COLUMN: An organizer’s lament (Dylan Days is coming)

This is my weekly column that was published in the Sunday, May 17 edition of the Hibbing Daily Tribune.

An organizer’s lament (Dylan Days is coming!)
By Aaron J. Brown

When I was a reporter I used to marvel at the busybody community activists who were in charge of such things as Chisholm Parallel Parking Days or the Bovey Lint Appreciation Fest. Such enthusiasm they showed, such perpetual energy these people expended for an event the crowd would enjoy once and then forget until the organizers would have to do the same work all over again next year. These organizers lived like ants serving drinks, tap dancing and spinning decorative plates for a sea of restless grasshoppers. Oh, how I pitied them.

Until, somehow, I became one of them.

Something’s about to happen. I’m opening the curtain. I’m admitting to you, dear reader, that I have a conflict of interest. A serious one, if my old journalism professors were here to talk to you, yell at you and demand you hit the deadline. I am writing a column about something I am involved in.

“What?” you say. “Sacrilege! You must only tell us what you think! You must never tell us what you do!” Well, it’s true. I do things outside of this column and one such task is to help organize Dylan Days, the annual arts event in Hibbing honoring this town’s famous son, Bob Dylan.

“Grooaaan!”

What’s that sound?

“Grooaan!”

Oh, that’s the sound I often hear when I mention Bob Dylan in mixed company on the Iron Range. I was giving a talk in another town a few weeks ago and mentioned “the legendary Bob Dylan” in the context of famous Iron Range natives. An audible scoffing sound emerged from the crowd, like I was selling VCRs – ironically to people unable to or disinterested in programming those VCRs.

“But wait!” I wanted to say. “You may not like Dylan or his public image, but in many ways he represents the spark and possibility of the Iron Range. His work has touched people all over the world and he’s from the same streets as you and me.” My voice echoes in my head, unspoken. “And besides,” my lonely thoughts continue, “it’s not like I just spent two days indenting paragraphs for the Dylan Days literary journal, you Neanderthals!”

“Community organizer” was a term both exalted and denigrated during last fall’s election as it was touted as one of President Obama’s early resume entries. Nevertheless, I often describe myself as something of a community organizer. Community organizing, Obama has said, is hard. People, by nature, tend to avoid organization unless you can demonstrate some reason they should put collective interest ahead of their own. Why should people get behind something like Dylan Days when so many good Iron Rangers spent the last 50 years honoring their roots through hard work and community service?

The answer is not to idolize a man, but to celebrate the unique caldron of possibility that is the hardscrabble Iron Range. This is an excerpt from the May 2009 edition of Rolling Stone’s Douglas Brinkley interview with Dylan:

“I ask Dylan if he minds people visiting Hibbing or Duluth or Minneapolis searching for the root of his talent. ‘Not at all,’ he surprisingly says. ‘That town where I grew up hasn’t really changed that much, so whatever was in the air before is probably still there. I go through once in a while coming down from Canada. I’ll stop there and wander around.’”

That image is the one that causes the longest pause when I talk to people. Imagine Dylan, a Hibbing boy gone far too long to wear the Bluejacket sweat band, wandering the town, most likely the edge of town which so fascinated him according to local lore. This town “hasn’t changed much,” this sentence at first seems offensive, but rings true. Mine layoffs. Struggling downtown. Oh, how cold the winds of reality and how warm the touch of truth. And how I love sharing the story of this place with a world that only knows us as “the hometown of Bob Dylan.”

It’s true what they say about sharks: They must swim to survive. As such, Dylan Days 2009 is coming this week, with events starting Wednesday and official activities scheduled Thursday, May 21 through Sunday, May 24. Oh, the high times you could have if you partake. Drink! Dance! Sing! Join rhyme and purpose to cement a monument of your time in the human race. All this and more at www.dylandays.com.

I’m sorry. I can no longer help myself.

Aaron J. Brown is a columnist for the Hibbing Daily Tribune. Contact him or read more at his blog MinnesotaBrown.com or in his recent book “Overburden: Modern Life on the Iron Range.”