answered one, a position that requires genuine novelistic skill to maintain across a full-length novel without becoming either a sustained false alarm or a premature revelation. Kwasniewski maintains it successfully, and the result is a mentor figure who is more interesting and more useful for a YA audience than either a simple trustworthy adult or a simple predator would have been.

What makes Rising Star work as a novel, rather than simply as an authentic portrayal of an industry, is Kwasniewski’s insistence on keeping Dani fully human throughout. The career is never more important than the girl pursuing it, and that priority is what makes this book genuinely valuable for its YA audience. Her relationship with her boyfriend Sean, her complicated family dynamics, the friends who knew her before the career arrived and who are becoming harder to reach as the career makes increasing demands, all of these are given the same care and the same specificity that the industry material receives, and the result is a novel in which the entertainment world illuminates Dani rather than overwhelming her.

Kwasniewski has written a debut that announces a writer ready to do serious work in YA fiction, with the insider knowledge to make the world she is depicting feel real and the emotional intelligence to make the person navigating it feel genuinely worth caring about.

The novel offers a portrait of the music industry from someone who worked inside it, and it is available in paperback, ebook, and audiobook editions through Rising Star on Amazon.

From San Antonio to the Second City, Jeremy Parsons’ Life Speaks Chicago’s Language.

The Chicago Journal Staff on September 5, 2026

By: Daniel Whitaker

Chicago has never needed Nashville’s permission to understand country music.

Long before “Americana” became an industry category, this city understood what happened when rural songs collided with urban lives. Chicago’s country lineage stretches from the National Barn Dance and the transplanted Southern honky-tonks of Uptown to the folk tradition that produced John Prine and Steve Goodman, and later to the insurgent-country world surrounding Bloodshot Records, Robbie Fulks and the city’s alternative-country scene.

It’s worth remembering that history while listening to Texas singer-songwriter Jeremy Parsons’ five-song EP, Life.

Parsons doesn’t sound like Chicago. He doesn’t need to. What connects Life to this city is an attitude: ordinary lives are worthy subjects for serious songs.

Released through MTS Records, the roughly 20-minute EP consists of “Tickin’,” “The Garden,” “Who Was I,” “Humanity,” and “Life Worth Dyin’ For.” Together, they amount to Parsons standing in front of life’s bathroom mirror and deciding not to turn away when the lighting gets unflattering.

That begins with “Tickin’.”

Chicagoans know something about clocks. Trains arrive, or don’t. Shifts begin. Winters come. Summers vanish absurdly fast. Parsons uses the ticking clock as a reminder that time isn’t waiting for anybody to get organized.

But “Tickin’” isn’t some hustle-culture sermon telling listeners to monetize every waking second. Parsons is interested in something more humane. Youth can be wasted and still be useful if the mistakes teach you something.

That’s a very Midwestern proposition: quit whining, learn from it, keep moving.

“The Garden” is gentler. Drawing on Parsons’ background as the son of a horticulturist, the song asks what’s growing in another person’s garden and whether its condition reflects what’s happening inside the person tending it. The gardening metaphor becomes a meditation on resilience, patience, and emotional maintenance.

It’s easy to imagine the song landing differently in Chicago around February.

Here, gardening requires faith.

You stare at frozen dirt knowing, or at least hoping, that something underneath it remains alive. Parsons understands that human beings operate much the same way. We endure seasons that don’t look productive from the outside.

Then comes “Who Was I,” the EP’s finest song.

Parsons looks back at himself at 25 and doesn’t encounter a budding American hero. He finds a drifter getting high, sleeping through days and living through nights while his parents had already accumulated the traditional markers of adulthood.

They had stability.

He had a dream.

That dream eventually carried Parsons to Nashville, but the fantasy didn’t unfold according to script. He ultimately moved back in with his father at 32. What could have become a humiliating footnote instead becomes part of the song’s emotional architecture.

Parsons wonders who’s chasing whom, the man or the dream.

John Prine would have understood the value of that question. So would Steve Goodman. Chicago’s greatest songwriting tradition has always found drama in people whose lives didn’t proceed according to brochure. Prine famously worked as a mail carrier while developing his songs in Chicago clubs; Goodman likewise emerged from the city’s folk scene before both became defining American songwriters.

Parsons belongs to a different generation and comes from a different part of the country, but “Who Was I” shares their belief that specificity beats mythology.

Then Life leaves autobiography behind.

On “Humanity,” Parsons confronts judgment, division, and our increasingly impressive ability to talk past one another. He admits his own limitations instead of positioning himself as the enlightened guy with the answers. The song’s recurring image of good and bad seeds connects neatly back to “The Garden,” giving the EP a thematic continuity greater than its five-song length might suggest.

If “Humanity” diagnoses the problem, “Life Worth Dyin’ For” offers Parsons’ answer.

Not a solution.

An answer.

Love. Laughter. Failure. Getting back up. Doing whatever good you’re capable of doing while you’ve still got time.

Parsons imagines reaching the end, able to say that he lived fully enough to accept the conclusion. It’s potentially dangerous territory for a songwriter (the title alone could become a motivational bumper sticker), but the previous four songs have earned the sentiment.

That’s what makes Life work.

Parsons doesn’t begin with wisdom.

He arrives there.

The sequence matters. “Tickin’” establishes mortality. “The Garden” introduces cultivation. “Who Was I” confronts the past. “Humanity” expands the perspective beyond the individual. “Life Worth Dyin’ For” finally asks what all of it adds up to. Critics have similarly noted the record’s cohesive emotional arc and its movement from personal reflection toward broader questions of connection and meaning.

And that’s where Chicago enters the picture again.

This city has historically embraced roots music with dirt beneath its fingernails. Its country and folk traditions weren’t imported merely for nostalgia; musicians here reshaped those traditions around migration, work, disappointment, and reinvention. Chicago became a place where country could meet punk, folk could become literature, and a songwriter didn’t have to wear the proper costume to tell a convincing story.

Jeremy Parsons would make sense in that lineage.

Life isn’t slick enough to disguise its author, and that’s a compliment. Its ambitions are human-sized. Parsons isn’t trying to explain existence in five songs.

He’s documenting what he’s learned from his portion of it.

For Chicago listeners accustomed to songwriters who value truth over polish, that’s plenty.

Because whether you’re staring across a Texas highway or waiting on an L platform with February wind cutting through your coat, the clock sounds exactly the same.

It keeps tickin’.

Ashley Puckett’s “Anchor” Finds Strength in Staying Put

The Chicago Journal Staff on September 5, 2026

By: Jack Sullivan

Chicago knows something about weathering storms. We know the particular violence of a January wind coming off Lake Michigan, the gray afternoons when the skyline seems to disappear into the clouds, and those unpredictable days when the lake can look peaceful in the morning and downright hostile by nightfall. Around here, an anchor isn’t merely a romantic metaphor. It’s something that keeps you from drifting when the water decides not to cooperate.

That makes Ashley Puckett’s “Anchor” particularly easy to understand from a Chicago point of view.

The Pennsylvania country singer-songwriter takes a familiar image, being somebody’s anchor, and builds a surprisingly vulnerable song around it. Co-written by Puckett with Andrew Douglas and Nathan Beatty, “Anchor” isn’t about rescuing somebody or pretending love can magically repair everything. Instead, it makes a quieter proposition. When somebody you love is struggling, sometimes the most meaningful thing you can do is remain.

That might not sound groundbreaking, but Puckett makes it matter.

From the beginning, she establishes that the narrator isn’t approaching another person’s troubles from a position of superiority. She’s been close to the bottom herself. She knows everybody carries burdens that are difficult to discuss, and that experience gives her offer of support credibility.

There’s a Midwestern practicality to the sentiment.

Chicago audiences have historically responded to music that feels earned rather than manufactured. From blues clubs on the South Side to country rooms across Chicagoland, there’s always been respect here for performers who can tell a story without dressing it up beyond recognition. Puckett’s greatest strength on “Anchor” is precisely that lack of pretense.

The song’s central metaphor does most of the heavy lifting.

An anchor can’t stop a storm. It can’t flatten the waves or turn February into July. It can only keep you from being carried somewhere you don’t want to go.

Puckett understands that distinction.

Her narrator offers another person enough stability to confront whatever they’re experiencing, even though that person isn’t certain about the relationship itself. There’s no guarantee that patience will be rewarded. That’s what gives the song tension. Staying beside someone when you know they’ll stay beside you is easy. Remaining when the outcome is uncertain requires considerably more faith.

Puckett sings the material with an appealing restraint. She has the voice to push harder, but “Anchor” doesn’t need to become a vocal Olympics event. Instead, she lets the emotion gather gradually. Her performance has enough polish for contemporary country radio without losing the sense that there’s an actual human being behind the microphone.

That’s increasingly valuable.

Country music in 2026 is a sprawling business, with everything from pop-country hybrids to traditional revivalists competing for space. In that environment, Puckett doesn’t attempt to win by being louder than everybody else. “Anchor” succeeds through storytelling.

The strongest writing comes when the song subtly reconsiders what it means to be “broken.”

Initially, the narrator offers support while the person she loves takes time to repair what they believe is damaged. Later, that idea shifts: perhaps they don’t need fixing at all. Perhaps they need enough time and support to recognize that pain hasn’t made them broken.

That’s a much more interesting idea than the standard “my love will save you” narrative.

And from a Chicago perspective, it feels familiar.

This is a city where toughness is sometimes confused with pretending nothing hurts. We endure the winters, complain about the construction, argue about sports, and keep moving. But real resilience isn’t necessarily about refusing help. Sometimes it’s about knowing when to let somebody stand beside you.

“Anchor” lives in that space.

Puckett’s own career makes the message more convincing. Raised near Pittsburgh rather than Nashville, she’s built her path incrementally through songwriting, performing, and independent releases. Songs including “Medicine,” “Bulletproof,” “Tequila,” and “Anchor” have helped establish an artist whose identity increasingly revolves around emotional directness.

Puckett has described “Anchor” as a turning point in her songwriting because it came from genuine heartbreak and showed her that listeners would respond when she stopped softening what she really wanted to say.

That realization is audible here.

The record isn’t perfect because perfection would almost work against it. The anchor metaphor is familiar, and anyone who has listened to enough country and pop music has heard plenty of storms, waves, and troubled waters. But originality isn’t always about inventing an image nobody has encountered before. Sometimes it’s about putting enough of yourself into an old image that listeners see it differently.

Puckett does that.

Maybe that’s why “Anchor” feels at home beside Lake Michigan. Stand along the lakefront on a rough day, and you’re reminded quickly that strength doesn’t mean controlling the water. You can’t.

You hold your ground.

That’s essentially what Ashley Puckett is singing about: loving someone without demanding that they become perfect first, remaining present through uncertainty, and offering stability without pretending you can control the storm.

In Chicago, we’d call that pretty solid advice.

Chicago’s Tap Water: Where It Comes From, What’s in It, and What Residents in Older Buildings Should Know About Lead

The Chicago Journal Staff 2 on September 5, 2026

Chicago draws 100% of its drinking water from Lake Michigan through offshore intake structures that have served the city since the 1860s. The water is treated at two purification plants and distributed through 4,300 miles of water mains to roughly 2.7 million city residents and an additional 125 suburban communities, serving more than 5 million people in total. The treated water meets all current federal and state drinking water standards. The problem is not the water leaving the treatment plant. The problem is what happens between the water main and the kitchen tap, where an estimated 412,000 lead service lines, the largest inventory of any city in the United States, connect the public system to individual homes. Chicago’s plumbing code required lead service lines for residential connections until the federal lead ban took effect in 1986, decades after most other major cities had moved to copper or other materials.

Key Takeaways

  • Chicago’s drinking water enters the system through two active intake cribs positioned two to four miles offshore in Lake Michigan, where water is drawn from depths of 20 to 30 feet and transported through tunnels approximately 200 feet beneath the lake bed.
  • The Jardine Water Purification Plant on the North Side and the Eugene Sawyer Water Purification Plant on the South Side treat the city’s entire supply, with the Jardine plant ranking as the largest conventional water treatment facility in the world.
  • Chicago has approximately 412,000 lead service lines out of roughly 491,000 total service connections, according to the inventory the city submitted to the Illinois EPA in April 2025.
  • The city replaced roughly 7,000 lead service lines in 2025 and is targeting 10,000 replacements in 2026, but at current pace, full replacement would not be completed until 2076, three decades past the federal EPA deadline.
  • No PFAS compounds were detected above minimum reporting levels in Chicago’s water during EPA monitoring conducted between 2023 and 2025, an uncommon result among large U.S. cities.

Lake Michigan Water Reaches Chicago Through Intake Cribs Built Over a Century Ago

Chicago’s water supply infrastructure dates to 1867, when city engineer Ellis Chesbrough completed the first offshore intake crib to draw clean water from beyond the reach of the sewage and industrial runoff that had contaminated the shoreline. The concept was straightforward: build a structure far enough into Lake Michigan that the water would be free of nearshore pollution, then tunnel beneath the lake bed to bring it to shore. Two crews, one digging outward from the shoreline and one digging inward from the crib, worked with picks, shovels, and mules 24 hours a day for two years before meeting in the middle. The alignment was off by just 7.5 inches.

Nine intake cribs were eventually built off Chicago’s shores. Six are still standing, but only two remain in active use. These two active cribs draw water from depths of 20 to 30 feet, below the surface turbulence and thermal layers that carry sediment and biological matter. The water travels through tunnels approximately 200 feet beneath the lake bed to reach the city’s two purification plants: the James W. Jardine Water Purification Plant, located just north of Navy Pier, and the Eugene Sawyer Water Purification Plant on the South Side near 79th Street.

The Jardine plant is the largest conventional water treatment facility in the world. Together, the two plants supply approximately 750 million gallons of treated drinking water per day. The Chicago Department of Water Management operates laboratories that run more than 600,000 water quality analyses per year across the system, monitoring the supply around the clock every day of the year.

How Chicago Treats Its Water Before It Reaches the Distribution System

The treatment process follows a conventional sequence that moves the water through multiple stages before it enters the distribution system. After raw Lake Michigan water arrives at the purification plant through the intake tunnels, it passes through traveling screens that catch debris. Low-lift pumps raise the water approximately 25 feet for its first chemical treatment.

Aluminum sulfate or ferric sulfate coagulants are added to bind suspended particles into larger clusters called floc, a process known as coagulation and flocculation. The flocculated water then passes into settling basins, where it sits for several hours while the floc settles to the bottom, substantially reducing turbidity. The water is then filtered through precisely graded layers of sand and gravel in a process the city describes as a natural polishing step.

Filtered water flows into clearwells for final chemical treatment. Chlorine is added to disinfect the water and maintain a residual disinfectant level throughout the distribution network, which is necessary given the 4,300 miles of pipe the water must travel to reach taps across the city and suburbs. Fluoride is added at the treatment stage to support dental health, as required by Illinois state law, and is maintained well below the EPA maximum contaminant level. The city also adds orthophosphate, a corrosion inhibitor that forms a protective coating inside pipes to reduce the amount of lead that leaches into the water from older service lines and internal plumbing.

By the time treated water leaves the purification plants, it meets all federal and state drinking water standards. The city’s most recent Consumer Confidence Report shows that all regulated contaminants fall within EPA limits, including disinfection byproducts from the chlorination process. Testing for PFAS compounds under the EPA’s fifth Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule, which covered quarterly sampling from 2023 through 2025, detected no PFAS above minimum reporting levels in Chicago’s supply, a result that stands out among large U.S. cities and reflects the advantage of drawing from cold, deep Lake Michigan water rather than river sources exposed to agricultural and industrial runoff.

Why Chicago Has More Lead Service Lines Than Any Other American City

The treated water that leaves Chicago’s purification plants is not the source of lead exposure risk. The risk sits in the last stretch of pipe between the public water main under the street and the plumbing inside a home. That pipe, called a service line, is the homeowner’s responsibility in Chicago, and in approximately 412,000 of the city’s roughly 491,000 residential service connections, it is made of lead.

Chicago’s lead service line inventory is the largest in the country because the city’s plumbing code mandated the use of lead pipe for residential water connections until 1986, when the federal Safe Drinking Water Act amendments banned the use of lead in plumbing. Most other major American cities had already transitioned to copper or other materials years earlier. The result is a city where the majority of homes, particularly those built before 1986, are connected to the water main through a pipe made of a material that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says has no safe exposure level for children.

Lead enters drinking water through corrosion. When water sits in contact with lead pipe, especially during periods of non-use overnight or during the workday, lead leaches from the pipe walls into the standing water. The city’s addition of orthophosphate to the treated supply reduces but does not eliminate this leaching. Factors that increase lead levels include the age and condition of the service line, the length of time water has been sitting in the pipe, the temperature of the water, and the chemistry of the water itself. Hot water dissolves lead more readily than cold water, which is why public health guidance consistently recommends using only cold water for drinking, cooking, and preparing baby formula.

Chicago’s reported lead levels at the system-wide 90th percentile are approximately 9 parts per billion, below the current EPA action level of 15 ppb. The EPA’s updated Lead and Copper Rule Improvements, finalized in October 2024, will lower that action level to 10 ppb, narrowing the margin. The 90th percentile figure reflects a sampling methodology that measures lead at the tap in selected homes, meaning some individual homes, particularly those with older or deteriorating lead service lines, may test significantly higher than the system average.

Where the Lead Service Line Replacement Program Stands

Chicago has a lead service line replacement program underway, but the scale of the problem and the pace of work create a timeline that stretches decades. The city replaced roughly 7,000 lead service lines in 2025 and is targeting 10,000 replacements in 2026. Against a backlog of more than 400,000 lines, the city’s own submitted plan projects full completion by 2076, completing approximately 8,300 replacements per year for 50 years starting in 2027.

The federal EPA’s Lead and Copper Rule Improvements, finalized in October 2024, require most water systems to replace all lead service lines within 10 years. Because of the size of its inventory, Chicago was granted a 20-year compliance window rather than 10, but even that extended deadline would require the city to replace nearly 20,000 lines per year starting in 2027, more than double the pace of its current plan. As of mid-2025, city officials had not yet updated the submitted plan to reflect the faster federal timeline.

Funding constraints complicate the acceleration. Chicago secured a $325 million federal loan for lead line replacements, but as of late 2025, less than a third of that amount had been spent. The city has also cited workforce and contractor capacity as limiting factors. Approximately 60% of the replacements completed over the past four years occurred alongside scheduled repairs for water main breaks and leaks rather than as standalone proactive replacements, meaning the replacement work has been largely reactive rather than systematically targeted.

Several programs are currently available to Chicago homeowners. The Equity Lead Service Line Replacement Program provides free replacements for low-income households at or below 80% of the area median income in priority neighborhoods. Applications can be submitted through 311 or at the city’s lead pipes web portal. The Homeowner-Initiated Program waives up to $3,100 in permit and tap fees when a homeowner hires a licensed plumber to replace the line independently. The MeterSave Program offers free replacement in exchange for allowing installation of a smart water meter.

What Chicago Residents Can Do While Waiting for Replacement

For the hundreds of thousands of households that are years away from a proactive city replacement, the Chicago Department of Public Health recommends several interim measures to reduce lead exposure from tap water.

Flushing the cold water tap for three to five minutes before using it for drinking or cooking is the single most practical step. This clears the standing water that has been in contact with the lead service line and draws fresh water from the main. The flushing recommendation applies after any period of non-use, including overnight, after returning from work, or after a vacation. Using only cold water for drinking, cooking, and baby formula preparation reduces lead dissolution, because hot water draws more lead from pipe walls than cold water does.

Installing a water filter certified to NSF/ANSI Standard 53 for lead reduction provides an additional layer of protection. Pitcher-style filters certified to this standard are widely available and effective for point-of-use filtration at the kitchen tap. For more comprehensive removal, an under-sink reverse osmosis system certified to NSF/ANSI Standard 58 addresses lead along with other contaminants. The Chicago Department of Public Health has distributed free water filters and replacement cartridges through community events and targeted outreach in priority neighborhoods.

Residents can check whether their home has a lead service line through the city’s publicly available service line inventory, which was submitted to the Illinois EPA in April 2025 and is accessible through the Department of Water Management. The inventory identifies each service line as known lead, known non-lead, or unknown material. Homes built before 1986 are overwhelmingly likely to have lead service lines, but confirming the status through the inventory or a physical inspection provides certainty.

Free lead testing kits are available through the city’s Department of Water Management. The kits are mailed to residents on request and returned to the city’s laboratory for analysis at no charge. Testing provides a direct measurement of lead levels at the tap, which is more informative than the system-wide 90th percentile number reported in the annual water quality report, because individual home results can vary significantly depending on the service line material, internal plumbing, and water use patterns.

FAQs

Does Chicago’s Tap Water Meet Federal Safety Standards?

Chicago’s treated water meets all current EPA and Illinois EPA drinking water standards. All regulated contaminants, including disinfection byproducts, are within legal limits. The risk for individual households comes from the lead service lines and internal plumbing between the water main and the tap, not from the water as it leaves the treatment plant. The city’s 90th percentile lead level of approximately 9 ppb is below the current EPA action level of 15 ppb but above the EPA’s maximum contaminant level goal of zero.

How Can a Chicago Resident Find Out if Their Home Has a Lead Service Line?

The city’s lead service line inventory is publicly available through the Chicago Department of Water Management. Residents can search by address to see whether their service line is classified as known lead, known non-lead, or unknown material. Homes built before 1986 are the most likely to have lead connections because Chicago’s plumbing code required lead service lines for residential connections until the federal ban took effect that year.

Is There PFAS in Chicago’s Drinking Water?

EPA monitoring conducted under the Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule between 2023 and 2025 did not detect PFAS compounds above minimum reporting levels in Chicago’s water supply. This result is uncommon among large American cities and reflects the advantage of sourcing from cold, deep Lake Michigan water rather than from rivers or reservoirs exposed to industrial and agricultural contamination. Continued monitoring is ongoing as federal PFAS standards evolve.

How Long Will It Take Chicago to Replace All Lead Service Lines?

The city’s submitted plan projects completion by 2076 at a pace of roughly 8,300 replacements per year. The federal EPA’s 2024 Lead and Copper Rule Improvements grant Chicago a 20-year compliance window, which would require roughly 20,000 replacements per year starting in 2027. As of mid-2025, the city had not updated its plan to match the faster federal timeline. The city replaced approximately 7,000 lines in 2025 and is targeting 10,000 in 2026.

Should Chicago Residents Use a Water Filter?

The Chicago Department of Public Health recommends that residents in homes with lead service lines use a water filter certified to NSF/ANSI Standard 53 for lead reduction. Pitcher filters meeting this standard are an accessible option for most households. Reverse osmosis systems certified to NSF/ANSI Standard 58 offer more comprehensive contaminant removal. Flushing the cold water tap for three to five minutes before drinking or cooking, and using only cold water for consumption, are recommended regardless of whether a filter is in use.