DRINKIN' IN AMERICA

 “It’s 6 o’clock and it’s time to rock, and me head is beatin’ like a drum

In the cold daylight, I feel like shite, and I can’t remember last night’s fun

Then the foreman says, ‘C’mon now, boys, stick your fingers down your throat and get to work’

 

And I wish to Christ, I’d stayed home last night, instead of drinking in America.”

 

“Drinking in America.” I bet that phrase summonses memories, the kind you never forget.

 

I thought I had put in some first-class imbibing before I moved to New York City. But that was akin to being a sprinter who’s suddenly tossed into a marathon.

 

4am closing time was a revelation. I remember thinking: Americans must do nothing but drink.

It was so different in Ireland. “Time, gentlemen, please!” would resound through pubs at 10:50pm in the winter and 11:20pm in the summer. Speed drinking would ensue, how many pints could you down before you were banished out the door by a frenetic barman?

 

Apart from the occasional tear, by American standards no one drank that much in Ireland, who had the money? To paraphrase Brendan Behan, “Getting stocious wasn’t a disgrace, it was an achievement.”   I mean, the pubs were actually closed on St. Patrick’s Day.

 

Women, as a rule, didn’t frequent pubs until the mid-1960’s, when lounges became fashionable. Up until then, working class ladies might squeeze into snugs, while their upper-class sisters sipped Babycham or the occasional cocktail in hotel bars.

 

Remember ballroom culture, up to 1000 women and men, many sporting pioneer pins, soberly throwing shapes. And what showband dared drink on stage with the parish priest presiding?

 

But right from the get-go, when the Irish came to America it was a whole different ball game.

During the Great Hunger years, many Irish immigrants settled in the downtown Five Points area. After some trepidation, they fit in well with free African-Americans who already ran dance halls; soon inter-racial bands were playing a mix of Irish jigs and African Juba music.

 

With little or no licensing laws, the shenanigans went on all night, and the Irish built their reputation as a drinking/dancing/romancing type of people who left the footprint of their saloons all over this country.

 

Part of the reason was economic. Immigrants and their large families rented small rooms in tenements. Most space was used for sleeping and eating, so there was need for a sitting room – often the nearest saloon or síbín. Not to mention that water was scarce and often contaminated. Beer was far safer.

 

Being a musician, I got to study “drinking in America” close up. The days of the Five Points were long gone by the 1970’s. In the Irish bars of The Bronx, say Durty Nelly’s on Kingsbridge, there was still a cultural connection to showbands and ballrooms, the men wore suits and ties on weekends, the ladies looked divine in their dresses; after 3 songs, you called out, “Your next dance please.”  And though the clientele was far from sober, a mannerly decorum was called for, and observed.

 

Oh man, did that change in the nihilistic 80’s with the huge influx of young immigrants from the jobless South and battle-torn North where the youth had already gone toe-to-toe with the British Army.

 

At the end of that decade I wrote the above quoted song, Livin’ in America, about young immigrant life around Bainbridge Avenue. Since many were illegal, there was a roaring cash culture and economy. 

 

I never witnessed such drinking – you had to tread carefully entering a darkened pub with your guitar and amp, for fear you’d trip over some client taking a post happy-hour nap to revivify himself before heading off to the Archway for a night’s dancing - and some serious imbibing.

 

That all changed when the Celtic Tiger began growling back home. Plenty of heavy drinkers still remained, but Bainbridge without bars became just another lonely avenue.

 

Though many pub owners would love a renaissance, it’s just a pipe dream. Young Irish don’t fancy the U.S. anymore - Australia, Canada and the EU are more welcoming and better reflect modern Irish values.

 

Besides, everyone wants to live longer, and affordability is all the rage. The good old days of “drinking in America” are receding in the mirror.

 

Ah well, I’m off to the bodega for a 6-pack. It’ll soon enough be “six o’clock and time to rock...”

OSPREYS, KNOW-NOTHIN'S, GERRYMANDERING & THE STATE OF THE UNION

 By the time you read this the Ospreys should have returned to my little patch of the Long Island Sound. However, it’s been a strange year for birds. They practically disappeared over the frigid winter months.

Normally, the red berries on the local holly trees would have been devoured by late January, yet they were still glistening during St. Patrick’s week.

 

Still, the Clapper Rails, in their long-beaked glory, have been click-clacking away in the nearby marshlands for weeks, and gloriously colored American Finches are cavorting amid the new leaves on the maple trees.

 

But no sign of the imperious Ospreys. Have they grown tired of us and our political shenanigans?

 

I still enjoy living in the North-East’s four seasons. But I’m less patient with the long winters. I try to take a vacation now in mid-March, something I could never do in my Black 47 years.

 

Last year I made it to Morocco and this year to Egypt, both countries where the sun can braise you and the dollar goes a long way.

 

The friends I made in both countries were reluctant to speak about the US. But when tongues loosened they were puzzled by our erratic foreign policy, the casual rejection of long-time allies, and the fear they might get denied entry when seeking to visit family members living Stateside.

 

It got me thinking of the times we live in and a country that was once considered a beacon of hope. What happened?

 

There’s no point in blaming politicians. We vote them into power. That’s what a democratic republic is all about.

 

I’ve always found the two-party system limiting, even restrictive; although I tend to vote Democrat, I don’t totally identify with either party. It’s a common immigrant complaint. Jan, my Czech landlord in the East Village, was the exception. A confirmed Republican, he used to proclaim, “Why should I vote poor people party, I come here be rich man!”  

 

However, the current Republican Party brings to mind the 19^th Century Know-Nothings. While the Democratic Party is still coming to terms with its failure to deal with Joe Biden’s geriatric ego. 

 

I consider myself a small “d” democrat and a small “r” republican. I believe in democracy and the principles of a republic.

 

With regard to the first, why do we allow self-serving Republicans and Democrats to gerrymander our states and districts as though they own them? Talk about appointing the fox to police the hen-house!

 

It’s not that long ago Catholics and Republicans in Northern Ireland refused to accept the rampant gerrymandering of their sectarian state. And yet here in the US of A, states are casually gerrymandered by both parties, often with the assent of a partisan Supreme Court.

 

As regards, small “r” republican issues: Why do we allow Democratic and Republican politicians to serially increase the National Debt without the least murmur of dissent?

 

Yes, I did indeed bring up this issue only months back in this column, but since then our current US Federal Debt has zoomed past 100% of our Gross Domestic Product, and shows not the least sign of slowing down.

 

Have you ever heard President Trump even mention the word “deficit?” 

 

Hardly, for if the word was part of his vocabulary, he would have thought twice about blowing the hell out of Iran in a war of choice whose massive bill has not even begun to become due. 

 

Yet, in all these macho Republican war games, how often have you heard a Democratic politician rail against the annual one trillion bucks cost of interest or the ever-growing size of the debt.

 

Nah, that can wait until the next Democratic Administration is forced to cut social security benefits in 2032, while our retired King of Debt looks on benignly from Mar-a-Lago.

 

When did we as a country decide to use the national credit card rather than pay as we go like other generations?

 

Back in January 1835 President Andrew Jackson totally paid off his national debt, while after 8 years of the Clinton presidency, we owed less than $6 trillion. The good old days!

 

Ah well, if I’m lucky enough to be still pontificating in 2032, I promise I won’t criticize our Republican and Democratic rulers when the fiscal chickens finally come home to roost. 

 

No way, I’ll be too busy scouring the skies above the Long Island Sound for sight of some common sense and the long-missing Ospreys.