TheRamblingsPage

Tomorrow morning my bride and i will board an aeroplane bound for Detroit (Rock City), where we will board another flying machine bound for Boston, where we will board yet another big silver tube bound for Ireland. We'll leave here just after 1000 Thursday morning, and touch down at Shannon just after 0600 Friday. Of course, that arrival time is in Crazy Irish Time, and i have no idea what time it will be back home in Central Daylight Time (or, The Time on God's Personal Wristwatch), but anyway we'll be on a series of 'planes for the majority of a day. We will then set about spending an entire week ~~drinking beer~~ seeing the countryside in Ireland. It's gonna be cool.

In the past week, as i've been warning my co-workers and clientele about my impending absence, i've gotten the same reaction a lot. First, of course, there's the cheering and offering of thanks to all the major deities. Then, as if there'd been a dress rehearsal, they would all ask some variation of, "Oh, are you Irish?" - and that's really made me think. I mean, no, we're not going to Ireland to research our heritage or to meet relatives too distant to even be on the Christmas card list or anything like that. As far as i know, i am related to no-one who has not always lived right here in Fonzy's U.S. of Aaaay. We're going to Ireland because it looks pretty on TV, and that's it really. But it has made me think.

I've never been outside the country. So i'd like to see the Olde Worlde and drink the Olde Beere and drive on the Wronge Side of the Olde Roade. But the question still hangs breathlessly in the air: Is Dennis Irish? And the answer is of course no - like most honkies i'm a mongrel. I do have Irish in me, but my blood also contains equal parts Scot, Cherokee, English and Other. It's an emulsion you wouldn't want on a salad. It means that i don't really have an ethnic or cultural identity. But i do think of myself as Irish more than anything else, and i couldn't tell you why. It's not a position i could defend. That's just how i've always thought of myself. And i don't know what the point was in telling you all that, but at least it answers the question (except, not really).

So today was eventful in the getting-ready-to-leave sense. It also yielded this cheery bit of info: Bossdad has prostate cancer. Fuck. Sure the doctor can say that, on a scale of 1 to 10 (10 being worst), Bossdad would only rank a 6. And the doctor can say that there are a variety of treatment options, any of which would take care of Bossdad's problem. And he can say that, even if Bossdad elected to ignore the diagnosis, it would be upwards of 5 years before it became a life-threatening Major Health Issue. But people are also always saying that, even after 9/11, you're more likely to die in a car crash than a 'plane crash - that doesn't make it any less bizarre to be flying halfway across the country, then all the way across the Atlantic. There's no way to say prostate cancer that doesn't sound like a really harsh thing to have in your life. And this is a guy who deserves to have it easy. But hey, if Combover Guiliani can beat it, surely Bossdad can.