In the early 2000s iCon adapted again and began focusing on brain-machine interfaces suited to the human enhancement movement, creating new technology that would enhance the user’s cognitive efficiency. Many company resources were also devoted to research into a more complete human-computer interface and the development of related software and hardware for the transhumanist movement. Given their new company goals, iCon no longer needed to be located near their industrial and commercial customers. Seven years ago, they announced that they were leaving the Chicago area and were looking for a new location for their corporate headquarters. Many major metropolitan areas, including some in European and Pacific Rim countries, began courting iCon, hoping to attract the influential software business to relocate with them. But unexpectedly, it turned out that CEO Cezary had his eye on a small town in Iowa. There were headlines in business publications around world expressing amazement when the tiny college community in Iowa became one of iCon’s top three locations and later the same publications were in shock when Barrow Heights was crowned as the eventual winner for the relocation, a victory accomplished without even trying to pursue the software company in the least. With a population of 1674 (fewer people than the 3000 people that worked for iCon, 2000 who would work at the HQ), Barrow Heights hadn’t really considered that it was seriously in the running for this kind of competition, only to discover it wasn’t just in the running — it had won the prize. And iCon started moving in before the bewildered small town had a chance to ask, “What just happened?” or install an additional traffic light. Without delay, iCon arranged to purchase five thousand acres directly south of Edgestow College, putting them just south of the southern city limits of the town, which the town council quickly annexed after providing the newcomer with property tax abatements for the next ten years.
iCon’s initial move had been quick, but settling in was taking some time, Barrow Heights and the international corporation both struggling to work out their mutual growing pains. The town did its part by adding a new hotel and eatery north of town next to the highway, upgrading infrastructure (putting in two new traffic lights, installing more T3 lines, etc.), the grocery store by adding a larger selection of organic, gourmet, and fine wine labels, the local airport by lengthening its landing strips to accommodate corporate jets. The international corporation did its part by encouraging personnel to make the best of the move by speaking politely to the locals and to overlook their culture shock of finding downtown Chicago was now a four to five hour drive away.
Barrow Heights had been very excited by the move in the beginning, looking forward to an economic shot in the arm from the newcomers. But revenue wasn’t flowing into local business or city coffers the way everyone had expected. Given the size of the corporate income and real estate tax breaks iCon had been granted and given the fact that most of HQ’s 2000 employees had not been hired locally (not one above the vice president level), but had moved with the company from the Chicago area. Many of the executives who relocated from Chicago commuted to Barrow Heights each day, as did most of the new hires, driving in from nearby cities like Dubuque or Cedar Falls-Waterloo, with other new hires living in the neighboring states of Wisconsin and Minnesota. It all meant there had been a lot of expenses for upgrades that weren’t being funded. In the five years since the relocation, iCon had yet to provide enough revenue for Barrow Heights to offset its expenses. So far, the burden of paying for all the additional spending for new construction and added services was falling on the small town alone.
For locals, the biggest burn in the list of growing pains was the location of iCon’s headquarters. Placement of the structure had been a matter of extended controversy, with bruised feelings still existing five years later. The sprawling glass-encased building was inspired by the designs of Frank Lloyd Wright, six stories tall in the center, a kilometer long running north and south (measured in metric, not imperial units), with a copper roof and many cantilevered sections supported by brick piers. The long, horizontal, angular design looked out of place next to the classical Collegiate Gothic architecture on the beautiful Edgestow College campus, buildings featuring the verticality of arches and towers. The clash in styles was annoying enough, but the sprawling corporate HQ was jammed up against the venerable educational institution. Built. Right. On. Top. Of. The. Line! A mere two feet away from the property line that it shared with the college, with not enough room to park three cars between the buildings, the six-story HQ was situated directly south of the physical science and research hall, the oldest building on the campus. For a good part of the day, the HQ blocked the sunlight to Noonan Hall, leaving the beautiful east-facing facade decorated with rows of crenellated arches and the columned main entrance in shadow. The science building had always been the architectural focal point for the college, prominently featured in photos and publications, but now Noonan Hall was dwarfed and eclipsed by its new neighbor. No one knew what iCon was thinking, crowding the college like that, when they had plenty of space to build to the south or west, having purchased over five thousand acres of land. Edgestow College’s president, Dr. Ruddemeyer and the college’s legal team had protested, and then filed complaints in court, but iCon had been deaf to their concerns, and Barrow Heights had no previous municipal building code regulations written that might mandate limitations on the location or height of a neighboring structure. The court’s ruling was that iCon had a legal right to build anything, anywhere they wanted on their own property. And this was what iCon wanted, no matter how many feelings and nearby toes were trampled on.
Fortunately, the bad impressions created in the beginning were starting to change. STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) faculty from Edgestow College, and often their students as well, were invited to iCon for consultations and to share in technology developments and updates. And iCon had recently started hiring Edgestow College graduates in the science and mathematics disciplines. New houses were being built in town, and many of Barrow Height’s elegant but neglected Victorian houses were getting new owners and new makeovers. In addition, other technology businesses related to computer-human interfaces had copied iCon’s move to Barrow Heights, hoping to share in the windfall of iCon’s technological advancements by being near the larger company.
But it sounded like dissatisfaction with the relocation still plagued some iCon employees, if you listened to the four at the table behind Mia. Seated directly in front of them, she couldn’t help but overhear their noisy complaints. In between the talking and laughing around the Edgestow College tables, she kept hearing bits of the conversation coming from the iCon people. They weren’t happy in the least with their current location, and kept going on and on (and on and on) about being forced to live in a small town in IOWA (heavy sigh). Not one of them had any plans for fitting in. At first their discontent had been easy for Mia to tune out, as was their conversation about celebrities who were famous for being famous — who was dating who, who was in rehab, who had been arrested, who was having plastic surgery done. But then the talk turned, again, to how boring Iowa was, how unhappy they all were to be here. And, they were getting louder:
— “I have no idea why iCon would re-locate their HQ here.”
— “If it was any other corporation, I would never have even considered coming to work here.”
— “There’s no culture here!”
— “Nothing to do!”
— “No good restaurants.”
— “No place to buy clothes.”
— “Or shoes.”
— “When I moved here from my home in California and was driving across Nebraska, it was mile after mile after mile of nothing. Nothing to look at, no place to stop. Absolute nothing. It was sooo boring. That needs to be fixed.”
— “They could use some fixing like that around here too.”
This comment made them all laugh and laugh.
Fix that? Mia rolled her eyes. She couldn’t he
lp scoffing at the idea that the hundreds of miles of western Nebraska landscape needed to be hidden behind a string of beige franchise businesses in order to re-create the same urban sprawl that already existed in so many other places, just so a random woman from California wouldn’t have to expend the mental effort of dealing with, let alone trying to appreciate, something as unique and beautiful as the open expanse of the Great Plains. Mia thought, “What would Joni Mitchell think of this person begging for pavement, complaining that Paradise hasn’t been paved over yet?”
More from the iCon table:
— “I have to drive to Chicago or Minneapolis just to see a decent play or attend a concert.”
— “I hear Damien’s wife still lives in the Chicago area, and he flies back there every weekend.”
— “I wish I had a jet. Or even an airplane.”
— “If you get one, take me with you!”
— “Have you tried talking to the locals? Oh. Em. Gee!”
— “Talked to someone who has never been to Chicago. Not once. Ever!”
— “They just don’t get it. Just don’t get it! Not a clue!”
— “My neighbor invited me to go with her — to their church’s potluck dinner!”
— “Did you enjoy the jello salad?”
A chorus of hysterical laughter followed that comment.
Mia couldn’t understand their fracking complaints. She loved living in Barrow Heights. When she moved here, her neighbors had immediately adopted her as part of the community. The nine-year-old girl next door brought her a May basket filled with candy on the first of May, the retired couple on the other side helped her with gardening advice and loaned her tools when she worked on her lawn, and several women had her over for coffee to get acquainted and later to catch up on news. Mia loved the locality, the place-ness of northeast Iowa too. She loved the rolling hills with flat plains in between, the views from the bluffs above the nearby Mississippi River, the wildlife that found a way to live alongside agricultural industry and inhabited places. Just before Christmas break, she had seen a bald eagle doing lazy circles over her block when she was out shoveling snow off her sidewalk. Things weren’t perfect here, and there were as many problems and jerks in Iowa as elsewhere. But why couldn’t these people with jaded eyes see the beauties of the world around them? Why did they wish that things everywhere were exactly the same? Was the best they could hope for mile after mile of colorless suburban sameness, with a gourmet coffee shop every seventeen-and-a-half blocks, sometimes on the left, sometimes on the right? To Mia, that world was dead, drab, artificial. She shook her head. “I won’t listen. Why get caught up in their negativity?” she thought.
Just then Jan shouted down to the other end of the table, “Any taco pizza left? I just love taco pizza, and The Airship taco pizza is the best ever. Bar none!”
Mia could hear the iCon people at the table behind her erupt in laughter.
— “Taco pizza?!”
— “I never even heard of taco pizza before I moved to Iowa.”
— “Maybe they could go to the nearest Happy Joe’s restaurant. I hear they invented taco pizza there.”
— “How ridiculous! Imagine — intentionally conflating the cuisines of two such unique and distinct cultures.”
Unable to take the complaints any longer, Mia abruptly stood up and walked down to sit in an empty chair at the opposite end of Edgestow’s table, between Dr. Grant Hartwig and his family and Dr. Harper. The new philosophy professor from the University of Florida was a tall (6'4"), athletic looking man with sandy blond hair and a red beard. He was also the coach of the college’s fencing club — a USFCA certified prevost. He normally chose an epee as his weapon, but at Mia’s request, he often used a saber to duel with her so she could stay sharp and not rely too much on the advantage of her longer arms when dueling with shorter female opponents.
Grant’s wife Tess (with long brown hair and beautiful brown eyes) handed him their six month old daughter, Madison. “Hi, Mia! Nice to see you. Grant, do you want more pop too?”
“Sure. Thanks, honey!”
Mia held her finger out, saying, “Hello, Madison. How are you this evening?” Madison gripped the offered finger and smiled, then shyly turned her face toward her dad, displaying the back of her naturally curly blond head. Mia laughed and caressed the curls.
Grant returned to his conversation with Dr. Harper. “I’d never heard of such a thing happening before. But just like that, the pastor asked me, asked us, to quit coming to his church. He said we were no longer welcome! All because I spoke up in the adult Sunday School class that I believed the sons of God in Genesis 6 were fallen angels and not the descendants of Seth.”
Setting two red plastic glasses of root beer on the table, Tess said, “That’s right. They’ve decided to bar us from attending.”
Dr. Harper said, “I’m so sorry that happened. And very surprised. The pastor’s reaction seems very extreme, given the topic and the circumstance that you weren’t causing a fuss about your opinion.”
Mia said, “There must be some personal reason or motivation behind it that isn’t apparent to you, Grant. Some past experience where that pastor now feels the need to keep disagreements and problems out of his church to avoid controversy later. It certainly doesn’t sound like you did anything wrong.”
“That’s right,” Dr. Harper said. “You’ve experienced something similar, haven’t you, Mia.”
Blushing, she said, “Well, slightly similar. In high school, I started going to a conservative evangelical church in Omaha, and overall, my time there has had a positive impact on my life. I went forward, as they called it, at a special meeting with an outside speaker and prayed what they called the sinner’s prayer, to be saved and receive the Savior into my heart. However, my experience there ended badly when I was forced out of the church for causing an upset to the pastor’s family — it certainly wasn’t over any theological dispute! The whole experience has still soured me on attending church, but I still believe in Jesus in spite of those horrible people. I haven’t turned my back on God.”
Grant smiled at Mia and said, “Once we find a new church, you’ll have to come visit. Can’t let yourself be forced off the piste, Mia. Have to stand your ground in every duel, no matter how hard.”
Mia laughed. “We’ll see. But church people don’t fight fair! I love God — it’s members of the congregation that I’m not so sure about. You know, a good many of them would look with disapproval at our meeting here in a bar. Especially one named for a Victorian era Unidentified Flying Object.”
Grant leaned back in his chair and stroked his beard in a mock-serious philosophical pose. “We must define our terms before we come to any conclusions. What is this thing called a bar? And does The Midnight Airship meet the definition of a bar? Making a cursory analysis of the activity in this establishment, at the current time, the number of customers sitting at tables ordering dinner exceeds the number of customers ordering adult beverages only. Therefore, I think we can all agree that The Midnight Airship is a restaurant that provides amenities such as a pool table and adult beverages, and therefore is not, strictly speaking, a bar.
Tess laughed and said, “Don’t forget though — this is Iowa. Pool starts with P and that rhymes with T, and that spells Trouble, real Trouble.”
Mia also laughed. “Terrible Trouble! Meredith Wilson, Iowan who wrote The Music Man. What is it about Iowa that it doesn’t have a sense of state identity, doesn’t brag about the Iowans who go on and do well? Ask the average Iowan to name 5 famous Iowans, current athletes excluded — and they can’t do it. I know — I’ve tried this little test in class on exams, for extra credit.”
Dr. Harper said, “I’m not native born, but I believe I can do that.” He counted on his fingers, “One, Ashton Kucher, actor. Two, John Wayne, actor. Three, Kurt Warner, quarterback. Four
, Shawn Johnson, gold medal Olympic gymnast. Five, Elijah Wood, actor.”
“Frodo!” Mia said loudly and raised her glass of sparkling water (with a twist of lime).
Tess also lifted her glass. “To Frodo!”
“Bravo, dear!” Betty patted her husband’s arm.
“Stephen, is that a list of famous people from Iowa?” Grant asked. “Or a list of famous people who left Iowa, haha!”
“Grant, to answer your question,” Dr. Harper said. “They don’t leave Iowa forever. They all eventually come back home.”
“Is this Heaven? No, it’s Iowa.” Dr. Tom Williams (Music theory) said, in his deepest voice.
“What’s that from?” Jan asked.
“The book’s Shoeless Joe.”
“No, the movie.”
“Field of Dreams.”
“That’s right. I’ve been there to Dyersville, the place they made the movie. Back when they made that film in 1989. I was an extra in the movie, one of them in a car waiting in a line with the headlights on at the end of the movie. So much fun! So many cars turned up, way more than the movie people expected. Everyone just got in line like we were told to do — and then we sat in the car for hours, talking and laughing. We had no idea when the movie people were filming us, didn’t see a camera anywhere. Found out later when we saw the movie that they used an airplane to take our picture. But you can see us all at the end of the movie. Every single car.”
Dr. Harper smiled and said, “I’ll look for your car next time I watch it, Jan.”
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