St. Patrick's Day has always been a big day in my family...revolving a lot around our favorite foods and drink. I made the soda bread and mint marvel cookies earlier this week, and the corned beef this morning, some of which will be in a corned beef hash for brunch on the big day, and the rest for Reubens either later that day, or another day during the week. My sister from Oregon is here for the week, and we're all going down to Miami on Tuesday to see family there. It's a week of parties!
My parents both grew up in Chicago (where the river is turned green for this day), with three of my grandparents being immigrants from Ireland; my Grandfather Roche was first generation, his parents having also come from Ireland. It was a shock to my family to discover that no one got this day off when we moved to Ohio! Surprisingly, my grandparents talked little of their life in Ireland, although there was family from both sides coming over on a regular basis---some to find work and stay, and some just to visit. I didn't realize this lapse in my education until I decided to visit the Emerald Isle myself.
The only thing I remember learning about my Grandmother O'Rourke's early life, was that she---being the youngest of 13---got to ride out into the fields each day with her father in a horse-drawn cart to check their fields. I don't remember my other grandparents ever talking about their lives, nor did I ever think to ask. Those lack of questions eventually led me to researching and writing TOOTS, about the life of a great aunt who came over as a child, and eventually married a homesteader from Nebraska!
I learned that women coming from Ireland, often came as unattended children; my aunt was 10, traveling with my grandmother of 12. All my grandparents came from rural counties, the first generation after the famine. Their education generally ended at fourth grade, and their primary language was Irish. The women came as servants and the men generally worked construction or transportation. In my family, the women started as servants in New York, eventually moving to Chicago with the help of relatives, and one married a railway conductor and the other a bus driver in Chicago. Early immigrants lived in tight communities centered around the parish church---not just the Irish, but their near neighbors of the Polish and Italian communities each with their own churches.
From an early age, I always wanted to travel---to see the world. Of course, I needed to find a way to pay for it. When I finished my nursing degree, I applied for a license in both Ireland and England (as a back-up) because they were both English-speaking countries. Ireland being my first choice. I got my first job in Dublin at a pediatric hospital, which served as the background for my third book, The Ghost of Gresham Green. The hospital was as I described and there really was talk of ghosts on the top floor, which had been a convent at one time, as nuns ran the hospital, even when I worked there.
That first job paid sixty pounds/month (about $120 at that time); my bedsitter rent (about $25, as I remember). The bedsitter had a sink, a little hot water heater, and a hot plate in a closet. There were 2 beds, a table and 2 chairs, and a space heater (I had a room-mate); we shared a bathroom down the hall. Laundry was a pain and I used to hand wash my one uniform, put it on a hanger, cover it with plastic and hang it out the second floor back window; no one could see it. I walked to and from the hospital---about 2.5 miles each way and I quickly lost those extra pounds from college. Despite what now seems an impoverished existence, I loved life in Dublin. So much so that I came home and went back for another round at another pediatric hospital. I encourage everyone to try life in another country. It gives us perspective.
St. Patrick's Day is a day to remember and to honor family---their bravery in leaving their homes and families behind and making new homes in a new country. Coming, as they were, from the country, not cities, with minimum education and language. Not so different from what we now see all too often.
Wishing you all a very Happy St. Patrick's Day!
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