Look Out, Cleveland

Day 23

The only preconceived notions I had about Cleveland were pretty much formed by a Youtube video the group had become fond of, called the “Hastily Made Cleveland Tourism Video”, which pokes fun at the city’s lack of any outstanding characteristics. In fact, when we talked to the one person from Cleveland we spent a good deal of time with on this day (a Clevelandian? Clevelandite?), our guide at the House of Blues, she mentioned that Cleveland is always kind of the butt of jokes around the country. What a strange claim to fame for a town…

The first thing on our schedule was a tour of the famous music venue and restaurant House of Blues. We got a chance to see some of the venue’s extensive folk art collection, which was really interesting. I enjoyed getting to speak with our guide at the House of Blues, especially about her feelings about being an American and what it means to her, because I felt like she expressed the way I also feel about being an American. She spoke about how there are lots of things about our country that she is not crazy about and she doesn’t usually feeling patriotic in the traditional sense but that she does love America because it is her home and this is what she knows, its where she was raised, so of course she is going to love it. America is my home, the only one I’ve ever known, and I think had I been raised by a loving family in any country in the world, I would feel some sort of love for and loyalty to it. We have seen a diverse assortment of regions, people and identities along the way on this trip and I have been considering how much I love most of them- so there are so many things about the reality, not just the ideal, of America that I really do appreciate. And I love the idea of America. But as far as feeling “proud to be an American” or things of that nature…I’m not sure I really identify with those feelings, or even fully understand what it means. Because for the most part, I think I would find things to love and be proud of in any country that I lived in.

Our next stop in Cleveland was the Rock ‘N’ Roll Hall of Fame. As an avid music fan, I found everything in this museum absolutely fascinating and could have stayed there for hours. One theme that this museum certainly calls to mind is the relationship that Americans have with pop culture and especially celebrities. For those who we have deemed beautiful or talented or strange enough to capture our national attention, there is no end to how far some will go to venerate them. From a whole section of the museum dedicated to costumes and props from David Bowie concerts to the exhibit of childhood scribblings of Jim Morrison, it is obvious the obscure relics of the famous fascinate people.

Something I’ve noticed on our travels is how knowledge of celebrities (and the media that makes it possible) is a uniting factor in America. We have been able to witness an excellent example of this by being on the road at the time of Michael Jackson’s death. We were in the van in Minneapolis when we first heard the news on the radio. By the time we went to dinner at the international market, there was a small crowd gathered around one of the TVs in the eating area, all discussing the star’s death. We continued to hear about Michael Jackson at almost every other stop along the road: they incorporated tasteless jokes about it at a comedy show in NY, our bus driver shared the latest news about the story, and in every city we saw all sorts of memorabilia being sold and worn. Consumption of popular culture and fascination with celebrity has been demonstrated as a unifying factor all along our journey, from Graceland to the Clinton Presidential Library to Mount Rushmore to Michael Jackson.

We ended our day with a show at the venue where we had toured earlier in the day, and saw The Roots at the House of Blues. It was an incredible show and served as a much-needed time to relax and have fun together. We came home exhausted and ready to see the famous Niagra Falls in Buffalo the next day.