An Iowa story

So this thing happened last night that made me happy to be an Iowan -- or perhaps more accurately, happy to live in a small town. (Although having come from an actual small town, I don't know if I quite agree that Iowa City is one, but it does have that kind of atmosphere. Let's say it's a small city.)

We were having a Halloween party, and around midnight we decided we had better traipse out to the cemetery to see the infamous Black Angel. When we got there, we were dismayed to see a lit truck idling right by the entrance, near the groundskeeper's building. We thought, "Oh, man, they stationed someone out here to ruin everyone's fun, darn the luck!" (The cemetery officially closes at 9.) But then the truck drove out, and it was just a couple of other Halloween celebrators. "Hey, you should go scare the groundskeeper," one said. "What? We're allowed to go in?" "Yeah, he's just there making sure nobody vandalizes it or anything."

So we went on in, and I went up to the groundskeeper and said "Hi! Can we come in?" He said, "You here to look at the Black Angel?" "Yeah." "Okay, go on ahead, just don't do any vandalism." And we went on ahead. The angel is far, far away from the groundskeeper's building. He was just telling people, "Don't do any vandalism!" and leaving it at that. How nice is that? They want everyone to have fun on Halloween, so they just station a guy out there to politely tell everyone not to do any vandalism. And that's good enough!

Of course, we did see a truck circling around a bit later - so I'm sure they were keeping an eye on ol' Teresa Feldevertova just to make sure no one lopped off another finger. Still, though. It was such a nice relief that, for once, the authorities were not there to ruin the fun for everyone...