Sean Patrick on Saint Patrick's

March 17, 2015
Day 321

I've been going back and forth in my head on what to write today.  Do I talk about my father's youth in Ireland or my own two trips to visit the ould sod?  Maybe I should mention how I attended the Saint Patrick's Day parade in Dublin back in 1981, but I've never been to the one right near me in Manhattan.

Maybe, I thought, I should tell them about my favorite Irish foods: corned beef, Irish sausages, and Crunchy bars, or my least favorite Irish cuisines: salmon, Guinness, and black pudding...yuck! 

Then I got to thinking about the time when I was 13 and spent six weeks living in Inchicore, just outside Dublin.  I brought the glass bottles of milk in from the front stoop when they were delivered each morning, I walked to the local shop and said hello to every person I met, and I happily spent a day at the Dublin Zoo in Phoenix Park with my cousin Bridie.  My cousins John, Bridie, Hugo, and Jerry are all still over there in the area, as are their children, and I hope to go visit them again soon!  In the afternoons, I'd watch a show we didn't have over in the states called Neighbours, starring an up-and-coming Kylie Minogue, who'd yet to hit it big.  That was also 1988, Dublin's 1,000-year anniversary, so my parents took my sister Marilyn and me to see a great viking exhibit that detailed the long history of the city and the region.

I toyed with the idea of just talking about being a redhead named Sean Patrick Brennan, how Irish my life has been in so many ways, and how much I appreciate and celebrate my heritage.

Or maybe, I thought, I'd simply reflect on the long lineage of Irish writers whose footsteps I know I walk in, whose writings have paved the way in style and background to my own.

I kept trying to figure out what to tell you about today, but I couldn't decide on any one idea, so I resolved to just mention them all.  St. Patrick's Day has always been very special for me, just as my Irish heritage has always been as well.  It's part of who I am, how I think, how I feel, and even why I write.  I'm very proud to be the son of an Irishman from Inchicore, and I'm very proud to say I'm Irish, every day of the year.