St Patrick's Day in the time of the Pandemic!

[jo]

It's not going to be the same --

No parades!

No bar-hopping!

No "Kiss Me - I'm Irish!" teasing.


But the day is still a good one to remember --

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY !!

[jo]

And a coincidence that the President of the United States, Joseph Biden, has Irish roots!

Joe Biden speaking to the public during his 2016 visit to Ireland.

In the letter below, the former vice president wrote in advance of his 2016 visit why returning to Ireland was so personally meaningful:

I’m leaving for a very special trip tomorrow.

I’m going back to Ireland – the country from which my ancestors hailed, and a country whose independence the Easter Rising set in motion, 100 years ago this year. It is my first dedicated trip to this nation as Vice President – during which I’ll meet with the country’s leaders, discuss issues of trade, economic recovery, migration and refugee policy, and other national security challenges, and celebrate our shared heritage. Our shared values of tolerance. Diversity. Inclusiveness.


And it’s a trip I’m so deeply grateful to be taking alongside my children and grandchildren…

…Over the course of my life, I’ve been a lot of places. I’ve traveled all around the world – more than a million miles on Air Force Two alone. I’ve been honored to have held a lot of titles. But I have always been and will always be the son of Kitty Finnegan. The grandson of Geraldine Finnegan from St. Paul’s Parish in Scranton; a proud descendant of the Finnegans of Ireland’s County Louth. The great-grandson of a man named Edward Francis Blewitt, whose roots stem from Ballina, a small town in Ireland’s County Mayo – sister city to my hometown in Scranton, Pennsylvania. An engineer with a poet’s heart. Months after my mother passed away, I found an old box of his poems in my attic.

In his poetry, my great-grandfather spoke of both continents, and how his heart and his soul drew from the old and the new. And most of all, he was proud. He was proud of his ancestors. He was proud of his blood. He was proud of his city. He was proud of his state, his country. But most of all – he was proud of his family.

And that is America: This notion that home is where your character is etched. As Americans, we all hail from many homes. Somewhere along the line, someone in our lineage arrived on our shores, filled with hope. We are blessed to experience that simultaneous pride in where we’ve found ourselves, while never forgetting our roots.

James Joyce wrote, “When I die, Dublin will be written on my heart.”


Well, Northeast Pennsylvania will be written on my heart. But Ireland will be written on my soul. And as we join the world in celebrating everything that Ireland has become, and indeed everything that she has always been, I could not be more honored to be returning.

You can see what I see right here and across social media.

I’m looking forward to sharing it with you.

-Joe

* Originally published in 2019, last updated in January 2021.

[jo]

Andrew Lloyd Webber once composed a beautiful, heartbreaking musical original called "The Beautiful Game" ( referring to a sport once called by the great Pele by that name - football, as it is known outside America). It has now been retitled The Boys In the Paragraph.

Current times have brought up many issues of social conflict due to issues of inclusivity - racism, gender equality, etc.

The Beautiful Game is a story where the heart is all about religious conflict. It follows the impact of the then sectarian violence ( Protestants Vs Catholics) in Northern Ireland.

This is a montage from the show - -with The Boys In Green singing about their love for the sport.





There was another dramatic musical that tackled the issue of religious conflict in France. It was the persecution of Protestants by the Catholics. It was called MARTIN GUERRE ( based on the story of SOMMERSBY) and composed by the songwriters of Les Miserables & Miss Saigon, Boublil & Schonberg.

I wonder why it never came to Broadway... and if Broadway will ever get to see these heartbreaking musicals?

I had a chance to see both and they were both very touching. I would even say that The Beautiful Game was the saddest musical that ALWebber, or any other composer whose work I have seen, ever wrote!


Jo

[jo]

It looks like the tradition of a St Patrick's Day Parade in NYC was kept burning, but on a much, much smaller scale.


www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/a-sign-of-spring-and-new-beginning-smaller-quieter-st-patrick-s-day-parade-returns-to-new-york-city/ar-BB1eGgKA?ocid=msedgdhp

But a procession of roughly 50 National Guard members, 50 NYPD officers, firefighters and other first responders did their best to keep the tradition alive, waking up well before the crack of dawn to celebrate the day of Irish pride.

“It’s so important that we continue the traditions of the parade,” parade chairman Hilary Beirne told the Daily News. “It’s a sign of spring and new beginning and hopefully, today will mark a new beginning for New York City.”

img-s-msn-com.akamaized.net/tenant/amp/entityid/BB1eGI61.img?h=900&w=1598&m=6&q=60&o=f&l=f&x=2264&y=930