Leaving Iowa - June 2011

Moving away from Iowa was extremely bittersweet which I find ironic considering I never wanted to step foot into the state when I moved there from Chicago 6 years ago.  We have made so many good friends and we don't want to leave them.  Who else is going to share our obnoxious passion for good food and wine?  We're still looking.  I also love my job.  Granted, I got to take it with me and now work from home but I actually like my co-workers enough to want to see them and even hang out outside of work.  We even grew to like the little town of Iowa City.  It only took 20 minutes to get from one side of town to the other, prices on things, especially groceries, were downright cheap and there actually was a ton to do.  I've also since found out that the hospital there was truly state of the art.  I mean, I knew it when we lived there too, but now I KNOW we were spoiled.  I want my shiny and new facitilites back.

In the seemingly short time we were there, three seriously major events took place.   First, on Holy Thursday April 13, 2006, an F2 tornado went through town, literally.  We had just moved into our newly built house a week earlier and happened to live across the street from a tornado siren.  Having grown up in Toledo, I'm no stranger to the siren and sadly, I knew to ignore it.  There was no tornado.  Even in Iowa.  That evening, however, the siren kept going off and by "kept going off", I mean, it was almost non-stop.  It had also turned pitch black outside complete with a major downpour.  Finally Bill and I were like, maybe we should turn on the TV.  Honest to God, we turn it on and the newscaster was saying "the tornado is now passing by Walmart".  We were like, Oh Sh*t!  Walmart was 7 miles from our house and the tornado was coming towards us.  Now, even though I mostly ignored tornado sirens, I knew that you either needed to be in a basement (in the NE corner, right??) or in a room with no exterior walls.  Being the end townhouse in a 4-plex, our only option was our downstairs 3x5 foot bathroom as we had no basement.  We chose option #2 which was breaking into the empty unit next to ours and hiding out in their pantry under the stairs.  Luckily, we knew the builder's garage door codes so we gathered up our cats (no, we wouldn't dare leave them behind), ventured out into the rain with a radio and deck of cards and hid for the next hour or two.  It was the first time the town ever took a direct hit and needless to say, the damage was pretty significant.  Walmart and Menard's roofs didn't make it and Dairy Queen was gone.  A sorority house was completely taken out and miraculously, two girls who decided to run back to their rooms to get homework instead took shelter in the phone closet and didn't die.  A number of downtown stores and restaurants were severly damaged along with university buildings and tons of homes and apartments.  The tornado's trail ended just 3 miles shy of our house.  Sadly, our 134 year old church was also destroyed.  Holy Thursday activites had just ended and there were still a number of people in the church.  The priest said his goodbyes, walked out to his car but decided he didn't like the looks of things.  He went back in and got everyone downstairs moments before the tornado hit. 

He later got a Person of the Year award for saving everyone.  After that, we paid attention when the sirens went off and even got to see one last tornado (on TV) shortly before we moved, moving north of town just a few miles from our house.

The next crazy thing to happen was the big Flood of 2008.  We had had heavy snow and rain in the months preceeding June and starting up in Minnesota and Wisconsin, flooding began and it trickled south.  Think New Orleans and Katrina and I am not exaggerating in the slightest when I say the same exact devastation happened in Cedar Rapids - a town about 30 miles north of Iowa City.

All that water came down to Iowa City and literally cut the town in two.  Businesses and the unverisity were forced to shut down.  Bill and I took an afternoon to walk around and take pictures.  These (below) were all taken by ME (after posting these on a social media site, someone insinuated that there was no way I could have taken them but let me assure you, I really did).  I believe when it was all said and done, the water got as high as 12' in some places.  I could post more pictures of other areas in town that were even worse but those I didn't take and I'm afraid of getting in trouble for copyright infringment!  :)

And finally, my beloved Taco Bell.  It was torn down and never rebuilt.  :(  (I did not take this one....tempting fate.)

Finally, the last event occurred in our neighborhood only a quarter of a mile from our house and is extremely, extremly sickening and sad.  My parents were in town and were woken up by sirens passing the house the Monday after Easter 2008.  Later that morning, they called me from the highway as they were heading home to tell me that they just passed a terrible crash that delayed them a bit.  It all ended up being connected.  A guy who lived up the street was charged with embezzling money from the bank where he worked so he decided to take out his family.  He murdered his wife and four adopted children aged 3-10 in their home on Easter and then took to the highway the next morning to purposely crash and kill himself.  It was absolutely awful.  I will never understand men who do stuff like this, especially those who just want out of their marriage.  Every time a story like this comes up I tell Bill - if you ever want a divorce, fine, divorce me, just don't kill me.  (Of course, faithful followers of this blog know that our only grounds for divorce are if either of us become a vegetarian.  Ha!)  But seriously, this story ended up making the national news and news trucks were stationed outside of the house for days.  The guy actually came from a very large extended family in Iowa City that happens to own a lot of businesses so it really rocked the town.  Please say a prayer for those kids.

So far living in Cleveland has been somewhat eventful too - a very sad high school shooting, a man killed his wife and daughter at a Cracker Barrel (see what I mean?!) and 5 crazies tried to blow up a bridge....and this was all in the last 3 months!  Luckily, Cleveland is so big that we live between 20-40 minutes away from where these events took place.  You know you want to come visit!  ;)