(Posted August 29, 2010)
- The road is familiar. When I was a lawyer, I had a hog farmer client, Bob Briard, who lived between Park Rapids and Detroit Lakes off Highway No. 34. So I’ve traveled Minnesota Highway No. 200, between U.S. No. 2 and Walker, where you turn on 34, probably over 100 times. I know the hills, the swamps, the conifers, the broad leaf trees, the watering holes (both human and animal) like the back of my hand.
- As my Pacifica glides (it’s one sweet ride) over the asphalt, The Boss is playing on the CD changer. “The Rising”, his response to 9/11 echoes inside the van. Since I fancy myself a writer, words have always been the most important component of a song for me. It’s why CSN&Y was “my Beatles”: their songs had words that either told a story, or made me ponder, back when my musical tastes were being formed. Same thing with Dylan. And Mary Chapin Carpenter. And of course, The Boss. I listen to his tunes as the tires pound the pavement, caught in the wonder of Springsteen’s well of creativity. And of course, in my off-tune second tenor (I lost the sweet soprano of my youth to puberty), I sing harmony with the E-Street Band. I sound like shit. But there’s no one else in the car so who gives a damn?Hackensack, Minnesota. A town of two hundred plus. The little tourist trap just off 200 seems an unlikely venue to ply my words. But if you thought that, you’d be mistaken. Despite the smallness of the place, the folks here like art, like writers. There are not only dozens of arts and craft vendors situated in the Community Center (where I have my table) and in white canopied EZ Ups along the street outside the Center; the entire social hall of Hackensack’s Congregational Church is filled to the brim with words: Writers of all stripes, shapes, and sizes are here to sell books. There’s not a famous one among us but who the hell cares so long as folks buy what we have to say?
At the end of the day, my supplies of Pigs exhausted, my attempts to sell Mr. Environment less than fruitful, my stock of Suomalaiset lightened considerably, I pack my stuff back into the Pacifica. The road hums beneath the rubber. The Boss is still singing. And life is good.
Peace.
Mark
