June 19, 2008
GROB: Strange spring
By JAMES GROB, Courier sports editor
Almost all of the well-known poems, proverbs and quotations about springtime are filled with words of optimism. Obviously, the poets weren’t visiting Iowa this spring.
At best, this spring in Iowa has been strange. At worst, it’s been a living nightmare.
Comedian-turned-actor Robin Williams is credited with saying, “Spring is nature’s way of saying, ‘Let’s party!’”
I’ll buy that, even though I don’t think that Williams was talking about this kind of party. This is the kind of party you don’t want to attend.
The flooding that started last week in northern Iowa is hitting the southern corners of the state as you read this. Of the bigger cities, Cedar Rapids and Iowa City were hit awful hard. You’ve probably heard all about it.
Tornadoes, too. Half of Parkersburg was wiped out. A group of boy scouts in western Iowa was terrorized by a deadly twister. It was sad and horrible.
Nature shook up the sports world, too. The Iowa Cubs played a baseball game in front of nobody. Olympic hopeful Shawn Johnson had her gym flooded, just a few days before the Olympic trials. Hundreds of sporting events have been postponed and canceled.
Aplington-Parkersburg High School was flattened by that tornado. The school is the former stomping grounds of four NFL football players. Casey Wiegmann, Aaron Kampman, Jared DeVries and Brad Meester are all doing what they can to raise money for their broken community.
The University of Iowa’s softball complex and track facility were under six feet of water earlier this week. Nothing was spared but the press box.
Johnson, now in Philadelphia for the trials, said that she was amazed by the support she received. According to an Associated Press article Wednesday, when her gym was threatened, parents, city officials and Iowans she didn’t even know began showing up. They filled sandbags and piled them outside the building. They wrapped plastic around the outside walls. They hauled mats and balance beams and vaults and uneven bars off the floor, carrying them up to a balcony where the water wouldn’t touch them.
Johnson wanted to help, but her coach, Liang Chow, wouldn’t let her. They were leaving for the Olympic trials in four days, and she needed to rest.
“I wanted to help so bad,” Johnson said. “My coaches wanted me to be as safe as possible. ... I understand that, but it’s really hard to stand back and watch when you’re normally helping.”
Chow was moved by all the support.
“It’s a real warm feeling, having these kind of people behind you,” Chow said. “It’s a bad flooding, but it was a great effort, a great community effort, a great (reminder) of people’s hearts. It was just tremendous.”
This week, I heard a story passed along by a student at the University of Iowa. He said he was working in a sandbag line in Iowa City this past weekend. He was getting sandbags handed to him by person who he called a “50-year-old hippie.”
The hippie was handing sandbags to the student, who was handing them to an Amish man. The Amish man was handing the sandbags to an Iowa Hawkeye football player, who was handing them to a Lutheran minister, who was handing them to a young single mother.
The single mother handed the sandbags to a national guardsman, who gave them to an off-duty police officer, who was giving the sandbags to a patron of the city jail clad in an orange jumpsuit, who was giving them to an on-duty police officer, who was handing them to a local businessman. Then the sandbags went to a couple of high school kids, who — directed by city officials — were both stacking them on the pile and then hurrying back to grab some more. Over and over again. They all worked, they all talked and got to know one another. Some of them told jokes and they all laughed as they worked. They even sang a little.
They did this for hours, this group of citizens with very little in common. Diverse Iowans working together with hundreds more for the good of their community. If not for the coming flood, none of them would ever have had a reason to meet.
The levy they built together didn’t hold. By the next day, the waters of the Iowa River had washed away all the work they had done together.
I don’t know if that story is true or false. Either way, I’ve given up on springtime. I’ll concentrate my hopes on summer — I’m convinced it will be a good one.
Spring can lift your spirits. But spring can break your heart.