Los Angeles. The sun - kissed taste of sandy freedom, smoggy alleyways and city tenements, stars, the heart of plastic grandeur, an American Dream personified.

I was holed up in a pad on Venice beach in between jobs. I had no furniture. It was after a break-up.

I met her eight years ago at Holy Cross Hospital where I worked in West Englewood. A poor people’s hospital on Chicago’s south side.