Effing Roch

I’ve only been to Rochester, Minnesota twice in my life. The first time was last Christmas, and the second time was this Thanksgiving. The purpose of both trips were to visit my girlfriend’s parents. I may have also passed through Rochester when I was a little kid, on a trip to see relatives in Iowa, but I’m not sure about that so I’m not going to count it.

Whether I’d been there or not, I knew a lot about Rochester when I was a little kid, simply because I liked learning facts about cities, and knew that Rochester only slightly smaller in population than Duluth at the time. Rochester was rapidly growing. Meanwhile, Duluth was rapidly shrinking. Rochester had the Mayo Clinic and IBM. Duluth was the westernmost port on the St. Lawrence Seaway, and the gateway to the Iron Range, industries that didn’t do well in the latter 20th century.

I love Duluth. It feels like home to me because that’s exactly what it’s always been. So it’s hard to comprehend when I go someplace like Rochester, which isn’t all that far away and shouldn’t be all that different, and yet it feels like I’m on another planet.

On our most recent drive back from effing Roch, I tried to sum up the difference for Christa. I did this shyly, because I really don’t know anything about Rochester culture, other than what I’ve seen in a grand total of something like four days spent there. And yet I’m told that it’s pretty accurate, so I’ll duplicate it here.

• Generally speaking, Rochester is a white-collar town populated by people who were drawn there by employment opportunities. Duluth is a blue-collar town populated by hippies and artists.
• In Rochester, everything looks new and clean and everyone likes it that way. The way to improve something is to remodel it, or better yet, to tear it down and build a new one. In Duluth, everything looks old. At its best, it looks impressive and historic. At its worst, it looks seedy and decrepit. In all cases, it looks cool. Everyone likes it that way, except for developers and people who live in Hermantown, Duluth’s only suburb.
• That said, tearing something down in Rochester is generally thought of as “progress.” Tearing something down in Duluth is thought of as “an outrage.”
• Rochester is building a new Lourdes High School. Duluth recently considered eliminating school in January to save money.
• The people who move to Duluth do so because they’re arty folk who want to look at Lake Superior. Arty people do not move to Rochester, and arty people who grew up in Rochester all move to Minneapolis or somewhere else.
• There are reportedly two cab companies in Rochester, one of which is new. According to the phone book, there are ten cab companies in Duluth, and I know about at least three more which are not listed.
• In this way, Rochester does not understand how big it is. Meanwhile Duluth does not understand how small it is.
• I have no idea how many original bands there are in Rochester, but I’d bet I can count them on my digits. According to the roster for last year’s Homegrown Music Festival, Duluth has somewhere around 150.
• Rochester is home to booming industries that provide good jobs for many people. Vinnie & the Stardusters, a Twin Cities band, once recorded a song called “Come to Duluth (If You Want to be an Unemployed Alcoholic).”
• I have no idea what the people of Rochester press their city government to do, but I’m fairly certain that they would never demand the legalization of backyard chicken coops, which is what Duluthians demanded last year.
• There is remarkably little facial hair in Rochester. Here, however …

It’s all a matter of taste, I guess. But me, I prefer a basement bar to a chain restaurant, an all-girl punk band to a pothole-free street.

Duluth … Duluuuth … you’re my hometown.