Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
nobodyeverquiteknows),thehighwaybridgeovertheMississippiRiveratDavenport(all
the cars seemed to be hurrying towards Illinois), a field of waving corn, the bridge over
the Missouri River at Council Bluffs and the Little Brown Church in the Vale again, taken
from another angle. I can remember thinking even then that there must be more to life than
that.
Then one gray Sunday afternoon when I was about ten I was watching TV and there was
a documentary on about moviemaking in Europe. One clip showed Anthony Perkins walk-
ing along some sloping city street at dusk. I don't remember now if it was Rome or Paris,
but the street was cobbled and shiny with rain and Perkins was hunched deep in a trench
coatandIthought:“Hey,cestmoi!”Ibegantoread-no,IbegantoconsumeNationalGeo-
graphic, with their pictures of glowing Lapps and mist-shrouded castles and ancient cities
of infinite charm. From that moment, I wanted to be a European boy. I wanted to live in an
apartment across from a park in the heart of a city, and from my bedroom window look out
ona crowded vista ofhills and rooftops. Iwanted to ride trams and understand strange lan-
guages.IwantedfriendsnamedWernerandMarcowhoworeshortpantsandplayedsoccer
in the street and owned toys made of wood. I cannot for the life of me think why. I wanted
my mother to send me out to buy long loaves of bread from a shop with a wooden pretzel
hanging above the entrance. I wanted to step outside my front door and be somewhere.
As soon as I was old enough I left. I left Des Moines and Iowa and the United States and
the war in Vietnam and Watergate, and settled across the world. And now when I came
home it was to
a foreign country, full of serial murderers and sports teams in the wrong towns (the Indi-
anapolis Colts? the Phoenix Cardinals?) and a personable old fart who was president. My
mother knew that personable old fart when he was a sportscaster called Dutch Reagan at
WHO Radio in Des Moines. “He was just a nice, friendly, kind of dopey guy,” my mother
says.
Which, come to that, is a pretty fair description of most Iowans. Don't get me wrong. I
am not for a moment suggesting that Iowans are mentally deficient. They are a decidedly
intelligent and sensible people who, despite their natural conservatism, have always been
preparedtoelectaconscientious,clearthinkingliberalinpreferencetosomecretinouscon-
servative. (This used to drive Mr. Piper practically insane.) And Iowans, I am proud to tell
you, have the highest literacy rate in the nation: 99.5 percent of grownups there can read.
WhenIsaytheyarekindofdopeyImeanthattheyaretrustingandamiableandopen.They
are a tad slow, certainly-when you tell an Iowan a joke, you can see a kind of race going
onbetweenhisbrainandhisexpression-butit'snotbecausethey'reincapableofhighspeed
