St. Patrick's day is a wonderful day, if only for the reason that it is one of those many holidays in which hoards of people get together to celebrate something with a meaning they don't quite understand. Even in this sleepy little town (read: small city in Northern CA), people will be seen wearing head-to-toe green and ungodly amounts of garish $3 beads, will drink unheard of amounts of green beer, and be altogether loud and obnoxious. Why? Because this is a holy day, and one must behave accordingly!
I can still remember the relative madness inspired by St. Patrick's day whilst in middle school (7th and 8th grades), even though (hopefully) the excitement really had nothing to do with drinking until near-death. In this case, it was just nice to have ANYTHING to celebrate... and of course, there were plenty of middle-schoolers who thrilled at the idea of making everything green... including their hair (looking back, the green-madness might've actually been kind of fun!) But the one thing that really bugged me about this particular holiday wasn't the obsessive re-wardrobing or the frenzy it inspired in my fellow class-mates (can I say fellow classmates if I'm not a fellow? Or if all my classmates weren't fellows?)... it was the fact that on this particular day it was suddenly "cool" to be Irish.
Now before I come off sounding like a hate all Irish people, you should know that this is very much not the case, my only real problem with the sudden fascination was that people who weren't Irish the day before suddenly became Irish on this one day. My most vivid memory of this insanity was when my then-best friend, being inspired by a sudden flurry of enthusiasm, proudly declared to all our friends (and, I'm assuming, anyone else who would listen) that she was "1% Irish." I mean really, 1%? That would be like if you went into a job interview and told the hiring manager you were 1% qualified for the job... it's just not going to happen! I feel bad though, because clearly, she just wanted to be kissed...
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I believe thats call plastic paddyism.
ReplyDeleteAny excuse for celebration.
I think you're right, it seems just an excuse for a celebration. My boyfriend is Irish and living in England at uni, so I usually make him feel more like he's at home, but this year it has just slipped my mind.
ReplyDeleteI never celebrated it really, and don't see the point. I'm not Irish.
If I wasn't such a light-weight I would TOTALLY see the point! But yah, I don't know... I don't really hate St Patrick's day... I just wanted to out my friend for being so ludicrous! LOL. I'm a way awesome friend, aren't I?
ReplyDeleteI have always been kind of jealous because I always liked the kiss me i'm irish shirts. Admitting that in a blog comment sounds kind of dumb, but i'm okay with that. At Old Navy I saw a shirt that said i'm not irish kiss me anyways. I totally bought it and it made me happy.
ReplyDeleteThat's kind of awesome.
ReplyDeleteThat's weird. You commented on my blog at the same time I was reading yours! I think I totally played up the I'm cool because I'm Irish thing when I was in middle school. I never died my hair green, though.
ReplyDeleteOkay, that is weird!
ReplyDeleteMy hair is too dark to die it with Koolaid, or else I might've actually joined in!
If your were Irish
ReplyDeletethen you wouldnt know what Koolaid is
so there.
I dont know what Koolaid is.
Sounds sort of lame.
So you're Irish then? That's kind of hot.
ReplyDeleteYou also didn't know what Twitter was, so I wouldn't go around bragging about what you don't know if I were you :)