FRONT AND CENTER (STAGE)

He writes, he tells stories, he sings. He’s Lake Forest octogenarian Steve Weiland, an open-mic regular at Gorton Center and a rookie author

Steve Weiland liked to crack wise from his seat in the back row of classrooms during his Loyola Academy years. “It was where I always sat, where I always had to sit,” he recalls. “My last name begins with ‘W’. I’d make snide remarks—remarks that teachers couldn’t hear. But I wasn’t a class clown. I enjoyed making people smile. I still do.”

Now, though, Weiland—a Lake Forest resident since 1979 and a retiree who founded and sold a trio of commercial software companies—occasionally delivers his brand of humor, along with his engaging storytelling, from the front of a teacher-less room. Specifically, it’s a cozy space at Gorton Center. The free event, staged on the second Wednesday (7:15 p.m.-9:15 p.m.) of each month, is called “Do Not Submit Lake Forest.” It’s an open-mic opportunity.

“You’re allowed to sing, dance, tell stories, read poetry, or share practically anything with audiences that range from five to 35 people,” says Weiland, who completed the unofficial “Renaissance Man” double major (BS in Engineering, BA in Fine Arts) at the University of Notre Dame. “You’re given seven minutes to do your thing before it’s the next person’s turn. It’s fun. I’ve done it four times. One time, though, I had to stop talking because my seven minutes were up.”

In late January, Weiland, 86, noted his April 8 appearance at Gorton would spotlight the importance of storytelling, especially among family members. “My parents lived through the Depression era,” says the Rogers Park native. “They never told me stories; I never asked them to tell me stories. I knew very little about them.”

Weiland’s three sons know tons about Dad. So do certain readers. Mr. Weiland wrote his first book, Not Quite Everyman, last year. He also penned political essays, a short story, and a bittersweet story in 2025. Talk about a prolific-plus pace!

“I started writing down observations, thoughts, opinions, and life-defining events 25 to 30 years ago,” he says. Some 800,000 words on some 700 pages later, Weiland decided to organize these pages and publish them. “I had this huge tub of words and strung them together,” he says. “It was easy. There’s a need to get stories out there, and you shouldn’t be afraid to tell them. That’s what I tell people when they ask, ‘Why did you write the book?'”

After retiring, Weiland served Waukegan’s Cristo Rey St. Martin College Prep and Chicago’s Josephinum Academy as an approachable, inventive volunteer assistant teacher for several years. Weiland is the kind of educator who’d explain the Pythagorean theorem to students and later captivate them by informing them of the Ancient Greeks’ measuring of the distance between Planet Earth and the sun.

“The light came on for one of my struggling students one day after I went over some things with him on a piece of paper,” Weiland says. “At the end of class, as I was about to throw the piece of paper out, he asked me if he could keep it.”

At the end of the day, Steve Weiland is all about joy—and eliciting smiles along the way. “My youngest, Peter, has a bass voice,” Weiland says. “He loves to sing. Together, while walking along a street in Chicago or in Lake Forest, we’d burst into song. ‘Summertime’ is the song we usually perform. Half of the people around us usually look away or hurry away, but a few choose to sing along with us.”