I’ve always liked St. Patrick’s Day as it coincides with the arrival of spring. Spring has come very early here this year, unseasonably so, and I’m finally starting to feel myself drawn out again to take it in. I haven’t gone to see if there are trilliums yet, but it was a lucky day a couple of years ago to find a 4-petaled one, a quadrillium.
My grandmother, who contributed a dose of Irish heritage and some strands of copper hair to my makeup was always magically able to find 4-leaf clovers on her suburban lawn.
My St Patrick’s Day this year involved a metaphorical 4-leaf clover coming untethered to where it can rest in my hand as a more or less “finished” reality. It has four leaves: 2 people, and 2 institutions. The stem – my brainstem – has been at different times holding or inhabiting or dis-inhabiting them all. I’m still adapting to the new vast emptiness of simply being done. A relief to be done, some understandings, some questions yet. Luck landed with one of the other leaves than the “me” one, but it’s still in the mix and at some level I’m glad things didn’t become too gory. I was still affected by the outcome, though I had been feeling less and less tied to whatever it might be.
Rather than feeling the day was about luck, I’ve been thinking more about how it represents the continuation of theme to me – pieces of and thinking about the Irish diaspora in North America that have become relevant over the last year – two places which held space for a time, one geographic and the other interpersonal. It feels right to have something come to a close on that theme. There are no steps left for me to take.
I think one of the most important things for me was holding firm to my lived reality, and discovering where my boundaries will be better in the future, and my discernment, without getting into specifics right now. Unwinding yet to do as a deep sadness passes through which will probably last a spell, longer than the loaf of Irish soda bread I’ve been enjoying with my tea. The sadness encompasses stacked losses and the lack of repair, and the cost of taking an action I would much rather not have had to take. This made my experience visible and legible, and for a time, my truth was held where its traces can remain.