I chose not to bore all of you with the more minute details of our first trip to Ireland. It’s a personal thing and I picked a moment to describe because personal moments don’t always (actually almost never) translate to someone who was not there in the moment. We did return to Ireland a few years later with my brother and my wife’s sister. That too was a great experience, albeit different. For the second trip, we had a condo to ourselves for the week. This meant we had a hub to return to every day or night. It also meant we made trips to grocery stores during the second visit. For an American, grocery stores outside of our own country are always an interesting safari. It’s like stepping through a portal and entering a bizarro world. Everything is sort of there and sort of the same but there are tons of subtle differences which all add up to create a wholly unique daily experience.
But I’m not here to write about this.
I’ve lived in New York my entire life. Growing up in the Hudson Valley afforded me the comfort and space of suburban life while also being within and hour’s drive of the city. I loved being in the city and spent countless hours of countless days record shopping down there, either at Generation Records on Thompson, Kim’s Video (RIP) on St. Marks, or even Bleecker Bob’s (also RIP) on the rare occasion I wished to argue with him over how much money he wanted for Inside Out’s No Spiritual Surrender on blue vinyl (I eventually got that fucker, lol).
But I digress.
The point is, as a New Yorker, I spent nearly my entire life without even so much as laying eyes on the Statue of Liberty. Never even glimpsed it from an airplane seat taking off or returning. My very first sighting of it was in late 2017 when my wife pointed it out to me as we were walking across the Brooklyn Bridge.
“Okay,” I thought. “That’s something, I guess.” I still couldn’t really see it well.
So when, in late 2019, friends were in town from New Mexico and my wife called me to come join everyone to ferry over to the statue, I jumped at the chance. Long story short, it’s a marvel and one that hits you in the heart when you’re there in Lady Liberty’s shadow. She’s unwavering and resolute with her eyes always forward and the time with her is special if you allow it all in. The kicker is, our trip that day was only getting started. Our friends also wanted to see Ellis Island and who were we to stop them? A quick boat ride later and we were disembarking onto Ellis Island and I suddenly found myself overwhelmed. Something dawned on me that I’d never allowed to fully set in until this specific moment in my life. My great grandparents, people dead before I was born, walked this same ground hoping for the kind of life that I’ve been afforded to live. They came to this country in the early 20th century, a long boat ride from Ireland, across the frigid and choppy Atlantic Ocean and arrived at this very spot. It’s a lot to take in.
We entered into the main hall with displays of what life looked like for early immigrants and you’re invited to grab a small phone-like device to aid you on the rest of your trip. Throughout the grounds there are stations where you dial the indicated number and are given a small lesson on a certain aspect of the entire immigration procedure. It’s a wonderfully in-depth and immersive experience. After securing our devices, we walked up the stairs into the main reception room and this folks, smashed me to bits. I dialed the indicated number and sat down on one of the benches in the hall. Through the device, I learned that many of these benches (including the one I was sitting on) are original benches — the very same used by the immigrants waiting to hopefully be approved entry into our country. This meant that for all I knew, I could’ve been sitting in the very same spot as either my great grandfather or great grandmother. Words cannot express what this does to a person. There’s an innate connection from family member to family member and it spans eternity. It never goes away — it can’t.
I sat there, unable to move, for nearly twenty minutes. Of course the tears came because how could they not? I’m a boy who grew to be a man. My family came from Ireland and settled in New York. I was raised by a mother and father who were raised by their respective mothers and fathers who were raised by their respective mothers and fathers. It doesn’t end. So when I think about my mother and father close to me, teaching me something new and then I think about my grandfather teaching me how to skip rocks and my grandmother sneaking me snacks whenever I wanted or allowing me to watch horror movies at a young age and then I think about what their parents taught and showed to them and then I find myself in Ireland where my family began. I think about the soil and the water lapping at the stones of a natural rock Jetty. I think of the toil of a farm, working that lush earth. I can no longer smell the gorgeous scent of peat smoke without getting emotional. All of this swirls inside of me at all times and then I find myself at Ellis Island, where my great grandparents’ names are on that fucking ledger and I’m sitting on the very bench where they sat huddled and hopeful and it’s all the most beautiful goddamn thing in the world.
The connections are real and unbreakable. It doesn’t just mean something, it means everything.
About half of this country needs a lesson in humility and empathy.
Why?
Because it fucking matters.
Open Mouth Insert Words 