The Present

When the school year started, Clark realized that it was now or never. She started riding it to school daily, locking it in the bike rack during the day. It takes her about twenty minutes to get to school – slower than biking but faster than walking.

“A lot of people come up to me and say their parents know me because they see me when I’m going to school,” Clark said with a laugh. “And sometimes frat boys will yell at me from cars.”

But college students and her classmates’ parents aren’t the only people she’s run into on the commute.

As Clark was riding her unicycle home on a chilly spring afternoon, she noticed a cluster of people and a camera crew filming something in a neighbor’s yard. 

Anyone who was at City last year no doubt remembers the day City High alumnus Harper Steele and her friend, actor Will Ferrell, of classics like Elf, Anchorman, and, more recently, Barbie, came to Iowa City last March to talk to City’s GSA and film scenes for Ferrell and Steele’s documentary.

But Clark had no idea who either of them were. 

“Some guy came up to me and said ‘Hey, can she [Harper Steele] ride your unicycle?’” Clark remembered. “I shook his hand and he had just a pit for eyes. I thought he was glaring at me and it was terrifying.”

Normally, Clark wouldn’t let a random person try her unicycle. But, noticing the cameras, she figured that they wouldn’t be able to steal it very easily. So, begrudgingly, she let Steele ride her unicycle.

“I left, and the next day, everybody and their mom had a picture with the guy who asked if his friend could ride my unicycle,” Clark said.