I went to a dinner party

and sat sandwiched between two people from Iowa, who were meeting for the first time. They talked about the many people they know who never left their small towns. People who found jobs and married their High School sweethearts. The dinner guests were concerned that these folks had never been outside the country, or even over state lines. I asked what industries are in Iowa.

Corn.

Nothing is more taboo at a Northern California dinner party than growing mass quantities of corn. They said that Iowa is becoming a leader in biofuels ... and looked puzzled when I laughed.

Both of the dinner guests had come to California looking for something better than the flat, endless green bushy fields, vertically planted as tall as people - horizontally stacked like the residents of Manhattan. An army of New Yorkers fueled by high fructose corn syrup, dressed in green jumpsuits, faces painted yellow. Second only to the criss-crossing matrix of powerlines. They came to California and made friends who draw pictures of bird silhouettes over rural landscapes and silk screen them onto t-shirts. A whole generation of young mothers will dress their infants in bird shirts that will be ruined by mashed peas and sweet potatoes.

Later, I was uneasy. I'd spent too much money on dinner and paid for it with my credit card, that says NORDSTROMS accross the front in stupid looking letters that only exist to make me feel like a donkey. Everyone else paid with their check cards or cash, and I'm stuck with my Nordstrom's punk-ass dork card that probably comes from a factory in the midwest. We ordered three servings of brussel sprouts, for six people. If you believe in these things, which I do, we were numbing our feelings around events that hadn't even happened yet. While we ate, Vanessa's former fiance was being rushed to the emergency room, hypothermic and toxic from a suicide attempt. Five appetizers, eight entrees, drinks and drinks and drinks. It all felt so right.

Vanessa was crying all morning. We went for a walk to get coffee and look in the windows at the shops on her favorite street. She talked about her fiancee and thank god I didn't try to relate. Sometimes we don't need to relate. It's never a good time to say, "That reminds me of the time my friend tried to commit suicide." Sometimes you just shut the fuck up and realize for five seconds it's not about you. This is very hard for me to do.

My dad went with Rafael to his little town in Marhuanta, a suburb of rural Venezuela close to the Amazons. He describes Rafael hanging out the side of the car, screaming at the people on the side of the road, reaching over to honk the horn, as the car rolled into town. Most of the residents of Marhuanta haven't been outside the country, is all I'm saying. And on the holidays, they crush corn into a sticky paste that is stuffed into banana leaves and steamed.

Did you know the following about Iowa?
- 52% of Iowans are Protestant, while 23% are Roman Catholic, and other religions made up 6%. 13% responded with non-religious, and 5% did not answer.
- The largest Protestant denomination by number of adherents is the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

Also, remember Dr. George Tiller, the Lutheran from Kansas who was murdered for performing late-term abortions, while entering his church on Sunday?

Kansas and Iowa are not the same state. Only one of them legalized same-sex marriage.