Frances Monaghan Writings

from 2010

There are three ways to say my name, five if you factor the silent g in the middle, and it all goes back to an Irish grandfather on my paternal side. Don’t get me started on the maternal side, I dont want to quibble, this post is about St Patricks Day and what it means to be a member of the Australian diaspora.
So- Irish, if I didnt have any other reference points beyond the family? Its gambling and horses and melancholy and a weird reverence for the grave, the grave, and the sea and sailors and did you know that remnants of the Spanish Armada washed up on the Irish shore and thats where uncle So and So gets his coloring. Its cops and the DLP and Catholics not welcome here signs in the window. Its violins and music and keeping yourself to yourself, its shame about being desperate and hungry enough to leave the mother country (is that an English phrase?) and shame that those who didnt had it so much worse.
Its remembering the shell shocked unhappy teeenage migrants from Northern Ireland in the sixties, then later the serial returners in the 80’s, off every second year back home, who just couldnt get used to cities with only a 200 year history and such blazing sun in summer. (Of course there are exceptions, but this are my memories)
And finally its Indian ladies asking me where I come from, unsatisfied with the answer ‘Australia’, and asking me what I know of my people’s history. I usually end up repeating what Ive read and heard about Ireland, but its second and third hand. Its not my experience. I guess they really dont want to know that cultural roots change over time. But they did, they do and they will. Happy St Patricks Day,sure I want to know how things are in Glocca Morra, but I still call Australia home.