By my senior year of college, enrollment at the University had increased dramatically and the dorms were so crowded that one of the twin beds in Room 224 South, Currier Hall had been replaced by bunk-beds and I now had two roommates. One was Jeanne from Huron, South Dakota, the other, Suzy, a transfer from Madison, Wisconsin. Her parents had relocated in Spencer; her older sister was still at Madison, finishing up her degree while her husband served out his military commitment.
Suzy’s parents came often to Iowa City to attend football games and always took Suzy and me to lunch or dinner at least once while they were here for the weekend. They favored three restaurants in the area and I learned to appreciate a more extravagant menu than I had enjoyed at home or at the dorm. First, there was The Mill, where Suzy’s father arranged for wine to be served with the excellent Italian food served there at the time, though to my knowledge, serving wine in restaurants was not yet legal in Iowa. Sometimes they took us to Curt Yocum’s Steak House in Coralville, which served their famous tender, aged steaks. It was there that I discovered Roquefort salad dressing garnished with a little strip of what I at first thought was lean bacon but turned out to be my first startling taste of anchovy. On one occasion, we were treated to a leisurely dinner at The Lark in Tiffin, where the table was first set with an enormous tray of appetizers, including a variety of cheeses, raw vegetables and dip, sauteed mushrooms, olives stuffed with anchovies and spicy chilled shrimp. I would later discover even more delightful viands when I visited their home in Spencer and enjoyed some of Suzy’s mother’s delicious Jewish specialties.
At Christmas break that year, I was a bridesmaid in Suzy’s wedding, where I met a nice, young accountant who worked for the firm that serviced her father’s department store. I had managed to get to Spencer for the occasion with some of Suzy’s friends who were attending the ceremony, but after the wedding, I was in need of transportation to Knoxville. Used to catching free rides home with other students from my hometown, I had given no thought to how I would get home after the wedding, with very little cash in my purse and only inconvenient bus or train connections available. The wedding had taken place on the 18th, and I really wanted to be home in time for Christmas. Suzy’s mother asked me to stay for a few days to help her “get used to Suzy not being around,” and give me time to figure out how to get home. The nice young accountant had a business appointment in Des Moines that week and offered to give me a ride that far. There, I could stay with my Aunt Virginia and convince one of my parents to fetch me the last thirty miles home. As it turned out, Virginia wasn’t home and we climbed through a window and waited for her or Uncle Willy to show up.
After a fruitless phone call to my parents and a supper with Virginia, Willy, and their three young daughters, the accountant drove me the rest of the way to Knoxville where he met my parents and two younger sisters and we made a date for New Year’s Eve.
During the week that followed, my mother, alarmed at the speed this new relationship was progressing, arranged for us to spend New Year’s Eve with my older sister and her husband. I was several months past my twenty-first birthday and both amused and resentful that my parents thought we needed chaperons (we all knew that my sister had broken nearly every rule and restriction when she was much younger than I was at that time.) The accountant went along with the plan, probably to avoid rocking the rather precarious boat, and I hoped that my sister and her husband would know of good places to celebrate, because I certainly didn’t. It was a very special New Year’s Eve – all because I got stranded in Spencer after Suzy’s wedding. A new roommate, Bobbi, moved in for the last semester, but I never got to know her well as I was much too busy getting to know the nice accountant.