NEITHER HERE NOR THERE - IN THE BRONX

 I had seen him at a number of gigs in The Bronx. He always sat at the bar, up by the stage, where he could take in everything, but not necessarily be associated with us.

I was playing with Turner & Kirwan of Wexford back then, it must have been the late 1970’s.

We had a regular Sunday afternoon gig at the Archway, courtesy of Manager Sean Lynch, where we could cut loose and play lengthy tracks like Traveling People and Father Reilly Says Goodbye from our album Absolutely and Completely.

We drew our own crowd to those gigs. But this was different. We were playing a midweek night, filling in for Dermie Mac, Gerry Finlay, or one of the other accomplished showband-like groups that the Archway clientele longed for.

To be blunt, we weren’t cutting it. The crowd that remained after enduring a couple of our sets had long stopped dancing.

It wasn’t that we didn’t try, we gave it our best - three jives, three slows, with some old time waltzes tossed in - but our hearts weren’t in it.  

We’d crossed over to the dark side - playing all original music down in the Village. Besides Alison Steele on WNEW-FM was raving about us, and wondering what part of heaven we’d dropped down from?

Still, there was only one set to go when I sat down next to the guy who had been eyeing us.

He ordered a Heineken and Jameson’s and shoved them in my direction.

“I bought your album last week and must have played it 10 times by now.” He stated, without the least enthusiasm.

I stole a look at him to make sure he wasn’t a total lunatic. He seemed harmless enough, so I shrugged as if such praise was common.

“Yez have got a lot better,” he added. “Jaysus, yez were fierce bad at first.”

Such observations are hard to put a spin on, so I held my peace and took a slug of the Heineken. Late sets could be dispiriting, so I saved the Jameson’s for fortification.

“How long are you over here now, about seven years, right?”

He had hit the nail on the head, but after his earlier “fierce bad” remark, I didn’t want to give him any satisfaction.

“You know that means you’re never going back,” he took a sip from his Budweiser.

“How so?” He had piqued my interest.

“No one goes back after seven years, unless you have a young wan waiting for you. And that’s hardly the case, is it?”

When I didn’t answer he looked me in the face for the first time and nodded. “You and me are the exact same.”

To my mind we had sweet damn all in common, but he barged ahead. “You and me are neither here nor there. We don’t fit in here and we’ll never fit in at home again.”

At that point Pierce Turner coughed into his microphone to signal that our third set was about to begin.

“I’ll remember that,” I called back to him as I mounted the stage, taking care not to spill the Jameson’s.

“I know you will.” He said. And he was right.

I never saw him again, but I can summon him up at will, though The Archway and Turner & Kirwan of Wexford have long gone.

He was talking about the emigrant’s curse. After 7 years you’ve replaced Manchester United with the Mets. It’s not that you don’t still support the red devils, it’s just that you don’t know the new players, and unless you’re a fanatic you don’t go down the pub early on weekend mornings to get soused and watch the games.

Meanwhile, the “young wan” you left behind has married someone else. And you’ve been talking to your American girlfriend about saving for a house and a family.

Oh, you still cause a great commotion when you do go home, but you don’t go for Christmas anymore; besides, there comes that day when both parents have passed on, and the house or farm has been sold.

You’ve settled down, made all the right decisions and, for the most part, you’re contented with life; but you notice that you often slip beyond the thread of friendly conversation to that solitary place where you are indeed - neither here nor there.

LUKE KELLY - REBEL WITH A CAUSE

 In a recent Irish poll, Luke Kelly was voted “the best representative of Irish heritage.” 

What a distinction for this son of inner city Dublin who left school at 13, and eventually took the emigrant boat to England in the dismal 1950’s.

But then Luke, by his early 20’s, was a local legend long before he gained fame internationally as singer/banjoist with The Dubliners.

I had the good fortune to come under his influence early on. As a callow youth, I came second in a talent competition held during the Wexford Opera Festival. The Dubliners were playing a week’s residency at the same venue, so I got to watch them nightly from side stage.

Luke and Ronnie Drew shared lead vocals during these stunning gigs. Every act that visited Wexford in those days “performed.” The Dubliners, instead, straggled onstage and captivated the audience with their songs and naked charisma. They left an indelible mark on the town.

In 1967 the Fleadh Cheoil was held in nearby Enniscorthy. On the closing Sunday evening thousands gathered in the old Town Square.

Traditional heads were hammering out jigs and reels to beat the band when a hush descended on the square as whispered word was passed around that Luke Kelly was about to sing. There was a silent surge forward and some sturdy GAA men took it upon themselves to act as stewards.

From out of nowhere Luke appeared, his head of red curls flashing in the sunset. He carefully removed his banjo from its case, and a bottle of Baby Powers from his back pocket. Then he was hoisted up on the roof of a car and stood there swaying until he gained his balance.

He took a healthy swig of the whiskey and passed the bottle down to a friend with a nod and a wink.

Some idiot broke the silence and was immediately shushed by a multitude of angry listeners. Luke didn’t even seem to notice. Then he began to sing to the accompaniment of his banjo, and his voice ricocheted across the sacred square where Pikemen had routed the English 169 years previously.

His first song was The Leaving of Liverpool. But when the chorus arrived, no one joined him on “So fare thee well, my own true love, and when I return united we will be…”

We had no wish to hear ourselves; we wanted to drink in this redheaded seanchaíwho had packed so much living into his 27 years.

He seemed surprised but seized the moment and sang another half-dozen songs, one as revealing as the other. On that evening he was the working class hero that John Lennon longed all his life to be.

What was so striking about Luke? Well, he was the man for that moment in the “summer of love.” The gangly Dublin kid who had endured the hard knocks of class-conscious Catholic Ireland came into his own in the heathen pubs and folk clubs of Northern England.

He came under the influence of proletarian intellectuals like Ewan McColl and Dominic Behan. They raised his political consciousness and taught him how to sing songs without frills or adornment, songs with a message that would soon pierce the hearts of a generation.

For Luke had that rare gift that I’ve only experienced from two other performers, Bob Marley and Bruce Springsteen – no matter the size of his audience, he was singing to just you alone.

The Dubliners were a groundbreaking band. They liberated their audiences by sweeping away the vestiges of British colonialism and Irish conservatism in a wave of innovation, braggadocio, and musicality.

As time went on, however, the moments of silence became rarer and Luke seemed to retreat into himself. He’d no sooner begin one of his gems than the crowd would join him in full throat. There were times he appeared disconnected, almost disinterested.

Booze, late nights, and constant travel wear everyone down unless there’s something to look forward to. His health suffered and eventually collapsed. He was only 43 when Dublin came to a standstill for his funeral.

His music lives on though, his clear rugged voice still cuts through speakers and AirPods, and I’ll never forget that evening in Enniscorthy Town Square when he silenced every whisper and set the heather blazing.

THE OSPREYS ARE GONE

 The ospreys are gone. They left in the weeks after Labor Day. 

When they get the call – genetic or atmospheric - they don’t delay, it’s a long way to Central America.

The male goes first, soon after the female follows, sometimes accompanied by her grown chicks, although the young ospreys seem to know the route and destination regardless.

Ospreys mate for life but they travel separately. The male arrives in Connecticut coastal areas soon after St. Patrick’s Day.

Having secured last year’s nest, he will fish just enough for personal sustenance. Mamma will arrive in a week or so, and dictate just how she wants the nest to look and feel; she doesn’t hesitate to discard any twig or other building material the male may offer, if not to her liking.

After mating she will take to the nest and lay up to 3 eggs. Poppa’s hard slog then begins. He must feed her, and himself, and as soon as the eggs are hatched, he is the main provider for roughly 50 days until the young can hunt successfully.

July and August are a treat for those who pay close attention. Where once the male dived alone, now the full family of 5 (if they’ve survived predators or illness) display their skills, swooping down on unsuspecting fish.

The first days of hunting for the young provide moments of hilarity, as a swift, seemingly confident dive may lead to an ungainly belly flop. But they learn quickly, out on the placid Long Island Sound.

There’s a clock ticking down to Labor Day. The young have a flight of thousands of miles ahead. Do they have any notion of this, or is it something genetic that drives them on to their winter home in Central America.

I’ve been watching ospreys for some time. I began soon after 9/11 – I guess that event caused many people to take stock of their surroundings. At first, sightings were rare, but around 2015 - the first summer after Black 47 disbanded - I noticed a jump in their numbers.

I was working on a novel then and making slow progress. Novels are hard to write and the work is draining. I began rising at 6am, and took solace in looking up from my laptop every few minutes for sight of the male as he circled the bay, pausing as hawks do in mid-air to scan the waters below.

I began to synchronize with him. If he dove and succeeded in clawing a fish, then I’d get a rush of adrenalin and finish a difficult sentence or paragraph. He failed often that first month, as did I. But as the summer wore on we both improved.

It took 3 summers of synchronizing with the male before I finished Rockaway Blue.

He returned the following spring in those first awful weeks of the pandemic. He seemed unfazed by all our fears and paranoia.

I wouldn’t say ospreys are methodical, they’re far too skillful and opportunistic, but there was work to be done, and my old friend set about it in his usual driven manner.

I followed his example, as best I could, and began All The Rage, a musical about the Rock ‘n’ Roll life in the East Village, the score of which I finally recorded last week.

I’m pretty sure he didn’t make it back this year, the male who now rules the roost in these waters has stripes on his belly, whereas my co-worker’s under-plumage was white as snow.

I mourned him for a while, but then rationalized that the new male is the son of my old friend, and life must go on.

I had been saving a project called Rebel Girl for the return of the ospreys in late March. It’s the story of the firebrand labor activist, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn. She was from The Bronx and gave her first public speech for workers rights when she was 15.

So, when mourning was over, I dove in. Stripe Belly has more energy than my old friend. I hadn’t noticed that he’d gotten slower with age.

Anyway, my young associate suits the drama and drive of Ms. Flynn, the songs and story already have an odd vibrancy. Hopefully, I’ll have the project ready for the long final polishing by the time my new friend returns in the spring.

MILES DAVIS AND THE MISPLACED HEADSTONE

I often take a train to New Haven nowadays, and since I find trains very relaxing I invariably feel drowsy as we pull out of Grand Central Station.

Nonetheless, I always awaken as we chug by Woodlawn Cemetery. Miles Davis lies within and I fantasize that the “coolest man in the universe,” gently rouses me with a toot of his golden horn.

Truth be told though, I feel very at home around graveyards. And why wouldn’t I? My grandfather, Thomas Hughes, was a monumental sculptor.

He was a quiet man who had left school at 14 to be apprenticed to his father. When he was 18, Thomas left his native Carlow with a horse and car, a load of limestone, and drove the 50 miles to Wexford town where he set up shop.

Life was far from easy, but he married, raised a large family, and prospered. Some years after my grandmother died, I moved in “to keep him company.”

Parents would never part with their darlings nowadays, but Ireland was a different country back then.

I probably still have limestone dust in my lungs for I spent much time in his yard near Wexford Quay.

On Sunday afternoons, however, we usually took a leisurely drive through the countryside. We would always stop at a graveyard, and he would potter around until some statue or headstone caught his eye, and there he would stand riveted, for what seemed like hours.

It took many years before I realized that he was either figuring out how to create or improve on such a work. For he was an artist, though he had never taken a lesson. Whatever he knew he’d learned through observation and hands-on experience.

His allies were the traveling people who loved sumptuous memorials. He would stand in his draughty office surrounded by heartbroken families as they pored over pictures of ornate headstones and statues.

They always paid cash up front, but he willingly offered big discounts for the chance to carve something original.

When I was 15, I began working for him during summer vacations. Patron Days in cemeteries were held all through those weekends. Families wished their ancestral graves to be brought up-to-date and spruced to their best, with the names of recently deceased added, old headstones cleaned, and new ones erected.

My job was to mix cement, scour stones and kerbing, and make the tea. There was little rush, you could dream as you toiled; but most of all I loved the peace and quiet that came with the terrain.

I also loved my workmates. Tom Fortune was from “out the country,” while John Redmond was a townie from nearby Monck Street. Between them they had accrued much native wisdom, and when pushed would share it.

They were kind men who treated me as an adult, and I learned much from them about life, including how to maneuver a stick-shift truck. They were both at ease with the world and content with their occupation, for it saved them from the scourge of loneliness in emigrant London.

One memory still causes a chuckle. We were sent to erect a headstone in a small overgrown graveyard up near Gorey. The person who had ordered the job failed to show.

However, there was a fairly recently dug grave situated in the general area where we had been instructed to put up the headstone.

It was a routine job and we took our time, savoring the lovely August day. In the late afternoon we departed for home with the contented feeling of another job well done.

All hell, however, broke loose the following morning for we had raised the headstone over the wrong grave, and to add insult to injury there had been bad blood of long standing between the two aggrieved families.

We rushed back out into a local cold war, and with much difficulty dislodged the headstone and kerbing; we then cleaned up the ravaged grave area as best we could under the stony gaze of the offended family.

The sun was going down as we erected the headstone over the proper grave, amid the muttered taunts and criticisms of the other hostile clan.

It made for a long, difficult day, but such is life, death, and bad blood in a country graveyard. We could have used a couple of soothing toots from Miles Davis’s golden horn. 

The Curse of the Subways

At an out-of-state wedding recently, I fell into conversation with a cheerful gentleman whom I didn’t know from Adam, or Eve for that matter.

Upon hearing that I was from New York City he inquired if the subways were as bad as ever.

I replied that they were quite pleasant nowadays, and compared to the 1970’s the experience was comparable to traveling first class on the Orient Express.

 “That’s hardly likely.” He declared.

“Why not?” I rose to the challenge.

“Because on the news every night, it’s one thing after another, murders, robberies, all manner of mayhem.”

“What channel do you watch?”

“Fox,” he smiled, “like any sane person!”

I began to look for an exit, but it was four deep at the bar, besides my drink was barely dented.

“Listen,” said I, cornered but unbowed, “I’ve never seen as many cops on the trains or in the stations since this new mayor got in.”

“You support that lunatic?”

I wasn’t sure if I did, but Hizzoner Eric Adams had made a promise to make the subways safer, and in my book, at least, he’d kept it.

From there the conversation degenerated, culminating in an exchange of views on a certain Republican presidential candidate.  Who knows what would have transpired if the bride and groom hadn’t been called upon to hit the boards for their first wedded dance.

And there we left it, after shaking hands graciously, but this chance clash of opinions got me thinking.

I occasionally take a taxi or an Uber, but like most New Yorkers I’m a subway rider.

Why?  Because they run frequently, 24/7, pretty much on time, are relatively inexpensive and safe. 

With a 0 .0001% chance of any violence being visited upon you, you’re more likely to get hit by a cyclist or car on the city’s streets.

That being said, there are certain rules to be followed, including always keep your eyes peeled – although you’re not in Columbus, OH where violent crime per capita is higher, there is always a need to be vigilant in New York.

Stand with your back to a wall, if possible, and do not approach the yellow border next to the tracks – the train won’t come any quicker because you lean over to check its progress.

Don’t stand in clumps - keep the walkway open. And above all, be courteous. New Yorkers value manners.

There are still some homeless people who ride the subways, although the numbers have greatly decreased. Respect them. There go you but for good fortune.

As always, New York is in flux, rents are high, the poor are finding it harder to get by, and there is great income disparity.

Still, for the most part, our citizenry coexists peacefully, it’s hard to find a more friendly city, and I’ve been way lonelier in many a small town.

The curse of the NYC subways - and the city in general - is the rise of ear-buds, earphones, and the like.

We live in a very violent country that boasts more guns than people.  And although shootings are down 26% in our city in the last year, you still should be aware of anyone approaching you from behind, and that’s unlikely with Taylor Swift massaging your eardrums.

Why anyone would want to program their own soundtrack is baffling anyway. There’s a rhythm and a beat to New York unique to the city. It’s why Bob Dylan, Henry Miller, Miles Davis, Edward Hopper, Joey Ramone, Walt Whitman, LL Cool J, and so many others lived and worked here.

None of them wore ear-buds above or below ground. They moved to the tempo of Gotham like millions of the rest of us. They watched, listened, and sidestepped to let their fellow citizens hurry past.

They avoided becoming part of that almost non-existent 0.001% that have been victimized on our streets or subways; of course, you’d never know this from watching, listening to or reading the sensationalist media outlets that exult in misfortune in order to sell advertisements or mold political views.

Brendan Behan hit the nail on the head with his observation that New York City “is a place where you’re least likely to be bitten by a wild goat.”

Should I ever run into my wedding acquaintance again I’ll mention this to him. Perhaps, he’ll come visit.

MAGGIE HIGGINS - THE MOST CONSEQUENTIAL AMERICAN WOMAN

 Maggie Higgins may have been the most consequential American woman. When it comes to the change she wrought, they don’t come much more important than Margaret Louise Higgins.

She was born in Corning, NY in 1879 to Irish immigrant parents. Her father, Michael Higgins, a free thinker and atheist, was a headstone maker who specialized in sculpting angels.

Maggie’s mother, Anne Purcell Higgins, married Michael in 1869. Both parents had an enormous influence on their daughter – Anne in particular, for in 22 years she conceived 18 times with 11 children surviving.

After a married life of almost constant pregnancy and near poverty, Anne passed away at the age of 49 from tuberculosis.

For some years after, Maggie tended to her brothers and sisters, and domestic duties in the Higgins household. But eventually she rebelled and set out to do her life’s work as a birth control activist. We know her now as Margaret Sanger.

She became a nurse probationer at White Plains Hospital. At that time, according to Maggie, doctors tended to keep business hours at hospitals, so during the night nurses were forced to make vital decisions about the health of their patients.

She specialized in obstetrics and gynecology. Women’s lack of knowledge of their own bodies due to church teaching and social convention astounded her.

Precocious and independent, her midwifery skills became well known and she was often asked by grateful patients how they could delay further pregnancies.

Doctors rarely gave such advice, for the Comstock Law of 1873 defined contraception as obscene and illicit; besides most Christian churches railed against it.

Maggie might have continued her nursing career to quiet and local acclaim, but two events set her on a different track. She contracted tuberculosis, the curse of the Higgins family, and she came to the attention of William Sanger, an aspiring architect and artist.

With her auburn hair and vivacious personality Maggie would remain attractive to men all her long life. Sanger was no exception and he fell head over heels in love with this young Irish nurse.

Jewish-Irish marriages were rare in those days but Maggie had long before rebelled against the dictates of the Catholic Church. The two settled in their dream house that Sanger designed and constructed in Hastings-on-Hudson.

Despite her tuberculosis Margaret Sanger had 3 children with her husband.

William Sanger was an active member of the Socialist Party and Margaret threw herself into political activity.

One cold winter’s night, a fire from an overheated stove burned down their home. Sanger rebuilt the house but Margaret’s suburban dream was over; she moved her family to an apartment in Manhattan and began socializing in Greenwich Village with such characters as Jack Reed, the subject of Reds, and Emma Goldman.

In a city jammed with immigrants she found much work as a visiting nurse on the Lower East Side and was horrified by the poverty, lack of any sex education, and the drastically high death rate among the newborn.

She became a member of the International Workers of the World (Wobblies) and along with Elizabeth Gurley Flynn led the successful Bread & Roses campaign for a living wage and better conditions for the textile workers in Lawrence, MA.

But she never lost sight of the fact that working families could not prosper unless pregnancy could be regulated. She did not believe in abortion (except in a medical emergency).

In 1916 she and her sister, Ethel Byrne, opened the first family planning and birth control clinic in Brooklyn. When they were arrested Ethel went on hunger strike and became the first woman striker to be force fed in the US.

Due to the ongoing publicity and notoriety engendered by the case, Judge Frederick Crane in 1918 issued a ruling that allowed doctors to prescribe contraception.

Margaret Sanger overcame many obstacles in her life’s mission to make contraception available to all women, and in 1960 the FDA approved the sale of Enovid – the first hormonal birth control pill.

She died in 1966, a year after the US Supreme Court’s landmark decision to legalize birth control for married couples in the US.

On July 13^th,2023 the FDA approved the first over-the-counter birth control pill that will allow all women and girls to buy contraceptives. Maggie Higgins’ impossible dream back in Corning is about to come true.

TEDDYBOY ROCKABILLY REVOLUTION

 One night, while departing the stage in the late, lamented Village Pub in The Bronx, I was approached by a gentleman who remarked: “When all is said and done, Kirwan, you’re nothing more than a trumped up Wexford Teddy Boy.”

Since slagging was one of the main forms of communication in Irish immigrant circles, and my admirer was about a foot taller than me, I didn’t dwell on the matter.

This would have been back in the late 1980’s. I was between bands and had taken to singing old rock ‘n’ roll songs for my bread and butter.

I was wearing a skinny black leather tie, pointed red shoes, with a dab of Brylcreem to grease back my hair. In truth, the slagger wasn’t far off the mark - I was attempting a bit of a Ted look.

Who were these Teddy Boys and how had their influence spread to the wilds of the North Bronx 30 years after their European heyday?

They first came to prominence in London in the 1950’s when working-class youth, tired of post-World War II rationing and deprivation, adopted long Edwardian style suit jackets, commonly known as drapes.

Sick of the all-pervasive, dowdy black suits, they wore these drapes in rich red or blue colors, over drainpipe trousers, bright shirts, skinny ties, suede shoes, and lime-green socks.

In those gloomy days Ireland’s greatest export was, as ever, its people, and it was a rare Wexford teenager who didn’t spend a year or two knocking London down and rebuilding it.

The more stylish of these emigrants were known to strut their Teddy Boy threads on Wexford’s Main Street during Christmas and summer vacations.

Sensing an opportunity, the enterprising Nolan family, introduced Wexford’s first jukebox to their recently opened ice cream parlor; the Teds stocked this magic machine with their favorite Rockabilly music, turned the volume up to 11, and a scene was born.

Their favorites were Elvis, Bill Haley, and Eddie Cochran – all three, oddly enough, with Irish roots. Added to these hell raisers were Buddy Holly, Gene Vincent, Jerry Lee Lewis, and a rake of others, mostly Southern White boys ripping up and ripping off Black R&B music.

The local Garda Síochána were leery of these teenage rebels and their exaggerated jive dancing, but as long as they kept it within the confines of Nolan’s small premises and didn’t engage in any of the new-fangled juvenile delinquency, how bad could it be.

The only serious incident occurred when Bill Haley’s Rock Around The Clock film played at the local Capitol Cinema, where some ancient seats were demolished, and the audience took to jiving in the aisles.

Teds seem to have been a mostly East Coast phenomenon with sightings also in Dublin, Belfast and Ballymena, though it’s hard to believe that Cork, Limerick and Galway didn’t also have their stylish rebels.

The Teddy Boy era faded in the 1960’s when mass marketing began to dictate teen dress styles.

There was a moment when The Beatles might have stemmed the tide of banal commerciality. Take a look at their early pictures, John and George show their unmistakable Ted influences. Then Brian Epstein became manager and insisted upon those silly collarless suits.

What’s interesting about the Teds is that they designed a style all their own with the help of local tailors. They insisted upon individuality – at least at nights and weekends when free from their factory jobs. For once, men outshone ladies in the couture department.

I still see remnants of the look in Ireland, the drapes have long gone but tight black trousers persevere, albeit with a healthy paunch drooping over an exaggerated belt buckle.

Don’t look too closely though, the wearer, often in his 70’s, may give you the hairy eyeball from behind a fabulously greased grey quiff!

Such characters tend to stand at the bar with a faraway look in their eyes until Elvis, Eddie Cochran or Bill Haley sweep away whatever modern dross is polluting the radio or juke box.

Then all at once they jerk to attention, suck in their beer-bellies, and they’re ready to jive and kick out the jams again, just like they did in Nolan’s ice cream parlor all those Rockabilly, Teddy Boy years ago.