WHY NOT HERE? A series of essays from young Iowans and Illinoisans

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By The Quad-City Times | Thursday, December 28, 2006 5:12 PM CST | () comments

Sheala Hansen, Cedar Rapids to New York City

Kelly Pulford, Quad-Cities to Chicago and back.

Hillary Rhodes, Boston to Quad-Cities to New York City.

Young current and former Iowans and Illinoisans answer the question that’s bugging parents, grandparents, employers and legislators. Their answers in essays and letters featured on this week’s editorial pages may surprise you.

Sheala Hansen, New York City: All my friends are Iowans; we just moved up here

I find this query interesting because I’ve never really thought of moving back to Iowa. When things such as tax incentives are mentioned, I tend to laugh. Lower taxes would not bring me back to my home state. Unfortunately, I don’t have much of a list of reasons why I would go back to Iowa. I really just have a list of reasons why I would never consider living there.

I couldn’t get a job in Iowa. I work in book publishing (which I love) and as far as I know there would be little opportunity in that field. However, this is not my main concern with Iowa. I live in New York for its wealth of culture and diversity. Once a month I go to Chelsea to brunch with friends and check out the latest installations at the endless parades of galleries. Yesterday I went to the Brooklyn Museum and was blown away by the Annie Lebovitz exhibition. I’m a modern art junkie and New York is the perfect place to feed that addiction. In Cedar Rapids I know a few family friends that own galleries. Besides these two, I don’t know of any others. I’ve gone to lovely exhibits at the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, but the museum is ultimately small and wouldn’t keep me coming back once a month.

Restaurants are another problem. Why is everything a chain? Why can the city of Cedar Rapids support only a small handful of locally owned eateries? Most food comes in large portions and is of mediocre quality. I have to say though, the free refills and waitresses’ willingness to split a check is always appreciated.

I go out a lot. I don’t go to clubs, but I do go to probably four or five different bars a week with friends or coworkers. I go to a lot of parties. I am not a homebody. From what I’ve seen in Cedar Rapids, I can’t fathom that there would be enough places to go out to keep me busy.

I hate cars. I dislike suburban sprawl. Highways, strip malls and parking lots make my skin crawl and leave me depressed for the current state of humanity. This isn’t a problem specific to Iowa, but to most of the country. I find it sad that there is no way to walk around Cedar Rapids. If there is a pedestrian near the mall, one can only assume this individual is some sort of unwanted element.

Reading this over I realize I sound like a bit of a snob, which is definitely un-Iowan. Perhaps I should move back there for that reason. I’ve encountered very little of that type of attitude there and have always found the people of Iowa refreshing. Living in different areas of the country, I’ve found myself gravitating towards other Iowans. There’s an easy friendliness, curiosity and lack of pretension that is always inviting. Living in New York, I’ve noticed that a lot of my friends are still the ones I made back in Iowa. We just all ended up moving here.

Ultimately I wouldn’t move to Iowa because it had things that made it more like New York or other parts of the country. I think I would move back to Iowa (kicking and screaming?) because of the things that have always been there. Like my family. I also love the beautiful countryside, the emptiness. If I had children or was looking for somewhere to settle down, I think my feelings towards Iowa would be a bit different. I know that I received an excellent education in public schools and always felt safe. It was a great place to grow up and a place I am proud to say I am from.

I also hear it’s affordable to live there. Maybe I could start one of those savings account things I’m always hearing about.

Kelly Pulford, Rock Island: Why I moved back

My husband and I met at the Adler Planetarium and Astronomy Museum in Chicago. I was an actress finishing up a Masters degree at Columbia College Chicago, and had co-founded the performing group Two Girls and an Audience. Matt was an artist who had just completed his second solo show in Chicago. We felt fortunate to have met one another because we had the same wants in life. Stifled by the daily grind in the big city, we wanted to pursue our art, but we also wanted to be able to afford a house and raise a family in the same environment we had growing up.

Relocating to the Quad-Cities has been a wonderful life change. My commute to work has gone from two hours to five minutes.

I am no longer emotionally and physically spent at the end of the day and I can focus that energy on family, art, and being a part of a growing community that has the quality of life that we have been seeking.

Hillary Rhodes, New York City: Quad-City stint opens the eyes of this East-Coaster

When I moved to the Quad-Cities in 2004, my dad joked, “How does a Bostonian spell ‘Iowa’?” (My parents live right outside of Boston.)

His answer: O-H-I-O.

To East Coasters, the Midwest is all the same: a giant, flat cornfield where nothing happens. Two-lane highways. Back roads. Tractors. Cows. Pigs. And simple folk (meaning dumb).

But I had a good time there, better than I had expected from those stereotypes. And sometimes, even though I’m in New York City now, I miss it.

I lived in Davenport for a year while I ran “Your Mom,” a now-defunct newspaper for teenagers. My friends were fellow newbie journalists and chiropractic students.

We were temporary and unattached, like a miniature ex-pat community — displaced, young creative types, huddled over ale at Front Street Brewery or burgers at the Boat House, making our own fun.

Knowing it wouldn’t last freed us up to have a great time. We talked all night, played guitar, fixed up old cars, drank tall boys in the middle of the week, went on walks with my friends’ cat, dated without long-term prospects and spent weekends in Chicago when the restlessness sank in.

And then, one by one, we left. We just drove off in our separate directions — North Carolina, Florida, Rhode Island and New York.

Now I live in a 5th-floor walkup in Manhattan’s Hell’s Kitchen. I pass more Starbucks’ on my 20-minute walk to work than there are in the whole Q-C.

There’s a sense, when you’re 25 and living in a brick duplex on Columbia Ave., jogging around and around VanderVeer Park for exercise, eating at Fuddruckers for lunch with your co-workers, that New York would be much more stimulating — that you need to be up all night, brushing elbows with famous people in smoke-free martini lounges and going to Broadway shows whenever you want.

But it’s not that different here than it was there. The same things still matter: Money, sex, power and fame; friends, career, family and love.

I-O-W-A. It wasn’t that bad.

Add your story about the reasons you moved from or to the Quad-Cities.

More essays

Why not here? St. Ambrose alum John Stender

Why not here? Davenport Alderman Ian Frink

Why not here? Rep. Elesha Gayman hopes to provide reasons to stay