Organizer Invites Participation for Next Year’s Parade

To the Editors:

This past Saturday was, by all regards, a beautiful day. Oberlin celebrated with pure joy an opportunity to come together as a creative, diverse, and welcoming community. It was sunny and warm; the flowers were blooming. The music was kicking, and the alpacas were not. It was really very much exactly like the perfect party: everyone was invited, everyone had a good time, and, quite notably, nobody got hurt. In fact, it seems to have healed wounds: it brought us all together in happiness.

Perhaps because it really was actually that idyllic, many meta-meanings have been posthumously assigned to the event, particularly by the Cleveland Plain Dealer. But the Big Parade was intended to be, and remains, above such limited generalizations. It was an event that brought the community together in celebration, it is true, but that celebration does not needs bear a political burden, as some might construe. While it means various things and much to many people, it has no single umbrella-definition, nor can exist as such.
The Big Parade is really, when you come right down to it, just a very big parade. And that is exactly why it was so great. Refreshingly free of any impeding and intrusive aims, it was able to live up to its only slogan: More fun than you’ve had in a long time.

A common and appropriate concern is to make this an Annual Event, and questions regarding next year have already arisen. For that reason, it is important to be crystal clear, then, that ANYONE AND EVERYONE IS INVITED TO PARTICIPATE IN THE BIG PARADE AND CARNIVAL.

If you weren’t involved this year, you made what we might call a Big Mistake. But you can easily rectify that by becoming involved next year. Just e-mail oberlinparade@hotmail.com if you know of something that should be involved, a community organization that wasn’t represented, a dance that didn’t dance, a song that wasn’t sung, if you have within you the desire to make a bad-ass float, or if you want to do something else that is entirely amazing, you can do it. It will be, and you are, welcome.

Along those lines, as one of the members of the Big Parade Committee, I wanted to take this opportunity to thank everyone who participated, supported, encouraged, and celebrated the event. Those of us who dedicated the past six months to the event realized that, once it was actually going on, it was impossible to take even the slightest credit for what we saw in front of us, and this provoked the most surprising and misleading responses to accolades. Students who had spent weeks working on floats, who hadn’t slept in four days, found themselves saying they “didn’t really do much.”
In some ways, that appeared accurate on Saturday, because it was so clear that the event could not have been at all possible as any single individual effort. What happened at the Big Parade and Festival, rather, was made possible by an entire community, town, college, and lots of great kids universally determined to have lots and lots and lots of fun.
Nevertheless, it might prove beneficial to attempt to clarify how such an amazing day was created. The main reason is that there was, for the past six months, a core committee of some 11-odd students and residents that were hell-bent on making this happen. We worked like mad. And we had a damn good time.

The committee consisted of many people, and to list them all is impossible, but it always included Zachary Moser, Catherine Goodman, Diana Fleisher, Page Neal, Seth Capron, Rebecca Fuchs, Gregory Bozman, Evan Smith, Abigail Morgan, Morgan Williams and the erstwhile William McCracken. In addition, hundreds of people — and a lot of kids — worked really hard to make this happen; if you want to know all the amazing things they did, ask them, and they might tell you. (You can BE them next year! You can make Anything possible!)

It is also rather important to thank the sponsors of the event: The Senior Class of 2002, Student Finance Committee, The Oberlin Partnership, The Office of the President, Conservatory Council, Oberlin Student Cooperative Association, and the Bike Cooperative. They provided the funding for our fun-thing in a time of financial difficulty, and we are very grateful for them for their support. (Inquiries regarding donations and contributions for next year’s parade should also be addressed to oberlinparade@hotmail.com.)

Ultimately, it is apparent that this community not just desires, but needs a Big Parade. Many community members were deeply moved by the event; while none of us on the committee knew about it initially, there was, until 20 years ago, a similar tradition in town to celebrate the spring. The spirit of pure joy that we found on Saturday was so imminently possible to create, essentially, because it has always existed in this town; long dormant, our Big Parade is awakening Oberlin from its slumber.

The Big Parade is growing to be a Bigger Parade next year, and you should, by all means, be involved.

Let’s keep this going!

–James Blachly
College senior