Want the key to my heart? Give me a giant teddy bear.

Though the unusual is usual in a newsroom and there isn't much that can surprise a journalist these days, the shaggy white plush bear waltzing down the hallway was enough to raise a few brows.

In an embarrassing, yet dazzling, display of long-distance affection, the bear was handed over to me -- the red-faced news editor standing in the hallway for all of the department to see.

Though I was pretty sure I knew who did this, I read the card anyway.

"It's beary cold in Iowa."

Now, my natural question was how in this world can a person send an enormous bear from Iowa to Louisiana. So I called the only boy I know in Iowa.

The answer was apparently quite simple.

"I can work miracles, sweetheart," he said in a way that instantly made me think of (my personal stud) Han Solo. "I'm unpredictable."

Unpredictable scares me. It means I have no control over what happens next. Even in the ever-changing vocation I've chosen, there are norms; deadlines are set and solid, sleep is minimal and sanity is irrelevant.

But throw in unpredictable and my world stands on its head.

Unpredictable makes me irrational and causes me to do things without really thinking about them, such as flying to Iowa for a wedding last weekend.

During those three days and nights I realized something about myself: I love Louisiana.

But I am obsessed with Iowa.

I think the intrigue Iowa holds for me is the fresh fascination of something new. Simultaneous rolling hills and open sky is a concept I have trouble grasping.

I was born under the open sky in the flat floodplains of the Red River, raised in the rolling piney hills of north Louisiana. I lived three years in Kentucky where I was introduced to snow. Separate they each are old news. Together my favorite things all pull together to form Iowa.

Iowa has traces of a million states but is at the same time wholly unique.

There is something romantic in the way each sloping hill ends with a stand of trees I can't recognize. Black bark and yellow leaves against green moss and blue sky. My friend thinks the trees may be oaks, or something.

He doesn't really know what kind of trees they are. He only knows with each one I see I love his home a little bit more.

During a weekend spent in Iowa City, two forces were vying for my heart: the scenic everything I was surrounded by and the boy responsible for showing me the scenic everything.

We spent the better part of a Saturday (better meaning the parts not spent at a wedding) driving through the quaint history of downtown Burlington. The sky was blue, and the air had the crispness we in Louisiana rarely can experience. We had the sunroof open so I could see the spires of centuries-old churches overlooking the Mississippi River.

Iowa captured my heart.

My first day back in Louisiana it was 86 degrees and the campus reeked of skunk. I yearned for Iowa, because it really is like Heaven.

Sharon Moore is a junior journalism major from Natchitoches and serves as a news editor for The Tech Talk. E-mail comments to sem010@latech.edu.