Welcome to Iowa Anytime

 It was a beautiful evening as the Chicago White Sox and the New York Yankees played an exciting game on the Field of Dreams in Iowa Friday night. Eight home runs and a thrilling 9th inning!

The announcers seemed overwhelmed that the corn from which the players emerged was taller than the athletes.  I am pleased they loved beautiful Iowa.  I know the Midwest is often considered fly-over country, but, seriously, had the Fox announcers never been here before? (They talked about grass as so green it looked like pretend grass carpet.) Iowans often travel to Chicago, New York, California.  Many have been to most U.S. states and overseas. 

I have lived in Iowa over 60 years of my life, most close to Dyersville in Dubuque.  I went with my father to Des Moines Bruins (Chicago Cubs minor league team) as a child.  When I lived in St. Louis, we had the Cardinals. When we lived in Detroit, we cheered for the Tigers.  When we lived in Connecticut, one of our son's cheered the Yankees while another cheered the Boston Red Sox. 

One game announcer said, "Iowans have probably never seen a Major League game before" The other chimed in, "It may take awhile before the 8000 fans here realize this is a real ball game."  The cameras showed one out-of-Iowa player taking a bite of corn right off a stalk and then spitting it out, finding it was not sweet corn but field corn.

But the field WAS beautiful.  The weather was perfect, unlike the terrible storms in the days before. The sunset gorgeous.  Welcome to Iowa any time.