I’m lying. As a long time drinker of the white (wine) and with a family heritage of wearing the green on my father’s side, one would think I’d be excited about the fact it’s St. Paddy’s Day. Or that at the very least, I would have a few great stories to tell of my crazy behavior on St Patrick’s Days past.
I do not.
I don’t even think leprechauns are cute.
Maybe it’s some weird reverse snobbery, but I have always hated this day. The smell of cabbage and corned beef cooking, the besmirching of beer and entire rivers with food coloring, the insistence on wearing green (a hue I would never don voluntarily).
I ended up in the middle of a St. Patrick’s Day parade last weekend. We had gone hiking in Millennium Park and took a side-jaunt to Holland. Michigan, not the Netherlands. It was perhaps the world’s most wholesome parade (certainly the only St. Paddy’s Day festivity with no one puking into the sewers or giving sideways peace signs while wearing oversized, sparkling hats).
No one was drunk, there were children running everywhere and we crossed Main Street in front of the bedecked firetruck without threat of being run over or trampled in the fray. I still didn’t like it.
I have to admit, as we passed a pub with a Bloody Mary bar (begosh, a splendor I had never seen before – hot peppers, chunks of sausage, cheese, veggies a plenty…) I pressed my nose to the glass, hands cupped around my eyes to cut the glare like a hungry Potato Orphan…
But of course I did not partake, even though we are all programmed to drink on this occasion. This is one holiday I do not have any boozy nostalgia for – in fact I will steer clear of “Irish on Ionia,” this evening – an event hosted by Barfly Ventures and boasting the fact it will “consume three city blocks.” Count me out.
Do I sound like a prig? Today I’ll be doing my usual wearing of the black and laying low…
And you’ve got to read last year’s post (it includes my one St. Pat’s drinking story in NYC):
