Rant #2,614: Drinks On Me

Happy St. Patrick’s Day to everyone.
 
But in 2021, the celebration has to be a bit different than it is in normal years.
 
We aren’t in normal times now, so this occasion has to be handled differently, or so I am told.
 
We can’t have parades with lots of spectators, because such masses of people together in one place can create a super-spreader of the coronavirus, so as I heard last night on the news, “if you want to LIVE,” with the emphasis on “LIVE,” you absolutely must avoid these types of things and you must get your vaccine shot.
 
And heck, can we even use the leprechaun as a symbol for this holiday anymore?
 
Will certain people who get upset at everything and anything get upset at this stereotypical symbol?
 
The world is off its axis, it really is.
 
Getting back to St. Patrick …
 
I have heard that St. Patrick wasn’t even Irish, that he actually was British.
 
I have no idea why we celebrate this day, or what his significance is, and I am not going to look it up. I am sure there is good reason to honor this man, but I really don’t know the actual reason for the celebration. I admit it.
 
But if St. Patrick wasn’t Irish, then I guess if somehow ties into the axiom for the day that everyone is Irish on St. Patrick’s Day.
 
I remember that my father used to tell me that St. Patrick’s Day was the worst day for this old cab driver to work on, because of circumstance related to the day and mostly, the parade.
 
Of course, the largest and most prestigious St. Patrick’s Day parade was in New York City, and the city was my father’s office, so to speak.
 
To hold the parade, many streets had to be shut down, so traffic snarls ensued all over the city, and that is one thing that cab drivers do not enjoy, as time is money, and if you get stuck in one of these snarls, you aren’t making money, even with a passenger in the car.
 
And then there was the behavior of some people related to the parade.
 
Some people—not just the Irish, but of every denomination and background—took St. Patrick’s Day as a day to drink, drink and drink some more.
 
So he would get passengers in his cab that were slovenly, passengers that stunk up the car with their drinking, and yes, he got passengers who threw up inside the car too.
 
They also threw up onto the car on the outside, and I remember one year he told me that on the holiday, someone actually jumped on top of the hood of the car and would not get off of it.
 
I laughed at his stories, until I actually saw the process in motion happening right before me.
 
I worked in Manhattan in the late 1970s and early 1980s, a good part of the time right off Fifth Avenue, and I remember that one St. Patrick’s Day, probably in 1980 or so, I was told by my employer not to let anyone into the building. We worked in a building where you had to punch in a code to get in, and we would normally not let anyone in—we worked right next to a drug and alcohol rehabilitation place, so we were always on our guard—but we had to be especially vigilant on this day.
 
I cam back from taking lunch, and made sure the door was shut. I waited by the elevator, but for some reason, it was taking forever to come down, and someone else had walked into the building, but did not shut the door behind him like I did.
 
Well, as I waited for the elevator, a woman got into the building as the door was closing. She must have been about my age—early 20s—and she had a bottle in her hand.
 
As the elevator door finally opened, and I had to wait for people to exit as I was trying to get in, I saw her in the hallway of the building, and she was spitting up her guts … but still managed to clutch onto her bottle even with every heave.
 
As I walked into the elevator, the girl was on the floor, enveloped in her own guts, nearly passed out but holding onto that bottle for dear life.
 
That is an image I will never forget, and while it shouldn’t symbolize St, Patrick’s Day for me, I am sorry to all my Irish friends and those who are Irish for just this one day out of the year, but it kind of does.
 
That is wrong, I know, but I still can’t get that image out of my mind, 40 years after the fact.
 
I guess it has to do with my view of women as somehow better than men, able to control themselves in certain ways better than men, but whatever the case, I can still see that young girl laying in the hallway encased in her own guts, and I cannot get it out of my mind.
 
And in recent years, this spate of drunken stupidity has been clamped down by the police, so the holiday became as safe—and orderly—as could be in recent times. I guess I wasn’t the only one who saw things get out of hand after all.
 
I guess the moral of the story is simple, to enjoy the day but don’t get crazy with it, but in today’s times when you have to watch everything that you say or do or think, I have to be very careful in my summation, because it is sure to offend someone.
 
The bottom line is that this is really a great, joyous holiday, everybody is Irish today, and I can drink to that.

Drinks are on me—
 
I'll have a Coke without ice, please.