Quaker Oats

At one point I lived about twenty miles southeast of Cedar Rapids, and drove into CR often in the middle of the night, on roads that were east-west or north-south, until I got up next to the Quaker Oats plant downtown.

Smell memories seem to be more intense than other memories, or maybe it's that they are stored somewhere separate in their own bright-smelling place. That factory had a distinctive smell, one that I remember clearly, and one that I liked, no matter what anyone says about corn syrup being bad for you.

Mixed in with the smell is the memory of learning about the prevailing winds based on where I encountered it most strongly. Winds in Iowa are almost always from northwest, but at various and changing directions; sometimes NNW, sometimes NWW, sometimes one-seventy degrees, sometimes one-fifty, that kind of thing. In the summer, with my windows down, it was strongest and I would actually go through the line of greatest strength on my way. to and from work; in winter, my windows up and heater on, I'd still get a pretty strong whiff.

I'd think of my grandfather, an agricultural extension agent in Ames, who, driving past fields with a strong poop smell, would point out that it wsa the smell of farmers making money. Or my father, a chemical engineer in Pittsburgh, making similar comments about the smell of steel mills prevailing throughout the city. Why is it that we remember such things so clearly? I defended the corn syrup smell as being of my chosen environment and thought it better than steel mills, which actually left grime on brick walks and houses. These days they want to bring a huge steel mill to Iowa and I'm thinking, be careful what you wish for, the peaceful Mississippi Valley will never smell the same. Maybe progress in some ways is good (as my father pointed out) and my grandfather would agree that the stronger the smell, the better off somebody somewhere was. OK. But those smells are around for a lifetime, I'll guarantee you.

I have a friend who moved to Oaxaca. I remember traveling there, and coming to a clearing in the jungle, on our way to the beaches at Puerto Escondido and Puerto Angel. That clearing was the center of a coffee plantation of some kind. And I'll never forget the smell of the place. Sure, it was beautiful, the mountains, the jungle, the little store with a coke bottle out front. But the smell was heavenly and eternal.

It's unsettling when even part of a factory blows up. I obviously have some identity issues tied up in that smell, which makes it all the more unsettling. I hope they get that boiler up and running again soon, either that or we'll have to switch over to some safer, healthier way of cooking down corn.