Letters & Interactions

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This letter has been edited for length. Read it in full at littlevillagemag.com.

SOME OF yOU MAy HAVE SEEN that this year in May, the mayor of Des Moines asked citizens to not mow our lawns, for the sake of pollinators and local wildlife. If you’re a tree hugger like me, this excited you quite a bit. Think about it: not hearing the grinding whirr of lawn mowers throughout the city even for just a little bit, seeing bumble bees and butterflies around homes again for what may be the first time in years for some people. But in May I ended up seeing way fewer people than I thought I would going along with this proclamation. I enjoyed the few I walked past that let the prairie that was once here re-emerge from our monocultured manicured lawns. I know very well that there are people that think letting nature do its thing is unsightly compared to everyone’s flat green carpets.

There are many reasons for this way of thinking. HOA laws. Neighbors complaining. But at the root of it all is why we continue to maintain turf lawns in the first place.

Turf lawns were and are above everything else, a status symbol. They gained popularity with the monarchy and the nobility in Europe, showing off that they had enough man-power to flatten entire acres of grasslands with scythes and trimmers pulled by hooves and feet and hands way before lawn mowers were invented. Yet even then, they made more of an effort to take care of the nature in these flattened areas than most common folk here ever have. They fertilized these areas naturally. They planted chamomile and thyme and different types of ground cover to make it easier to maintain.

This all changed drastically with industrialization. Immigrants here wanted to show off that they came from nobility or worked up to their status by mimicking the evergreen flat grasslands that were so iconic to status there. Of course, this was not good for biodiversity or nature here. The turf we maintain here takes so much water and irrigation to maintain because it does not belong here, and never has. We parch this land and cause it to crack and dry and crumble by only letting turf grasses with one-inch roots grow, and the drought will only get worse as the planet heats up. I won’t even get started about the fact that Walmart sets out RoundUp on the shelves right by the front door, urging people to kill and poison the only distinguishable life in their yards. Don’t buy RoundUp.

I could go on and on about what lawn culture has done to life on Earth, but what

I really want to focus on here is, why only May? Why shouldn’t we want to let pollinators and life here thrive all year, every year?

To me, lawn culture is an epidemic that needs to be extinguished. There is no reason we should still be following suit on a trend from the 1600s that we shouldn’t have started in the first place. It is unsustainable and wasteful. What grows here, belongs here— or, that’s how it should be.

—Sam Moon, Des Moines

Gary Barta, UI’s embattled Athletics director, abruptly announces retirement (May 26)

Smart, get out before the Brian Ferentz project! —Tom W.

Something must be up. More to this story coming later? —David P.

I don’t think so. He’s been mulling this over for a while from what I’ve heard. With the cancer scare

/LittleVillage

READER POLL:

Which is the best lettuce-less salad?

transition. He definitely was not forced out. This was 100% his decision. —Chuck W.

Finally, and good riddance. —Susan F.

He should have been gone long ago! —Connie F.

something must be up. Anyway, thanks for the lawsuits, Brian Ferentz, and eliminating several men’s sports.

David M.

Next stop for Sioux City powerlifter Mitchell Betsworth: the 2023 Berlin Games (June 8) a couple years back and with the AD being in a good place, probably just felt like a good time to step away. Iowa has a star in the making in house so it should be a seamless

Wow! Congratulations! SO MANY will be cheering you on. You are AWESOME! —Connie W.

REPRESENT MITCHELL! —Ellie

Stress Fractures John Martinek

New Bohemia & Czech Village

Time Capsule Dale

Meet Dale, a Gen X townie who fell asleep in 1996 and woke up in 2023.

All I wanted was a beer garden, a barstool with a lil-bit-a duct tape and a proper breaded pork tenderloin. Not too much to ask for during an ideal spring day trip to Marion. To my astonishment, the Horseless Carriage has turned into a (kind of) Friendly Confines in Linn County—7th Avenue in Marion now includes Wrigleyville Sports Pub, a Cubs-themed concept bar that this baseball lover could get used to, and quickly.

A few shared pitchers later, I’m ready to hang out in the comfort of a more familiar venue—if I can manage to find one!

A few blocks down the road, inside a minivan with nine new drinking buddies, we stop in Uptown Marion to discover that one of Eastern Iowa’s most legendary bars is nowhere to be seen. Alley Oops is gone, replaced with a public library. A blue-collar institution, lost to the ages. Did someone save the Blues Brothers poster at least?

What’s more, I’m told the tornado slide and old-ass fire engine have been removed from Thomas Park, and MHS doesn’t play football there anymore! I tell my fellow beer guzzlers to go on without me; as Dan Conner once said, “I can’t believe I’m too depressed to drink.”

I look up and a young man named Travis Ried urges me to buck up and enjoy Marion for what it is now. Just that moment I notice Zoey’s Pizzeria, open and ushering customers through the door. I speedwalk over and order the biggest Chicago-style pizza they bake, passing it around to everyone who wants to party with me Marion-in-2023 style.

Travis called me an Umbro cab or whatever, and I tipped my hat to the former Marion Maid-Rite location where my family got into a heated argument and a one-sided food fight. Family moments are precious, even when a crinkle-cut French fry is whizzing through the air.

—Jay Goodvin

[Update:] Mitchell won silver overall!!! —Cristin M.

‘If I don’t stick up for the drag queens, who’s gonna stick up for me?’: a Q&A with James McMurtry ahead of his sold-out Iowa City show (June 10)

Nearly 20 years ago when James McMurtry played the Iowa Arts Festival he spoke out for human rights from that stage and a few people were upset that he brought politics into his show. The rest of the crowd were cheering. It was awesome to see a huge group of people cheering for a better world. —Katie R.

Four historic sites illuminate Iowa’s role in the Underground Railroad (June 20)

We have a station in Eldora. Many

Personals

Spring Roll is seeking a new pad. The 2-yearold husky mix likes running at the speed of light, singing in languages lost to time, and snuggling as tight as rice paper. Hungry for some Spring Roll? Meet her at the Iowa City Animal Center. If you hit it off, you don’t even need to pay the adoption fee; Half Moon Kennels has sponsored several dogs in the shelter, including Ms. Roll. Visit icanimalcenter.org.