Why I Owe My Existence to Saint Patrick and Green Beer

Thirty-eight years ago today, friends dragged a young art-school dropout living in Hanover, New Hampshire, out to a Saint Patrick’s Day party. She didn’t want to go—drunken green-beer fests weren’t her thing—but as she didn’t have plans that evening, she reluctantly agreed. She chucked her body paints into the car, just in case the evening was really boring and she needed to spice things up a bit.

One of the party’s hosts was a man in his mid-twenties finishing up his duty to Uncle Sam by working in a lab. He’d come home from Vietnam relatively unscathed the year before and welcomed the cold regions lab work as an alternative to a war zone. He and his friends had invited everyone they knew and everyone everyone knew. They readied the green beer (this being America in the 70s and the hosts being not exactly sophisticated gentlemen, they assumed that this was how the Irish celebrated the day). “Let’s celebrate the luck of the Irish!” they said, as they turned on the music and friends began to arrive. Little did they know what kind of luck the evening would bring.

The party was well under way when the lass and her friends walked in the door. Oh dear, the woman thought. I’m not going to like this. Why did I let myself get dragged here? She also, however, notice a guy regaling his friends with a funny story. She also noticed the half-empty mug of green beer in his hands. Still, she thought he was cute, if a bit old. He must be one of the Army guys. His hair is too short.

As for the guy, well, he almost stopped telling the story when she walked in the room. Her long brown hair was in two braids, and she was wearing some kind of gauzy shirt with jeans. He thought she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

The party went along, as green-beer parties tend to do, and the guy finally worked up the courage to go talk to her. Funny and charming, the guy made the woman laugh, and her friends noticed that she liked him. He seemed too old for their friend, but the woman assured her friends that she’d asked, and he was only a few years older than she was (while she appeared to be about seventeen, she was actually twenty-two).

She learned that he had been to Vietnam, that he was from Philadelphia, and that before he got drafted, he’d studied to become an engineer. He already liked the Red Sox. In short, she learned that while she was a bit of a free spirit, he was shockingly normal. He was actually a grownup, too, even if he and his friends entertained themselves by throwing parties with green beer. For some reason, this appealed to her.

“I think I’m going to go get my body paints. He’s so normal. I bet it will shock him,” she told her friends, smiling. The party didn’t need spicing up, but she liked that guy and thought it would be amusing to see his reaction. If he could handle the body paint, then maybe he could handle her.

Out to the car she went, and she returned with her paints. And as she started painting on the man’s chest, he fell head over heels in love. The woman noticed and smiled a bit to herself. She liked him too, so when he asked her out for a date, she said yes. A while later, she and her friends left the party, and her friends tried to talk her out of going out with the old guy. She didn’t let them.

The rest, as they say, is history.

And that, dear readers, is how my parents met and why I owe my existence to Saint Patrick and green beer.

One of Those Moments When Everything Comes into Focus

Sunday afternoon found me walking toward Inman Square from Union. The day was one of those days we New Englanders long for—sunny and in the 60s after a long, cold and snowy winter. Wearing a tee shirt and a light cotton sweater, I was bobbing my head and wearing a ridiculous grin on my face as I strolled. Yay! Winter won’t last forever!

I reached into my purse to grab my phone, as I thought I’d heard it ringing, and I saw that I had missed a call from my sister. My nephew’s first birthday was on Monday (my trip to Inman was to get his present), so I figured she had called about arrangements. I dialed called her back, and she answered.

“Hey, Sister! GORGEOUS day! Are you outside?”

“Um, Sassy, something’s happened. I just got off the phone with Mom. She thought she was dialing 911. Dad passed out while driving, and now he’s throwing up. I had to tell her how to get 911 where she was and then I called 911 too. Now she won’t pick up the phone.”

My heart sank.

My body started shaking.

Oh shit. My Dad is having a heart attack. I just talked to him this morning. How can he be dying?

“Oh my god. Dad’s having a heart attack,” I said to my sister.

“That’s what it sounds like to me, too,” she said.

“Shit.”

“Shit.”

Sister said, “I’m going to keep trying Mom, but I thought you should know.”

“OK. Call me if you hear anything. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

I snapped the phone shut and turned around to head home. Then I turned back toward Inman. Then I turned back toward home. Then I turned around again and kept walking. You can hold it together if you keep walking. Just keep walking.

I kept walking.

Then I called my mom. She didn’t answer. I almost started to cry. Then I called again. This time she answered.

“Hi, Sassy. Yes. We’re in a snow field. The State Police are here, and so is an ambulance. We’re off 93 in Concord. Dad is conscious and talking, and he looks a little bit better. It might have been an issue with his blood sugar, but we don’t know. It doesn’t look like it was a heart attack, but we are going to Concord hospital. They won’t let me go with him. I have to get the car towed out of the snow field, and then I’m going to go. Pray. I have to go now, but keep calling. I’ll pick up.”

“I love you, Mom.”

“I love you too, Honey.”

I called my sister. She’d talked to Mom too. We were both relieved that he was alive at this point, but we were trying to figure out what had happened.

“Sassy, Mom took the wheel. She steered the car through THREE LANES of traffic on I-93. She did donuts in a field until Dad came too and hit the brake. She didn’t know how to dial 911 on a cell phone.”

“Oh my god.” Then, “We need to get her some First-Aid training. What happened?”

“Did you know his blood sugar was an issue? I didn’t.”

“You didn’t? I did, but I thought he was controlling it.”

We talked some more about how to talk to Mom and Dad about how they need to take better care of themselves before it dawned on us that we should go visit them. I had a phone interview early that evening, and even though I said I’d cancel it, my sister insisted that I take it.

We wrapped up the call, and I said, “OK. I’ll call Mom and let her know we’ll be there this evening.” I went in the toy store to catch my breath. I bought Nephew a present and walked back outside. Then I called Mom.

“Things are OK, Sassy. Dad walked to the ambulance. That made me feel better. I’m still here with the car. I’m so glad you’re coming. Don’t skip your interview. My god, that whole thing was so scary. Sassy, I did DONUTS! I don’t know how I did that. Will you call the hospital? I don’t know what is going on with Daddy. They didn’t let me go in the ambulance—those movie scenes are bullshit. Will you call the hospital?”

I called the hospital, and they actually let me speak to Dad. He sounded weak, but he knew what was going on, and he sounded OK. “I think they’ve ruled out heart attack. My blood sugar might have dropped. Or it could have been a reaction to some medication. Mom saved my life, you know.”

“I know, Dad. I’m really happy to talk to you. Sister and I will be there tonight.”

I went to a coffee shop in Union Square and finished making my phone calls while sitting outside in the sun.

On my way home, I called Date to cancel our plans for the evening. He came over and hugged me before my interview. The woman blew me off, which was just as well, as I doubt I would have made much sense. My sister came with Nephew, and we headed to Concord to visit my Dad.

After two days in the hospital, where doctors ran every test in the book, it was determined that he needed a lower dose on his new blood-pressure medication. He got a stern talking-to about losing weight, but his blood sugar was actually OK. Everything else was OK. More terrifying details about my mother’s driving feat came out, but she’s OK too. The first night, she told my sister and I that she was going to go in her room and cry for an hour, but after that, she seemed better. We had Nephew’s first birthday party at the hospital.

My god. My nerves are shot, but I am so so so so so happy that I still have parents. I might complain about them a lot, but I love them. They are OK. So am I.

So When Will It Be THAT Bad?

This will not become the Sassy’s Miserable Unemployment Blog, I swear, but this little tidbit seems worth sharing.

My dad is great, really, a kind man, and he’s always been good to me. However, the man is a true believer Republican. Although our political fights aren’t personal, you can imagine they get rather heated. My parents came down from New Hampshire on Thursday, to see me and my sister (and the very, very cute little nephew). And he offered up this little pearl of wisdom:

“The economy really isn’t that bad. People just need to realize that they’ve lost nothing until they sell the stocks.”

Excuse me?

“Dad,” I said, “your DAUGHTER just lost her job. Her date lost his job. Several of her friends are looking for work. Exactly when does it get to be THAT bad?”

Fuuuuuuuuck.

Then my mom decided to chime in with her two cents about the stimulus package and how Obama was bankrupting America.

Then snotty little me said, “Funny, I didn’t hear you saying anything at all about money when we spent all this money on unnecessary wars. From the bottom of my heart, thank you for the last eight years.”

Civility eventually returned, but the whole thing really turned my head.