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They keep renovating Des Moines International (“if you think of O’Hare as a foreign destination”) Airport, but it’s hard to design away that special feeling the place has always conveyed. A feeling that you misread the invitation, and the party ended right before you got there.

Fly into DSM, make the dramatic march off the airplane, and you walk into a place that feels more like a life-sized school diorama project than the showplace entrance to a city. Nearly empty corridors, advertising that dwells on the thrills of higher education – how many people rush off a plane and immediately enroll at Upper Iowa University? – and a baggage claim area that could host an Arena Football League game and still not seem crowded.

Of course, there’s another way to look at it: No hassles. Nice.

We all have opinions about airports, because they have become such a common part of our lives. Even I can name 30 airports that I’ve flown through, and I never go anyplace. I offered to list them at the dinner table once, but everyone suddenly had to check their text messages. Maybe tomorrow night.

The various airport visits, however, tend to blend together. Probably my most memorable moment at DSM came when I was dispatched to interview some PETA protesters. They were flying in to cause trouble as part of that organization’s carefully crafted attempt to gain everyone’s hatred, and I was promised the protestors would be young women dressed in lettuce leaves.

It was the kind of moment that makes you glad to be a reporter instead of being stuck in some grown-up job.

But I was misinformed. The lettuce leaves were plastic and, much more important, there appeared to be some conventional articles of clothing underneath.

You had me ready to sign up, PETA, but then you lost me.

In the absence of vegetable-based wardrobes, a trip to our airport is usually a fairly humdrum experience. If you see someone you knew in high school, hey, that’s probably your high point for the day.

So if you have time to kill, you’re going to need a good book or a vivid imagination. Otherwise you’ll find yourself with nothing but a very modest food court, one gift shop – heavily subsidized research scientists have found that it’s possible to print “Iowa” on virtually any object – and an irresistible urge to say, “Well, I guess I’ll go look out the window again.”

It’s not the fault of the décor or the architecture. We just don’t get the crowds that excitement requires. It’s the endless churning of humanity that makes an airport interesting.

It’s fascinating to watch a random assortment of travelers mingling and parting, never to see one another again, and it makes one wonder about so many things. Which one of these young people will become famous? Will someone in this waiting area be dead by next week? Hey, did that guy just drop a dollar bill?

You can do this at DSM, but you don’t have much material to work with. Just like the sidewalks of downtown, many things are happening, but few people are visible.

Because we lack frenetic travelers smacking each other with luggage, the message is: OK, take it easy, you made it to the ground safely, don’t get excited. And, sorry to bother you, but welcome to Des Moines.

They’re talking about renaming the airport. Maybe we should storyboard some changes that would actually change the experience. We could keep one concourse nice and dull for locals, but hire extras to busy up the rest of the place by constantly milling around and pressing their fingertips to their temples. Then visitors will think, “Man, this is one high-energy city.”

And now for an alphabetical list of airports I have known. It will continue until our new interactive publishing system indicates that everyone has stopped reading by displaying three dots: Amsterdam, Anchorage, Atlanta …