I Often Wonder About...

21 Oct, 2025

...paths not taken in life, and my recent visit to Iowa brought up some more opportunities to wonder about.

Ever since I graduated from Cornell College in 1993, there had been several times where my life returned to Iowa. I spent a couple years after college visiting friends who were still in school, up to the point where there was a set routine for these road trips:

1. My friends M. and N. would pick me up at my parents' house in Elmhurst, as I was still living there after graduation. We would stop in at the Portillo's in Elmhurst, located at St. Charles Road and IL Route 83, with at least one member of the party ordering what we affectionately referred to as "the Grabber Deluxe:" an Italian beef and sausage combo with peppers, served wet; large cheese fries; and a large chocolate shake served in the same cup as their large sodas. I think I ate this combo exactly once, though I was a fan of the Italian beef with cheese on a croissant.
2. From Portillo's, we'd head onto Interstate 88, often stopping in at the DeKalb Oasis for a bathroom break. Odds were high that we'd also run into Cornell College students there.
3. West of Rochelle, where Interstates 39 and 88 would intersect, the effects of our heavy meal would make themselves known. Let's just say there were quite a few drives where the windows were rolled down, regardless of the outside weather.
4. At Rock Falls, IL, we'd decide to either take US Route 30 the rest of the way to Mount Vernon, IA, or to travel along Interstate 88 to its end in the Quad Cities. The advantage of taking I-88 to Interstate 80 would be more frequent bathroom breaks, particularly at the rest stop near LeClaire, IA that had vending machines whose contents M. memorized. Going hand-in-hand with frequent rest stops would be the big attraction just west of the Quad Cities: the World's Largest Truckstop in Walcott, IA. We'd often waste an hour here, playing video games and occasionally eating at one of the fast-food places if Portillo's weren't on the menu back in Elmhurst. The disadvantage of driving along I-80 was that it took longer to make it to Mount Vernon, as you had to exit the interstate in Iowa City, then drive north on IA Route 1 for 20 miles. US 30 was more direct but isolated once you were west of Clinton, IA; I-80 allowed you to drive faster, but took up more miles.
5. Regardless of the route, we would arrive in downtown Mount Vernon (such as it was, given that it's a town of 4000-ish people), then head to the bars where we knew most of our friends would be. Hijinks would ensue, etc.

I clearly enjoyed these road trips, as there were a lot of good associations with the people in the car, and at the college itself. Looking back, I think some of these associations influenced my decision to move out to Iowa City in 1997, which I had mentioned earlier in my Spokane Option post. I had connected good feelings with my time in Iowa, so I naively assumed that association would continue were I to live there. As mentioned in the linked post, that association broke down quickly, leading to the lowest points in my life. All of a sudden, Iowa became linked with personal, professional, romantic, economic, and mental failure. It was a shocking and unwelcome change that turned out to be the first of many, as detailed in this footnote from the same post. Since I've already discussed those difficult points there, no need to rehash them here. Let's move on.

A few years after the meltdown in Iowa, it's 2002 and I'm living on my own in Chicago. I had an opportunity to move out of the family house, though with the events of Iowa in mind, I had self-doubts that I'd make it on my own. My parents also had doubts about my solo living skills, but we were both at the point where we needed separate spaces to live. I had moved into Chicago in July 2002, and within five months, I met L., who by sheer coincidence was attending a small college in Iowa. Her school was in a part of the state I had rarely visited, but it was Iowa all over again. The bad associations from the late 1990s were now being pushed aside, thanks to the quickly blossoming relationship L. and I had. She graduated in 2003, then attended graduate school in the Chicago suburbs while I was still living in Chicago. Upon graduating in late 2004, she immediately got hired by a library system in St. Louis, then moved to STL at the beginning of 2005. I followed eight months later, with an engagement wedged in between those dates, followed by a marriage in November 2006.

Because of my meeting L., my feelings about Iowa had returned to being positive. It was tempered somewhat by L.'s own feelings towards her school, which can best be summed up by pointing out as of today, she only had attended one local alumni event for her college since graduation, and that was in 2006 or 2007. To this day, she says what she remembers most about the event was that she was so put off by its atmosphere, she left in a hurry and lost a Tupperware container originally gifted to her by her mother! She has never returned to campus, and is in no hurry to do so. Fortunately, L. has much better associations with Iowa as a whole, just not with her particular college. Otherwise, we wouldn't have made so many trips to and through Iowa since our marriage.

From my recollection, we've stayed in Iowa City and Cedar Rapids numerous times, both related to Cornell's Homecoming and otherwise. We had one weekend getaway in Fort Madison, allowing us to experience some of the wineries in that part of the state as well as the Amish communities in nearby Van Buren County. We have also stayed in Des Moines, which L. knew really well from her college days, and she was happy to see how well the city had developed since her graduation. For other road trips that took us through Iowa, we've traveled the entire length of the Avenue of the Saints, we've gone along Interstate 29 on our way to Sioux Falls, we've gone through the Okoboji Lakes region, through Pella, and even through Fairfield (cue the Greg Brown song). In the 90s, I had solo trips through Waterloo/Cedar Falls, and in some of the small towns near Iowa Falls. L. went through lots of the state during her time in college, as she was dating a guy who got active in state politics. Between us, we haven't covered every one of the 99 counties¹ in the state, but I think we can say we've experienced over half of them.

Thanks to these repeated trips, every now and then L. and I had talked about moving to Iowa. We nearly did so in early 2017, as L. was offered a chance to serve as a high-level assistant to a library director in the Cedar Rapids metro area. Her current position was draining her mentally, physically, and spiritually, and in spite of a serious paycut, L. was interested in the CR opening. We rang in 2017 in CR, as L. had scheduled an onsite interview for the position, so our minds were fully set towards moving to Iowa. However, a better position opened up in the STL system, and after careful consideration, L. decided to take that opportunity instead. One factor weighing in on her regarding the CR opening was the pressing need for an expanded or new facility, and L. was concerned that the folks in charge didn't have a real plan for the replacement infrastructure. As it turned out, Mother Nature had her own plans for the library's infrastructure, though nobody obviously knew them at the time we would have moved.

Since our respective times living in Iowa, going back to the 90s and early 2000s, Iowa has changed significantly in terms of its population and its sociopolitical outlook. What was once a "purple" state has now become a deep red one, with the pockets of blue shrinking over time. At the same time, an aging white population has been offset by younger non-white families moving into the state, and not just to Iowa's few metro areas. These changes are likely going to stick around for a while, possibly for the remainder of both my life and L.'s. A move to Iowa would likely be a lateral when compared with Missouri if you factor in cultural and political shifts. While the names would change on the ballots, the same arguments I've heard in Missouri would show up in Iowa. Even though I’m not ruling out the changes in Iowa over the last 30ish years, I think any political or cultural issues I might run into there wouldn’t be too surprising after living in Missouri for 20 years. Even the cost of living would be somewhat similar between the two states, with a few shifts here and there (cheaper food and drinks in Iowa, utilities are more expensive there, gas prices are somewhat close to each other, etc.).

Any move to Iowa would have to take in two bigger changes than what I mentioned above: the overall population spread, and the weather. Iowa's population is considered to be more urban than rural, but its metro areas are much smaller and more concentrated than the two major metropolises that bookend Missouri. Because of this population density, the state still feels--and still thinks of itself--as largely rural. Additionally, like many parts of the US, Iowa's rural population has migrated to metro areas for employment, which means the rural mentality still can be found in towns and subdivisions. It will always think of itself as a state filled with farmers, even if the actual farms are decreasing in number. As for the weather, well, I personally wouldn't mind having four real seasons again. Winters in my part of Missouri have been quite lame for a few years, as it never gets cold enough to fully kill off bugs or mildew.

As I write this, there are NO PLANS to move...to Iowa, to New England, to Canada, or anywhere else. Let me just make that clear. I still cannot deny that, several decades on, there's still an odd pull for Iowa in my mind. If the opportunity came up, I wouldn't be against relocating there, but for now, I'll just be content to be an Idiot Out Wandering Around even when I'm outside the state boundaries.

#Life #Metablogging #PersonalHistory #ThinkTooMuch #WhatIf