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that-shamrock-vibe · 5 years

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St. Patrick’s Day: Celebrating Irish Culture

It’s that time of year again where for one day in the 365 rotation, the people of Great Britain are given an excuse to drink to excess and penalize anyone who forgets to wear green. For us who have Irish heritage we often treat is as both a serious and lapse event, we still get drunk but feel it is our duty as Irishmen and Irishwomen to do so.

However, unlike other religious holidays such as Christmas, Easter and Thanksgiving for our American cousins, the religious foundations of this day have long been lost and only really celebrated by those devout to religion.

This, fortunately, does not concern me as I am not religious. However I have recently been feeling an itch to learn more about my Irish roots and maybe it is just the time of year or the fact I have been feeling rather reflective lately, but I thought I may as well start this journey by talking about what I do know to the faceless masses online.

My Heritage:

Okay so I know I am 1/4 Irish on my father’s side, my granddad is fully Irish as are my 9/10 great-uncles and great-aunts. I know the names of two of them but to be clear I do not come from the type of family where all the extended family is known.

In total I know I have a mum, dad, sister, brother, 3 uncles, two sets of grandparents a cousin and just under a dozen great-aunts and uncles collectively from both sides. I know for a fact my dad’s side of the family is expansive from my nan’s funeral but the only ones I could point out there are the great-uncle I know and my second cousin(?) who I only met there and who was absolutely wasted. No one does a funeral better than the Irish.

I also know my great-aunt on my mum’s mum’s side (her sister) has a daughter and granddaughter, aside from that and the fact my cousin is pregnant I am at a loss to where everyone else is on my family tree.

I also know I am from Irish descent on my mother’s side as my great-great-great grandmother is Irish to some degree and her daughter and my great-great grandmother hails from Ireland but again no one living knows the actual heritage there. Either way for me it’s very little but adds to what I already have from my dad’s side.

In the grand scheme my heritage doesn’t mean anything really. To my knowledge our family is not religious, my dad essentially denounced god when my brother died and aside from attending a religious youth group during our pre-teen years, my sister and I have never had an interest in religion. I am Pagan and more specifically Wiccan but at this point in time not practicing and the only things I worship at the moment are JustEat or alcohol.

It’s also note-worthy that I didn’t grow up surrounded by my dad’s family, as mentioned earlier the first time I met the mass of them was at my nan’s funeral back in March 2013 and that became a drunken haze which didn’t really include much socializing. Because of this, and because I have moved cities a few times in my life, I haven’t got a natural brogue more commonly known as an Irish accent.

Interestingly though, because of being brought up in the generation where TV raised us, which took place the generation before any screen raised kids, I have adopted a very fractured Irish accent which only comes out in certain situations such as when I converse with other Irish people and almost catch their accent. Also certain words and phrases I say in everyday conversation will sound Irish, words like “Word(s), World and generally words containing that “or” sound will come out as Irish.

Irish Folklore:

There is a lot to be said about Irish folklore also, not least about the legendary creatures the country is for, specifically Leprechauns and Banshees.

For instance, I always believed that my sister was a banshee because when she used to get angry her shrieks were earsplitting. There is an old wives tale of if Irishmen were to track their family history back long enough, they would discover they had a banshee as an ancestor. Some tales about banshees believe that their physiology is a curse that is passed down through the generations. So it stands to reason that my sister could very well be a banshee.

Leprechauns meanwhile are supposed to be creatures of luck that travel on rainbows and continuously recite limericks. If one is caught then he is supposed to lead you to their pot of gold which is traditionally said to be at the end of the rainbow.

While there are many other creatures and tales in Irish folklore, such as Selkies which are essentially Celtic Mermaids, none of them are really as talked about or celebrated as the aforementioned two creatures and St. Patrick’s Day.

The only other mainstream celebration in folklore other than the three is the symbolism of the lucky four-leaf clover which when in possession of an individual is meant to grant said individual luck. This is also a reason as to why clovers and shamrocks are often used as visual representations for luck.

Who’s Dublin Got:

So as I mentioned before, my dad’s side of the family hails from Dublin and when I mentioned that to a classmate, his response was to ask “What is there in Dublin?”. My first response was to retort with “More than Hull” but I thought better of it and instead decided to educate both him and myself.

When it comes to famous people from Dublin, there are some I know are from Dublin and some I had to research. For instance I know the singers Danny O’Donoghue, Sinead O’Connor, Nicky Byrne and Brian McFadden are from Dublin. The latter two of whom are/were members of Westlife which is a boy/man band based in Dublin. Their manager Louis Walsh is also from Dublin and his pets Jedward are also from there, those two aren’t the best of examples but I digress.

In terms of acting talent, Colin Farrell, Poldark’s Aidan Turner, Game of Thrones’ Aidan Gillen, the Gleeson family consisting of actors Brendan, Domhnall and Brian are all from there as well as Sherlock’s Andrew Scott and Michael Gambon.

What It All Means:

So what being Irish means to me, in terms of looking deep and not just saying it’s an excuse to drink, wear green and say a few stereotypical one-liners, is more of a sense of longing to belong. Because I have never been around the Irish congregation of my family for longer than a funeral and I haven’t even been to Ireland I literally just have the superficial Irish tropes which everyone simply believes I am playing up rather than being genuinely Irish.

As mentioned before, I don’t have an actual Irish brogue and have traces which when they appear I get told I am putting it on...I am not. Yes I like to drink, particularly Guinness, whisky and gin, yes I like the colour green and cannot remember where the favoritism started. All I know is green is great and green suits me. But I don’t just want to be a stereotypical Irishman.

My ambition in life has always been to travel, one place of interest for me to visit is definitely Dublin to get a feeling of my heritage and my family history.

So in conclusion, I want to thank everyone who has made it this far down and say that while this has been quite a deep and personal post it is also something I hope brings some poiyancy and food for thoughts.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day, drink, be merry, stay safe and have a think about what these days and traditions really mean to you. In the mean time post your comments and check out other posts.

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