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City boy meets farm girl ...
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By: Tracey Forbes
| 09/10/2009 |
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CALL ME a romantic, but I think every now and then, we need a good love story to remind us of the beauty that still exists in the world.
So, my fellow readers of Our Iowa, please pause for a moment and allow yourself to fall in love all over again.
City Boy Meets Farm Girl...
Editor's note: The following article was originally published in a recent issue of the "Our Iowa" magazine and is used with their permission.
It's a match made in Heaven...er, in Iowa. Now there's going to be a wedding!
By Tracey Forbes
CALL ME a romantic, but I think every now and then, we need a good love story to remind us of the beauty that still exists in the world.
So, my fellow readers of Our Iowa, please pause for a moment and allow yourself to fall in love all over again.
My name is Tracey Forbes, and I'm a 27-year-old woman who is proud of two things: my family and being an Iowan.
I am the product of two solid Iowa families molded together. My mother comes from a Reformed Church of America pastor's family from northwest Iowa. My father is from a Catholic farming family from southeast Iowa. My maternal grandparents met at Central College, and my parents followed suit and met there as well.
My parents eventually settled into a life of teaching and farming at Lone Tree-yup, the same "lone tree" that was featured in Our Iowa a number of issues back. The Forbes farming tradition is a longstanding one in our community, and I have always felt a deep sense of pride in being part of it.
Nonetheless, as a young girl, I was independent and headstrong and determined to do something different with my life. So I began to travel all over the world and become exposed to other cultures. I had high hopes of going to college someplace far away but settled on Hope College in Holland, Michigan.
I cherished being the only Iowan among my Michigan friends and could entertain them for hours with stories from the farm. Finally, I invited a group of them to experience a weekend in Iowa with me.
That was 9 years ago. This same group of friends-which now has tripled to over 30-still travels to Iowa every autumn from all over the U.S. to attend the Lone Tree Fall Festival.
(I'll be honest-the festival is nothing spectacular, but don't tell my dad because he helps with it. However, it's the experience of being with Iowans here in Iowa that draws my friends back year after year.)
But let's get back to the love story...
Became a Missionary
My free and independent spirit-as much as it longed for Iowa-was being called in a different direction after my college graduation. I worked as a missionary for a year in Costa Rica.
Then I returned to Michigan, where I settled in a poor neighborhood (on purpose) and began a ministry working with my low-income neighbors to make our small urban community a better, safer and cleaner place.
As a 24-year-old, I felt blessed that I'd found a calling so quickly that fit my passion to serve others in a meaningful way. My ministry became my heartbeat, while my little car-the one I'd driven since high school-memorized the 6-hour route between Michigan and Iowa. I felt stuck between two worlds I desperately loved, so the best I could do was keep one foot in each.
Fast-forward a couple of years, and you'll meet an almost 27-year-old woman who had everything she needed in life: a fulfilling job, a supportive family, an abundance of friends, and the best home and community in Iowa to retreat to when life became difficult.
The dating scene wasn't of much interest to me. The only thing I was sure of was if I were to meet someone special, he'd need to have a deep appreciation for my Iowa roots. I wasn't so sure I'd find this in Michigan.
Let me pause for a moment to introduce you to my brother Michael, because his role in this story is significant. Michael and I have always shared a deep friendship that goes beyond what most siblings experience.
Like me, Michael loved Iowa and our farm. However, life has an interesting way of shaping us, and something about our upbringing in Iowa led us both to Hope College...and then to jobs working with at-risk inner-city kids.
Michael is now a teacher at an inner-city high school in Anchorage, Alaska. We both miss home every day but know we belong where we are.
Met Mr. Right
Anyway, I'd been skeptical I'd meet a man who would measure up to my brother and all he represented. But ironically it was Michael who introduced me to the only man who ever could.
Being the storyteller he is, Michael often shared stories of Iowa and our farm adventures with his college buddies. One friend in particular, Karl, found these stories fascinating and became determined to visit Iowa one day...and also find a way to meet "the Forbes sister" who was part of those adventures.
Karl shared one critical passion with me: a love for the Beatles-especially on a record player. (Some say it's outdated, but I personally think the record player is coming back.) I had inherited an entire collection of Beatles records, so my brother and I decided to host a wine and records party. Michael invited Karl.
Karl and I "connected" instantaneously, but we were somewhat restrained by the fact we'd each attended the party with someone else. As the night progressed, Michael and I entertained our guests with Iowa stories (it runs in our blood), and Karl couldn't get enough of our antics.
Eventually Karl and I lost ourselves in conversation about life in Iowa and my passion for my Michigan community-and we both knew we had met someone important.
Nonetheless, the next day he moved to Memphis, Tennessee, where he began his first job as a teacher for Teach for America. That's a program designed to help failing inner-city schools.
A year passed, and Karl and I maintained limited communication until he returned to Michigan for the summer. We went out to lunch and started seeing each other every opportunity we had.
Home to Meet Mom and Dad
The Fourth of July was quickly approaching, so I decided to surprise my family and bring Karl home to spend the weekend on the family farm. They'd known nothing of Karl before this, but they fell in love with him immediately. And Karl fell in love with Iowa upon crossing the Mississippi River bridge.
Karl's love for Iowa and the farm confirmed what I already suspected: I would marry this man in Iowa someday.
Karl and I, along with part of the Forbes clan, spent the entire holiday weekend at Catnip Ridge, the place where the Forbes family farms began. It's a place deeply embedded in our family, and my aunt and uncle farm there now.
We spent the weekend in family activities on the farm, geocaching (a new form of "treasure hunt" game using GPS) on the nearby Hoover Trail, sitting around bonfires and listening to Grandpa and Grandma tell stories of the good old days. We also adjusted to our new nicknames-"Bluegill" (Karl) and "Sweet Corn" (me).
Despite the 9-hour drive from Memphis, Bluegill made several trips back to Iowa after that-once to participate in the infamous Lone Tree Fall Festival, where he won the 2008 "Agricultural Challenge". (I always knew my man had some farm boy in him!)
Asked for Her Hand
Then, without me knowing, he returned later in the fall to ask my parents for my hand in marriage and to ask my grandmother for her engagement ring, which would soon become mine.
In October, Karl and I met again in Lone Tree to watch my younger siblings play football. We were enjoying a beautiful fall weekend with my family and decided to use Saturday afternoon to go geocaching on the rest of the Hoover Trail.
(We had discussed that our time might be better spent searching for the key to the Mini Cooper in the Our Iowa Treasure Hunt...but decided against it for reasons about to be revealed.)
We had been geocaching all afternoon, and since I'm somewhat directionally challenged, I don't always find the geocache sites. However, my dad and Bluegill promised me I could find the next one.
On that day, I found the best geocache of my life...for after opening it, I realized it contained Grandma's engagement ring. Then, with the whole family watching, Karl got down on bended knee and proposed to me in the middle of an Iowa field. To which I said, "Yes!!!"
We returned to Catnip Ridge, where the Forbes clan excitedly awaited us, and we celebrated our "find". We told my grandparents we wanted to get married on the Forbes farm, and my grandmother beamed proudly with tears rolling down her cheeks.
Aunts and uncles got excited about the prospect of a wedding on the family farm, and the following summer couldn't come soon enough.
Their Wedding Day
That brings us to August 1, 2009-our wedding day. I've been busily preparing for a wedding in Iowa that will bring all of my worlds together...a day that celebrates family, farming and faith...and friends, fun and food.
We are expecting it to be a day unlike most: When the inner city meets the farm, and when three sets of living grandparents who have been married for over 60 years will share their marriage blessings with us.
On that day, I will wear a 60-year-old wedding gown made by my great-grandmother and worn by my grandmother and mother. It'll be a day when a small Iowa community comes together to celebrate with their little Iowa girl and the love who fills her life.
Shhh-Keep This a Secret!
EDITOR'S NOTE: If you're like us, you feel like you "know" Sweet Corn and Bluegill after reading this story. So let's surprise them with wedding well wishes from Our Iowa readers.
If you'd like to send them a card or a note with your wedding blessings, address it to Tracey and Karl and send it to: Our Iowa, 1606 Golden Aspen Drive, Suite 109, Ames IA 50010. We'll forward them to the happy couple.
Let's all help them make this a day they'll never forget!
Squiggleys:
"We both knew we'd met someone important..."
"With the family watching, Karl got down on bended knee..."
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©The Lone Tree Reporter 2009
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