Saveur

Photo: Blair Jensen

Two weeks before my family arrives for the holidays, it begins to snow. My husband Mike and I and our 2-year-old son Nash walk up to the Victorian Stroll on the square in Albia, Iowa. I'm trying to see this town through my parents' eyes. I've been talking it up, convincing my mom and stepdad (and myself) that moving a thousand miles away from them was the best thing for us. So what if the Albia Theatre is showing Mortal Combat? Steve and Ed, the guys who run it, still sell penny candy; admission's just $3.50, and we're going to need those movies as winter drags on and on. Anyway, right now the snow is new, the four blocks of the square are outlined in twinkling white lights, the courthouse is hung with old-fashioned colored bulbs, and Mike and Nash and I are excited.

"So, where are you from?" is a question I always dread. The answer says so much about you: sophisticated or domesticated, hip or hick. I hem and haw, then answer: I was born in San Francisco, and when my mother married my stepfather, they decided the big bad city was no place to raise us girls. My sister Verity (then 10) and I (12), like many city kids, knew the maître d's at our favorite restaurants by name but had no neighborhood kids to play with. So, we headed for the heartland: Galena, Illinois. I pictured Little House on the Prairie; my new classmates thought I knew the Village People. But gradually, I became a Midwesterner. Then, in 1985, when I started college—Grinnell, in Iowa—my parents moved east to Bucks County, Pennsylvania, just over an hour from Manhattan.

When I tell this story, people seem dazed. They may never ask this question of anyone again. But then they look at me with new respect, as if I somehow have the power to fit in wherever I find myself. I think this is what everyone wants: to fit in. I knew I wanted to live somewhere a long time, and to establish my own history that would mingle with the history of somewhere, no matter how elusive.

In 1996, my husband and I found ourselves in suburban New Jersey. Nash was a year old. We didn't fit in. Mike was from Iowa, so we decided to move back. But back where? We knew it had to be right—small town, good schools, not too developed, but with a healthy town square. We'd driven through Albia for years on the way to visit Mike's mother in Corydon. Was I remembering it correctly, or was I so anxious to belong somewhere that I couldn't trust my memory? Then I found out that Albia starts planning its Christmas festivities in April—and I knew I'd picked the right town.

Albia was settled by corn farmers in the early 19th century. Its stately town square was laid out in 1845 and, after the original wooden structures burned, rebuilt in brick. New coal-mining money—lots of it—began to flow into town late in the century. By 1904, the square was complete, and Monroe County's population had swelled to 40,000 (it's now down to 8,000 souls—3,870 of them in Albia itself). The square was recently renovated—and placed on the National Register of Historic Places—thanks to the efforts of Robert T. Bates, a hometown boy who made good in Hollywood, decorating houses for big-time stars like Joan Crawford. Bates had a vision for this once-proud town, and his foundation donated $2 million for its restoration.

And now we're here at Albia's Victorian Stroll, with our hands freezing and our noses running. I had no idea people still celebrated this way. Shops stay open very late—9 p.m. is very late here—and in each store window, sponsored by a business or a club, local citizens in costume play out Victorian scenes. We dash into the courthouse for free coffee and cocoa. Celebrated local baker Dorothy Koffman has rounded up 600 dozen cookies—decorated sugar cookies, rich fudgy mint bars—mainly from the church ladies, who now stand proudly behind long cafeteria tables, pressing samples on Nash.

Part of the tradition of the Victorian Stroll (first held, only ten years ago, for all its old-fashioned feeling) is to urge newcomers to become committee members for the event. At my first meeting last spring, everyone already knew who I was, thanks to a front-page write-up in Albia's Union Republican: I was the one who'd bought Greg Morehead's house. At first, I was amazed at how much work so many people were willing to donate, not for personal gain, but rather for our town's pride. I must admit thinking that there was no way I could take this seriously. But tonight, as I walk around the square, I realize that I know these people; they're my neighbors. And when we stop in front of Santa, he speaks to my son: "Ho, Ho, Ho! And what do you want for Christmas, Nash?" My son's eyes widen and he stares at that Santa and says, "Woody and Buzz [characters in the movie Toy Story]."Santa looks up at me and says, "Have you got that, Frances?"

Now we're getting hungry, so we wander over to the Albia High School Band Parents' Soup Supper at the First Christian Church. The supper starts at 4:30 p.m. and lasts as long as the soup does. The evening is run by tireless women who not only work 40-hour weeks—teaching, cleaning, nursing, or farming—but volunteer for their church societies, smiling all the way. Everyone helps, and there is an easy camaraderie in the kitchen—and a definite hierarchy. (A first-timer, for example, should definitely not attempt to adjust seasonings; I don't.) The hearty vegetable or creamy potato soup we buy tonight will help send the band to Kansas City this spring, forever shaping a memory for these kids, some of whom have never left the county. The band plays through supper, guaranteeing that no one can hear my child as he loudly announces how icky his soup is. A church lady nearby laughs: "Oh yes, I've been there. Wait until he's three"—then offers him a big piece of banana-cream pie, says she's never seen a cuter child, and bets he'll be a great tackle one day for the Albia Blue Demons. Wow, I think. They expect us to still be here.

This article was first published in Saveur in Issue #31