The luck of the Irish

Or, Murphy had it all wrong!

We had driven from Kilkenny that morning after taking leave of Lorna Byrne and the group of Japanese who we took to meet her. Lorna was magically gifted with the ability to see angels in full technicolour since birth. They told her about future events which would include her receiving a massive Georgian style estate from an American fan of her work. She pointed at its gates from in the car and told me how decades before whilst still a poor married woman with children, she had passed it by and had clearly seen an angel who informed her it would be hers one day. One may scoff, naturally. Scoffing at such stories is now de rigeur in a woke world determined to stamp out infidels of the spirit and mind. Lorna is surely one of the most grounded and sane people I have yet to meet. But both of us being feisty old Celts would mean we had our moments..

Lorna Byrne

“ I’m sorry I pushed you a bit back there Lorna.” She had been famously late for our first meeting so I had reminded her that people had traveled across the planet just to spend time with her. Without missing a beat Lorna quipped, “ Oh don’t you worry I will push you right back!”

My wife and I were headed for the village of Glenavy. You can see it here on my Japanese Google map at the end of the route. It took more than the three hours predicted and involved a peculiar transition from Euros to pounds Sterling. It must be hugely weird for people who do not known about Ireland’s partition in 1921 to experience this ‘border’. Yet there are no checkpoints, no ‘show me your papers’ at all.

I walked into the petrol station shop. As I prepared to pay for the Mars bar in Euros the chubby checkout woman gave me a scunnered look.

“Oh, so we are already in Northern Ireland I see!” She was not amused and pointed to the Union Jack flags proudly announcing the entry into the United Kingdom from the Republic of Ireland.

That night we watched Brad Pitt and Leonardo Decaprio onscreen in Belfast, a city that is almost equally dour and grey, nay as depressingly depressed as my home town in Aberdeen. Just South, in the republic, they had gotten it right in Dublin where you can palpably feel the mirth, the music and the lilt. Flags can do that to places. And yet Belfast had produced people who were very influential in my life like musician Van Morrison, writer C.S. Lewis and the great actor and director Kenneth Branagh. But do note that they all left their grey homeland just as I had done mine. Great place to come back to and much better that we left!

I soon had a near run in with a local drunk, bleezing in Belfast, who staggered towards me threateningly as I crossed a busy road. I knew that any interaction with this local would probably involve a beer bottle in my face. Thus I kept my distance. Mind you, if you speak with an English accent in the Republic you could easily suffer the same fate. Like the Scots our Irish brothers clearly have an attitude problem with the English. Wonder why? I was therefore always conscious of putting my Scottish accent to work wherever I went in these two countries, this Jekyll and Hyde combination that felt more like the difference between the free and the UK-oppressed to me.

This kind of in your face, face, is easily visible in Belfast :)

We arrived in the picturesque wee village of Glenavy. There might be some answers here I thought. According to that ancient marriage certificate I had taken she was married here to my Scottish born grandfather Robert Watters, a Royal Marine in the British navy at the time.

We parked the car and headed into the church for the morning mass. Before it began I introduced myself to the priest and told him I sought information on a certain Mary Ellen Hall. My grandmother had been both baptised and married in this same church aeons ago. If anybody knew anything at all, the congregation here would be the best place to find out. I explained our reasons for wanting to know about my ancestors and the kindly old father nodded and said he would do what he could. He would be sure to ask the congregation if anybody was related to the Halls. He did.

We were filing out of the church on that sunny summer day when the priest drew me aside. “I have someone to meet you here.”

A well built man of about fifty shook my hand and said that he had information about the Hall family. We stepped outside where the graveyard stretched around the church with a healthy dose of Celtic crosses strewn amongst the gravestones.

“Last year we would not have had this gravestone here since we just had it re-done this year. Take a wee look at the name.”

Sarah Hall! This was the newly made, replacement gravestone of my own great grandmother!

I was nonplussed, completely amazed at this perfect answer to the entire journey up here to discover more about my Irish ancestry. Could you wish for more than this in the space of two hours?

He continued,

“That’s my great grandmother, wife of agricultural labourer James Hall.”

I stood stunned for a moment attempting to grasp the import of his words. Not being at all genealogically aware of who was related to whom in the family tree (beyond knowing there was Irish in us) I asked him point blank,

“Well if she is my great grandmother and yours too, well I guess we must be related.”

He smiled back in instant recognition of the fact that we shared the same DNA chain.

We later figured out this man was my second cousin. He then took me to visit his wife and daughter. Strangely enough she had a hobby. It was to upkeep all the genealogy charts of the family so she was probably the most informed person on the entire family line we could have hoped to meet. Luck of the Irish?

“Actually I am living in the 250 year old cottage where your great grandparents lived here in Glenavy. Would you like to take a look? You can stay there if you like since I am heading off to France today for a legal conference.”

So a woman I do not know, daughter of a man I have never seen, offers me her home for a week while they are off in France! All on the strength of an introduction by the local priest? The key ingredient in all this trust had to be more than just words. The Irish may be friendly but they are certainty not naive. I remembered I had shown the priest the birth certificate! One piece of paper with the Hall name on it was all that was required. Then all doors were opened and we had a wonderful afternoon with our relatives.

We returned to the hotel in Belfast, politely declining the generous offer of a 250 year old cottage once inhabited by a tough old farmer with hands like boat paddles. Looking at the one photo of him was shown by my new kin it was obvious from the big strawberry nose that he, like most of the men in my line had some blood in his alcohol. No doubt a great muckle drouth.

So to celebrate this St. Patrick’s day 2024 I have recalled how gathering old government documents to apply for Irish nationality through my grandmother I was led to a village in Ireland. There it was clear that the luck of the Irish easily outweigh Murphy’s law hands down.

One thing did go wrong though. Before we had said goodbye to our Japanese group one physician who was with us had gotten pickpocketed in Dublin. Her passport and all her credit cards and cash had gone. I took her to the Guardia (police) and we started the process of getting her back home. That would require re-issuing a passport and we were lucky to have a Japanese embassy in the city. She would possibly have to spend up to ten days extra in Dublin while waiting. She was very calm and collected about the whole thing and later security footage actually identified the thief in the shop where it had happened. The woman had been apprehended a few days after the theft.

Thanks Grandma!

We left her at the hotel and headed for the airport. Later I heard that not only did she have a fantastic time alone there, away from her busy hospital schedules, but she told me her wallet was finally returned intact with her passport while she was still awaiting its being re-issued. The thief was ordered to pay back the stolen funds.

Murphy’s law had been overturned by the luck of the Irish. Happy St. Patrick’s day! Now then, to finish there must be a Limerick percolating in me somewhere.

A nose like a ripe berry had he

Oh what a drouth he must surely to be

With a smack in your face

Of that hand like a mace

Great granddad made sure we would see!