[masthead image: Fertile Fields in the Iowa Fall]
Iowa fall. My favorite time of the year is fall. My favorite place on earth is right where I was standing when I took this shot. It is a hill on my grandparents' farm, where I've stood thousands of times and watched the sun set, where I can remember one year when my grandpa had a few cattle fenced in here and calves dotted the hill side in spring, where scrub evergreens and native yucca plants now dot the Loess soil of the hill side, where the best farmers grow the best crops on the best land.
Iowa land. So many seasons have passed by while working and playing on that farm. I've seen and been seen there, I've met some of my nicest friends there, I've forged endless memories of me and my sister and my cousins enjoying our acres of outdoor play area there, and I've even grown a few crops of my own there - vegetables, mostly tomatoes. There's nothing like the smell of the dirt.
Iowa dirt. Standing on the draw bar of the Farmall H while Grandpa cultivated always was a favorite treat, because I could watch the black birds flock in behind the tractor, where they pecked around until they found an earthworm or a grub. The moist smell of fresh tilled earth filled my nostrils as we went back and forth, making round after round together in the field. Even today when I smell fresh-tilled earth, I still get the image of all those black birds, with their iridescent black feathers shimmering their many colors in the bright, hot sun.
Iowa sun.
