Column: Thoughts and memories for another St. Patrick's Day in Chicago
If you participated in the weekend's hoopla, good for you. Perhaps some of you have a hangover this morning, failing to follow the advice of George Shinnick Sr., who opened the venerable Shinnick's Pub in Bridgeport in 1938 and had this bit of timeless tavern wisdom: 'He who drinks and drinks with grace / is always welcome in this place / He who drinks more than his share / is never welcome anywhere.'
I've got nothing against drinking and can still recall, a bit foggy as they might be, youthful memories of starting St. Pat's parade days at the bygone Elfman's delicatessen on State Street and then, proceeding north, stopping for a drink at any bar we encountered and that would have us, until only one of us was left standing. Such excessive drinking behavior remains one of the reasons that people rail against the excesses of this holiday, arguing that booze and its attendant misbehavior gives fuel to the unjust drunken Irish stereotype.
My mother was Irish to her core, a Cavanagh, and it was she who took me by the hand to my very first St. Patrick's Day Parade, which also happened to be the first to be held on State Street in 1956. There has never been a person I have known who despised St. Patrick's Day celebrations more than she did.
I don't remember, though I can logically assume, that then Mayor Richard J. Daley led that first parade. But I have always remembered something my mother told me that day. As we watched the parade, all around us were hundreds of smiling faces and I asked my mom, who was not smiling, 'Why aren't you happy?'
'The Irish have not always had a happy time of it,' she said.
True enough I would learn from stories from her and her mother. I would learn that March 17 is believed to be the day St. Patrick died in 461, and he is credited with bringing Christianity to Ireland and efficiently, if apocryphally, ridding the island of snakes.
I did not have a drink on Monday, but was tempted. I live in a neighborhood thick with taverns — one called Dublin's, for the capital of Ireland — many of them fine and lively places. And so it was that I found myself thinking about going inside one of them when I was approached by a young man toting a plastic one-gallon water jug and asking, 'This is my borg. Care for a sip?' It was 10 a.m.
I will not give you the details of our entire conversation, which took place in the one-block stretch of Division Street between State and Dearborn Streets, a section that for the first year was wisely closed to traffic.
'OK, what's a borg?' I asked.
He explained that a borg stands for Blackout Rage Gallon and is a relatively new 'invention,' a concoction that consists of a fifth of vodka, water and some sort of flavoring (his was orange Kool-Aid). It has nothing to do with St. Patrick. It has nothing to do with Ireland.
As politely as possible I thanked him and went home to listen to a song.
It's a fine song titled 'In the City of Chicago.' Sung by Christy Moore, it embodies what it means to be Irish in this city.
In the City of Chicago
As the evening shadows fall
There are people dreaming
Of the hills of Donegal.
1847 was the year it all began
Deadly pains of hunger drove a million from the land
They journeyed not for glory
Their motive wasn't greed
A voyage of survival across the stormy sea.
To the City of Chicago
As the evening shadows fall
There are people dreaming
Of the hills of Donegal.
Some of them knew fortune
Some of them knew fame
More of them knew hardship
And died upon the plain
They spread throughout the nation
They rode the railroad cars
Brought their songs and music to ease their lonely hearts.
To the City of Chicago
As the evening shadows fall
There are people dreaming
Of the hills of Donegal.
And that was that, another St. Patrick's Day over and done.
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