There is a Light Beyond these Woods

My father left his home in Wexford in the summer of 1958 and started the long trek north to the icy tundra of County Louth on Ireland’s north east coast. The trip, on his trusty Triumph motorbike, took about seven hours. This is about the same length of time it would have taken him to fly to America, that other destination for so many Irish men and women in the 1950’s.

Thankfully, my Dad chose to come to Dundalk and it was there that he met my mother and through a combination of geography and biology I came along. Dad might have left Wexford, but a little bit of it stayed with him, mainly expressed through his love of hurling and a determination to maintain his sing-song southern accent while living among nasal toned northerners.

He passed on some of that to me (although unfortunately not the accent) and I became the stereotypical son of an emigrant. Hurling was as uncommon in my home town of Dundalk as it is here in Melbourne, but I followed it religiously and dragged Dad up to Dublin for big matches whenever Wexford played. I should point out that being a Wexford fan is a labour of love and endless disappointment. We start each season with low expectations and generally find at season’s end that they have been entirely met. But as with any low achievers, the occasional highs produce a feeling of euphoria that supporters of Manchester United, for example, will never feel.

In September 1996, I stood on the pitch in Croke Park with my Dad and watched the Wexford Captain hoist the All-Ireland trophy. We both cried that day and I’m not sure who was the proudest. My Dad who was reliving memories of his childhood when Wexford were the best team in Ireland. Or me, the emigrants son, proudly wearing my replica jersey but speaking with a different accent to those around me.

The other way my Dad kept in touch with his roots was by having the local paper from his home town posted to him each week. He’d come home on Friday and read about football teams he’d never see, festivals he’d never attend and death notices of people who weren’t even been born when he left.

We modern immigrants have more immediate ways of keeping in touch with back home, but the intention is the same. We have a connection to our home that we never quite lose, despite our wonder lust and our desire to see if there is indeed a light beyond these woods. We have the internet, email and mobile phones, which means for example that I can read the Irish Times before any of my friends back home.

This connection to home is strongest at Christmas and around St Patrick’s Day, when Ireland gets mentioned around the world in positive tones. It makes you realise how lucky the old Emerald Isle is as a country. Take Belgium for example. Does its Prime Minister get a guaranteed meeting with the US President on their National Day? Are Belgians allowed to close the main streets in Capital cities around the world or is the Sydney Opera House ever bathed in red, black and yellow light? Actually, that last part probably happens but only because the Belgium and Aboriginal flags share the same colours.

I’d hazard a guess that the Irish are the only race in the world that is universally liked. Even our old enemies the English think we’re a cuddly bunch of leprechauns with a pig in every parlour. Nothing frustrates Irish people more for example, than the fact that England supports our football team in the World Cup, if England are not playing. This week you would have seen intoxicated Irish people in every City from Arkansas to Zagreb merrily vomiting their guts up while wearing Orange wigs and Galway GAA jerseys. And yet we are forgiven for all this because we’re seen as a race of party people who seem to have been put on earth to amuse everyone else.

This positive view of Ireland is found everywhere in the World apart from in Ireland itself. We Irish were already expert at self loathing and inferiority complexes before the death of the Celtic Tiger. Now the country is engaged in a process of navel gazing and introspection that would not look out of place on the couch of a New York shrink. There seems to be a need to define what it is to be Irish itself and where we now fit into the modern world.

“Ireland is not a place, it’s a state of mind” is a cliché. But as clichés go, it’s not a bad one. I probably think more about my nationality now than when I lived in Ireland and if my recent Folk Festival outing was anything to go by, I’ve developed a liking for music that used to make me cringe back in Dublin. But I’m haunted by the thought that my pride in being Irish is boosted by the fact that I don’t have to live there. I can now pick and choose the elements of Irish culture I like, from music to literature to black pudding. All are available on-line or in the back packer targeted shops in St Kilda. And I can enjoy all these things without having to endure the smell of wet duffle coats on the 16a bus into Dublin on a cold March morning.

Everywhere I go in Melbourne, I hear Irish voices, which suggests that I’m not the only one to have found the escape hatch. Most countries show their displeasure in the ruling elite by overthrowing the government. In Ireland, we have the additional option of voting with our feet, and sadly most of us who are unhappy chose this option, as opposed to staying to bring the fight to the aristocracy.

But the truth is, most of us don’t leave out of bitterness, we leave because there is a light beyond these woods and we want to go and see what makes it shine. That’s why I left home and I suspect my Dad had the same intention.