It’s possible only a handful of people will watch

moving through Irvington on Sunday. Most years, the number of parade participants far exceeds the number of parade viewers.

That’s just how Steve Slavik likes it.

Slavik has greying hair and the lanky build of a former baseball star. Neighbors call him Coach Steve because he once coached T-ball. The waiters at

, where he has a table reserved daily for lunch, call him Coach Steve, too. The Coach Steve special includes an IPA, a hamburger and two pickles.

Which is to say Steve Slavik is a man of traditions.

None have lasted as long as his annual Northeast Portland St. Patrick’s Day Parade.

Slavik, whose family is Czechoslovakian, held the first parade 25 years ago on a whim.

For years, his Irish father-in-law had held a big St. Patrick’s Day Party in Michigan. But Tom Healy grew old, and in 1989 decided to cancel his party.

"Why don't you come to our house?" Slavik asked his wife's father.

Healy hesitated. The trip from Detroit is long.

"We're having a parade!" Slavik blurted.

Slavik had never held, nor planned to hold a parade. But that March, he threw his first with Tom Healy as the grand marshal. He's been holding them every year since.

The neighborhood has changed considerably since he held the first parade. Irvington meant something different when he, his wife Julie and their four children bought an old boarding home on Northeast Hancock Street in the late 1980s.

“The one thing that has stayed the same in this neighborhood is people know there is going to be a parade,” Slavik said.

Last month, Slavik and buddy Steve Turina hoisted a light-up parade countdown sign in front of Slavik’s home. His is the hundred-year-old house that hangs a holiday chandelier every Christmas, Valentine’s Day and Fourth of July. Slavik and Turina also hung a banner they repurposed from a 1988 Michael Dukakis rally. Instead of Dukakis, Portland now hearts the Irish.

Slavik is the parade’s organizer in that he announces the date and pays for the permits. But Sunday morning, there’s only one rule for the “O’Slavik parade.” Be at the

at 11:30 a.m.

“You come any earlier, you’re just going to see me, a kid on a bike and a dog with a bow,” Slavik said.

There are no registration fees. No pre-parade line-ups. If Slavik sees you watching the parade, he will likely beckon you to join the trail.

It’s grown from a block-long crew in 1989 to --- well, who knows how many people will show this year. Slavik says every parade is bigger than the last. But its official length will be determined sometime after the parade starts Sunday at noon.

Slavik knows the Oscar Meyer Wiener truck is going to be there this year. A fire engine from Northeast Broadway Street’s Station 13 will drive through. The Irish Wolfhound Society will walk, as will the Greyhound Rescue group. As a joke, Slavik invited the county dog catchers to build a float behind the dog troupes.

“What’re you going to see is the cutest stuff,” Slavik said. “There’s going to be a ‘Truck ‘o Pats.’ Any Pat -- Patricia, Patrick -- can ride in my old pickup truck.”

A few months ago, the New Horizons orchestra called Slavik at home -- “I’m the last man in the world without a cell phone.” -- and asked to participate.

“Just be at Fernwood at 11:30,” Slavik told them. “And we’ll head west from there.”

“But we’re not a marching band,” one of the members told him.

“Well how many of you are there?” Slavik asked.

The 20-piece orchestra will set up in Slavik’s yard and play as the parade goes by. They’ll pause when the

Marching Band or the River City Pipe Band passes.

The bagpipes drew writer Charity Egland out of her home a few years ago. On

, she reported seeing less than 20 people total watching what she dubbed “the ghost parade.”

“When I threw on some shoes and took my dog down to watch, there was exactly one other person on our block watching it go by,” Egland wrote. “So the people in this parade were essentially waving to no one. And still they paraded.”

Tom Healy died 15 years ago. But Slavik is still holding the parade to draw his family closer. His kids have moved away the last few years. Saturday, they’re flying in from New York and Arizona. A whole clan of Healys will join them from Detroit.

“That’s a real testament,” Slavik said Thursday, tearing up over his usual at the Columbia River Brewing Company. “It’s not like, ‘Ugh, it’s Christmas. I have to go home.’ They want to come back.”

The parade will travel west down Northeast Hancock Street then back east on Tillamook. If no one’s watching, that’s fine. Slavik will have everyone he needs marching alongside him.

-- Casey Parks