Lá Fhéile Pádraig

Today is the day when everyone likes to be "a little bit Irish," in part because everyone enjoys a celebration.  And 17 March is the day everyone who has even the slightest drop of Irish blood ... and many who don't even have that ... celebrate St. Patrick's Day, the day that is set aside to honor the memory of Patrick, the most generally recognized patron saint of Ireland, and also to showcase Irish history and culture.

St. Patrick's Day was always a special day in our family because my late father was Irish.  If the terrible truth be told, however, he was only half-Irish.  It was his father, our grandfather, who was the 100 percenter.  It did not really matter because my father's names, first and last, were so quintessentially Irish that anything he or we kids lacked in literal genealogy was regained in spades.  Based on our last name, we were presumed by anyone we met to be of wholly Irish ancestry.  If some are born Irish, some try to achieve Irish-ness and some have Irish-ness thrust upon them, we were partly the first and all of the last.  This was the case even though our mother, so far as we are able to determine, did not have even one Irish gene, being generally of English and Danish ancestry.  Whatever the situation, we are all "typical" American "Heinz 57" products, and our Irish blood actually runs more thinly than in some.  Still, we are all proud of what we do have.

Patrick himself, more likely than not, was Irish gene-less.  If he did have any Irish genes, they could only have been a heritage from some remote Celtic ancestor in Britain.  Although accounts of his life are variable and in question, the most generally accepted story is that he was born early in the fifth century in then Roman-occupied Britain to a Christian Romano-British family.   At the age of 16, the tale goes, he was kidnapped by Irish raiders and sold into slavery in Ireland.   After some time in Ireland, he managed to escape and returned to Britain.  From there, he went to study for the priesthood in Auxerre in what was then Gaul (present-day France).   After becoming a bishop, he returned to Ireland in order to convert the Irish to Christianity, which at the time was principally Roman Catholicism.  He was extremely successful in doing so.  Irish folklore tells that one of his teaching methods included using the shamrock to explain the concept of the Holy Trinity (the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit) to the Irish people.  According to Irish folklore, Patrick is also supposed to have driven all the snakes from Ireland.

St. Patrick's Day is also the time for the "wearing of the green."  Technically, this means wearing a shamrock on one's clothing, but in practice generally means wearing any article that is green.  When I was very young, not wearing green on St. Pat's meant that the offending person, Irish or not, would receive a strong pinch from a so-called "friend."  Interestingly, according to Wikipedia, the color originally associated with St. Patrick was actually blue.  Over the years, however, the green of the shamrock and its association with St. Patrick's Day grew so that green is now the favored color.

One of my own most memorable celebrations of the holiday actually took place in Morocco in the early 80s.  At the time, HWMBO, whom I had met there (a story for another time), volunteered me to "corn" the beef for corned beef and cabbage for our expatriate celebration, which would number 100+ persons.  Interestingly, corned beef and cabbage, while thought of as traditionally Irish in the United States, turns out not to be so Irish after all ... at least not according to this article.   But to Irish Americans, it still remains a standard meal on The Day.

Whatever the traditional basis for the meal may have been, I had never before in my life actually "corned" beef.  I had always been able to buy already corned beef at the store and, until then, had never thought about how it got to be that way.  The "corning" process basically cures or pickles the beef in a spiced brine.  The only recipe that was readily available in those pre-Google days came from a friend and was actually a Jewish recipe.  Some ingredients that the recipe were called for were not readily available where we were, so engineers visiting from the US were impressed into service as "condiment transporters."  A Moroccan friend, who managed a restaurant business, purchased a whole beef for us at the souk and had it cut into smaller, more manageable, chunks.  I borrowed as many large plastic containers with covers as I was able to find and cleaned them thoroughly.  Several helpful friends came over to help prepare the beef for the brine, as well as to help prepare the brine solution itself.  It was quite a communal effort.

But that was just the beginning.  Once the raw meat was in the containers with the brine solution, it had to be marinated for several days.  It also had to be turned every single day so that the marinade would reach and cure all parts of the meat.  Fortunately, the house we lived in at the time had a large and cool cellar where we could store the containers.  But I was terrified that the meat would somehow be spoiled.  I don't believe that I slept well at all until it was time to take the meat from the marinade and cook it with the cabbage, carrots and potatoes.  The cooking of the dish was also a communal effort.  But I was afraid either that it would make everyone ill or, in the worst of worst cases, actually kill someone.  Fortunately, however, everything worked out well.  Frankly, it was the best-tasting corned beef that I've ever had ... if I may allow myself to say so.  The biggest hit of the whole meal, however, was an enormous and absolutely divine trifle that was prepared by the Irish engineers who were at the celebration.  I am very happy ... and relieved ... to say that we all had a wonderful time.

In recent years, in honor of my late father, friends and family gather to hold a Memorial Cribbage Tournament in the tiny mountain village in Montana where he spent his happiest years.  Cribbage was his favorite card game.  The tourney is usually held either on the weekend immediately before or after St. Patrick's Day.  As part of the festivities, everyone must wear green and march around the local circle area, as can be seen here in photos from past celebrations.

Whoever you are and wherever you spend it, have a truly magical

St. Patrick's Day!