100% Sugar: Iowa

Ingredients

• Guilting yourself into self-sacrifice (aka covering someone's 8am shift)
• Staying up until 2am to write a sketch you end up deleting, which is proper because it was about a shady "drug" deal by a man selling Molly-- the American Girl Doll.
• A 211-page document on the Redesigned SAT, ready to be edited, with your name on it
• A reservation for 52 people at 8:30pm at your restaurant during a night in which you're closing-- the night before your 7am flight
• $11 spent in an airport Starbucks... on one person... which is not that shocking, now that you think about it
• This picture in a text message at 6am to show how excited you are at 6am to be in Economy Plus:

  

  Excited

• 2 identical 5-hour car rides in Midwestern corn in 2 days
• 3 states in one day
• Chocolate-induced acid attacks because there are gas stations that sell chocolate and you make poor decisions
• Sleeping on a love seat (and not in a metaphorical way)
• 8 hours in O'Hare airport
• Drinking coffee

All this for... IOWA. 

Instructions

All this for... Iowa. 

Cedar Falls, Iowa. The home of UNI, University of Northern Iowa. Setting for Yelp's most entertaining middle-aged reviewer, Rob C., whose criticisms of everything Cedar Falls garnered a 45-minute dramatic reading of every restaurant in "CF." In case you didn't know, "vampires with bad taste" is a "very Cedar Falls look." (Gripping, Soulful Review of the 'Jokers' Comedy Club by Rob C, Yelp.com)

After Melanie, my artistic soul partner, and I looked up how much hotels (don't) cost and how much Rob C. hates every single place in Cedar Falls, Iowa, we proclaimed to each other, "why the F*#$ are we going to Iowa?!" Up until we actually arrived-- nay, up until we actually began what we came there to do, the day after we arrived-- we repeated the phrase: "F*#$ing Iowa." 

So, why Iowa? The University of Northern Iowa is, randomly, a phenomenal school to study Autism in arts education. Naturally, they hosted the first-ever Autism and Arts Education Symposium, and it was BOSS. I can't begin to explain how floored we were. Melanie and I represented our non-profit theatre company, Bluelaces, and were selected to lead a workshop-- just two 23-year-olds leading a workshop on devising highly interactive and multisensory theatre for individuals on the Autism Spectrum. BAH!! (We killed it, though.) (Even though the majority of people there asked how old we were.)

 

Once we got into the swing of presentations, networking, and kick-ass shows either featuring kids on the Spectrum (like a once non-verbal teen singing a live rock-band version of "Since You Been Gone", no less) or featuring talented college performers trained to perform for audiences with developmental disabilities, we forgot we were in Iowa. Not kidding. Not even kidding. Not even remotely kidding. I only remembered once we left campus and tried ordering "you know, actual restaurant food but quick to-go" at a sports bar & grill (like the expectant and impatient New Yorkers we are) and were met with the bleach-blondiest, sports-lovingest, craft-beer-drinkiest white, buff, semi-mullet-y loud population of diners. And when we left and bought humungous bags of colorful flavored sugary popcorn that ruined our stomachs in the best possible way for the drive home. Ah, the Ohioan in me felt at home.

But oh, yes: That drive from Iowa was my second 5-hour drive in 2 days. It led me back to my second out of 3 states I'd been in over those 2 days. All after pulling a few Narcoleptic All Nighters (aka, trying to stay awake as late as possible to finish something due the next day, but truly just falling asleep invariably for hours until around 2:30am) and working a few closers that week. The best way to describe how I physically felt is to imagine how you'd feel if, say, for example, you woke up at 4:30am, flew in an airplane, drank an acidic drink you're not supposed to consume like maybe coffee, drove 5 hours, and then anxiously ingested a few hotel-cup-sized cups of gas-station-bought Reeses, M&Ms, and Swedish Fish to sugar-high your way through finishing your workshop presentation. Or... yeah... Yeah, no, that's actually what I did do. So, yeah, imagining that would be exactly how I felt.

Midwest sugar, man.

[I feel really bad because recently I met someone from Iowa (don't worry, this might happen only about 3 times in your life, total) and made that "eeeeh, I'm so sorry" stink face followed by a stereotypical review of Cedar Falls that would have made Rob C. proud. But this Iowan did not seem to appreciate it. As he shouldn't.)

All of this. For F*#$ing Iowa. Wait-- that's not true. All of this... for f*#$ing Autism. I wouldn't have rearranged my week and worked so much, so stressfully, and traveled to 3 states in 2 days to simply gain a chocolatey acid stomach. I did it for Bluelaces, and for coming together with others who support the advancement of arts education in the Autism community. I even added UNI (Univ. of Northern Iowa) on Twitter on our way home, and I think that's the first time I actually learned how to use Twitter. We love Rob C., but not enough to ever visit his hated town of Cedar Falls without a bigger reason: Autism advocacy will always be that bigger reason. No matter how many states with rolling hills we have to go to! Or college love seats we crash on  in Chicago after driving through those hills! Or how many hours I wait in the O'Hare airport back to NYC after not really sleeping on that lumpy college love seat! We do it for the kids, we do it for the adults, we do it for the families, and we love it.

Wait-- that's not true, either. It's the popcorn:

It's always the popcorn.