A Hillbilly Perspective

Yesterday, I worked in Aplington with a group of volunteers from Tyson’s Waterloo plant, feeding hungry bikers ribeye sandwiches, pulled pork sandwiches and hot dogs. This is the bunch that raised $50,000 for last year’s Powering the Spirit campaign to raise money for childhood hunger relief in their community. They’re joining fellow Iowa Tyson Team Members in raising what will no doubt be an even larger sum for agencies in the RAGBRAI towns across the state.

Corn. More corn than an Ozark guy can even think about. Remember the first time you saw the ocean and were awestruck by water as far as the eye could see? Same thing with corn out here in central Iowa. It becomes easier to understand how the U.S. has been feeding the world. And harder to understand how we let people go hungry in this country.

Bicycles. This RAGBRAI thing is something else one has to see to fully comprehend its scope. Yesterday in Aplington, the bikers started coming in at around eight in the morning, and were still rolling through when we closed our food booth at 3pm. Road bikes, mountain bikes, cruisers, recumbents, tandems, trios, quads, bikers in costume, bikes with trailers, sound systems; if you can imagine it, someone’s probably riding it in RAGBRAI. Nobody can accurately describe the experience of seeing ten to fifteen thousand bicyclists.

Heart. I figure geography had something to do with naming it “America’s Heartland.” But I might submit that the spirit of the people I’ve met out here fully validates the moniker. These are great folks. Hard-working. Friendly. Caring. Productive. I’ve run into a bunch of big-hearted people out here. More about that later. All week long a lot of them, our fellow Tyson Team Members, have been volunteering their own time, doing hot, hard, physically demanding work to help feed hungry children they’ll probably never meet. I can’t tell you how proud I am to be associated with them.

Ed