It’s St. Patrick’s Day. Like any good American of marginal Irish descent, I have corned beef in the cooker and cabbage in the fridge. I love corned beef. It’s kind of a fake Irish dish, but American style St. Patty’s Day is kind of a fake holiday.
Every year the stores have corned beef at ridiculously low prices and so I buy some. It’s full of toxic, nitrates etc., and I’ve cut back on processed meats, and red meat in general, since I had cancer. But it tastes great, tastes even better when you rarely have it. And every year, St. Patrick’s Day takes me back to my time in Ireland, part of my self-managed semester abroad in Europe that helped me stumble into journalism.
I think about a pub owner, John Maloney in some tiny town, name forgotten, that had a youth hostel. A youth hostel and two pubs and not much more. I was there for a day that turned into a few days and then more than a week. There’s something about a quiet Irish countryside that’s good for the soul. On rainy days, I would go to Maloney’s pub, once before it was officially open, where I could chat with John while he set up for the day. He had been to the US. When I told him I was from New Jersey, he was happy to tell me that he had seen Jersey from across the water in New York.
If I had stayed longer, I think I would have become an apprentice publican. I learned how to make Irish coffee and hot Irish whiskey. I learned the proper way to pour a Guiness. John had a picture of Kennedy behind the bar. We’re so proud of him, he said, speaking for the entire country. This was during the Reagan years. We don’t want to talk about the other guy, he said.
We talked about St. Patrick’s Day in the U.S., with the parades and green beer. It’s not that big of a holiday in Ireland, John said. But we watch the American parades on TV. It was like an uncle talking about some crazy stuff his nephews were up to. Scratching his head maybe, but kind of quietly proud of their antics.
There are more Irish in America than in Ireland, he said. The way he said it sounded like he felt practically American, which I guess made me practically Irish.
We didn’t talk about corned beef, which is what I started to talk about. I grew up in a culturally deprived home. We never had hot sauce. My mother had a tiny jar of cayenne pepper for those recipes that called for a pinch. That same jar lasted her through my childhood and adolescent years. And we never had corned beef. I was in high school the first time I had corned beef. My girlfriend was in the hospital with a toe problem stemming from ballet lessons. There was a possibility of losing the toe. I was with her for most of the day. Her parents came by at one point. I was afraid of her dad, a Philly longshoreman named Stosh, who moved his family across the river to Jersey. Stosh didn’t seem to like me. How many fathers like their daughter’s high school boyfriend? After a bit, he went out to get food. He got sandwiches for everyone from a nearby deli. He got me corned beef. I guess I got some points for showing up and being supportive. To say the sandwich was life altering might be excessive, but wow it was good. I have no idea how much corned beef I’ve eaten since then. A lot, although these days it’s mainly once or twice a year.
The final part of my St. Patrick’s tradition of sorts involves regret for not brining my own brisket to avoid the nitrates. I did it once. It’s not that hard. So, as I say every year, maybe next year.
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