Iowa and Other Stops Along the Road

Do you play the "map" game where you count up all the states you've visited?

Do you think about how different places might have influenced the way you talk, what you like to eat, what you think even? I've lived so many place I'd have to stop and re-count them!

Possibly the first faraway place I ever visited was in high school when our Mississippi school sponsored an Exchange Trip with a town in Iowa. There were all sorts of reasons they chose Spencer, Iowa for us to visit. Weather, demographics, etc etc. We went there in February, they came to us in the early spring.

It was a trip I haven't forgotten. According to a now-destroyed diary, we stayed at the U-Smile Motor Hotel along the way. (Must file that name away but it sounds slightly risque, doesn't it?)

First blizzard.

First kids who talked differently from everybody I knew.

First visit to a packing plant. Eeew. How have I ever eaten beef again.

It was the only time I ever set foot in Iowa. 

But the world has shrunk since those days. Now you can visit almost anywhere, in person or virtually. You can have friends who are nothing like you, yet everything like you.

You can have a refrigerator magnet, a special gift from a friend- complete with his #truefriend heart- and be transported back to high school, and a blizzard!

 

 

In case you're wondering, here's a photo. Note: not too many of us had real snow boots. 

(I'm not in this picture so I assume I was behind the camera.)

The snow got a lot deeper. We were stranded there a few extra days but nobody complained!

 

 What places do you remember that were so different they made your eyes open wider or your attitude change or your idea of where you could live flipflop?