Room With a...View?

Sometimes there's a kind of unrealised beauty in the mundane. Beauty may be a bit strong. Fascination may be a better word. And decay and deprivation and dirt can be fascinating –and gross at the same time. Stopping over in Chicago for one night with little money I found a cheap hotel; the room was ..quaiI don't think the window-cleaner had been there since there either. The rest of the room was ok; it was just the windows that left something to be desired. But the caked layers of dust and cobwebs that filled the gaps between the two panes somehow also filtered the sunlight fractioning it into interesting shadows and patterns. One was left feeling the passing of time, of the stream of guests that must have stood right here, right back to when the windows were first installed and first cleaned; feeling history and and the story of their lives. The hotel was never going to score high on anyone's rating, but standing here really did make me think about the city. Location: Chicago, USA