Turning Green

I wasn't born wearing the green.

I married into it.

Mr. G. is 100% Irish. My roots are mostly Germanic in nature, and we've been in this country so long, our ties are barely visible. I grew up in a suburb comprised largely of folks of eastern European descent. Pirogies and kielbasa and stuffed cabbage ruled. So St. Patrick's Day wasn't a huge deal back in my day. There was some residual interest, of course, because of the Catholic thing, but it wasn't nearly as sacred a day as it is in my current neighborhood.

For example, the schools my son attended as he came of age closed on March 17th. The bishop gave Catholics a day off from the meat thing yesterday because the green holiday fell on a Friday. The downtown streets filled with revelers. And my neighborhood hosted its annual pub crawl.

As I drove down my street last night, I noticed it was lined with parked cars. That's because the nearest main street is home to several bars, mostly Irish. We treat this night like New Year's Eve...a sort of amateur time for drinkers, an excuse to imbibe too much and behave badly. We've awoken to broken beer bottles in our driveway, cans on our tree lawn, etc. We stay home.

We celebrated in our own grand fashion at work, where Stacey took the initiative and organized a potluck. Yours truly baked hot cross buns for the first time. They looked, as my brother noted on my FB page, like I'd been hitting the rum balls when I made them. (See the photo and decide for yourself.) But they tasted pretty good, and almost all of them were devoured. Coworkers provided scrambled eggs, hash, a casserole, pancakes (hot off the griddle), some fruit and lots and lots of sweet stuff. Very yummy. We overachieved, and thus resorted to urging passersby all day to partake.

Actually, having a potluck was a great idea, a way to celebrate the forefathers and foremothers of the Irish population, many of whom came to this country to avoid starving to death in their native land. In a time when the reigning government just wanted them to go away. Sadly, too many of them did.

So, although I am not Irish, I was happy to join in the celebration. Sans alcohol. That includes rum balls.

Sláinte.