Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
drawing in. By four o'clock the daylight was going. By five the sun had dropped out of the
cloudsandwasslottingintothedistanthills,likeacoingoingintoapiggybank.Ataplace
calledFerryville,IcamesuddenlyupagainsttheMississippiRiver.Itfairlytookmybreath
away, it was so broad and beautiful and graceful lying there all flat and calm. In the setting
sun it looked like liquid stainless steel.
Onthefarbank,aboutamileaway,wasIowa.Home.Ifeltastrangesqueezeofexcitement
that made me hunch up closer to the wheel. I drove for twenty miles down the eastern side
of the river, gazing across to the high dark bluffs on the Iowa side. At Prairie du Chien I
crossed the river on an iron bridge full of struts and crossbars. And then I was in Iowa. I
actually felt my heart quicken. I was home. This was my state. My license plate matched
everyone else's. No one would look at me as if to say, “What are you doing here?” I be-
longed.
In the fading light, I drove almost randomly around northeast Iowa. Every couple of miles
I would pass a farmer on a tractor juddering along the highway, heading home to dinner on
one of the sprawling farms up in these sheltered hills above the Mississippi. It was Friday,
one of the big days of the farmers week. He would wash his arms and neck and sit down
withhisfamilytoatablecoveredwithgreatbowlsoffood.Theywouldsaygracetogether.
After dinner the family would drive into Hooterville and sit out in the cold October air and
through their steamy breath watch the Hooterville High Blue Devils beat Kraut City 28-7
at football. The farmer's son, Merle, Jr., would score three of the touchdowns. Afterwards
Merle senior would go to Ed's Tavern to celebrate (two beers, never more) and receive the
admiration of the community for his son's prowess. Then it would be home to bed and up
early in the frosty dawn to go out hunting for deer with his best friends, Ed and Art and
Wally, trudging across the fallow fields, savoring the clean air and companionship. I was
seized with a huge envy for these people and their unassuming lives. It must be wonderful
to live in a safe and timeless place, where you know everyone and everyone knows you,
and you can all count on each other. I envied them their sense of community, their football
games, their bring-and-bake sales, their church socials. And I felt guilty for mocking them.
They were good people.
I drove through the seamless blackness, past Millville, New Vienna, Cascade, Scotch
Grove. Every once in a while I would pass a distant farmhouse whose windows were pools
ofyellowlight,warmandinviting.Occasionallytherewouldbealargertown,withamuch
larger pool of light scooped out of the darkness-the high-school football field, where the
week's game was in progress. These football fields lit up the night; they were visible from
miles off. As I drove through each town, it was clear that everybody was out at the game.
There was nobody on the streets. Apart from one forlorn teenaged girl standing behind the
