A Bronx Irish Christmas Long Ago (Terence Winch)

  
In the kitchen at 1912 Daly Ave, Bronx, NY, ca. 1961: Paddy Winch, Bridie (nee Flynn) Winch, my brother-in-law Kenny Reich, Jesse [Jimmy] Winch, Terence  Winch, P.J. Conway.

 

C E L E B R A T I O N

___________________________

In our world, nothing compared

with Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve.

God’s power surging through the congregation,

from altarboys in our stiff collars and big red bows,

to the solid men of the parish in their finest array:

Blue suits, gold wrist watches, crisp white shirts.

The women perfumed and girdled, lipsticked

and bejeweled.  Enough incense

in the air to do the Wise Men proud.

 

The procession wound through the church,

organ honking, voices lifted in the special

Christmas sense of the slate wiped clean

and the universe beginning anew.

The tree in the house lit with fat colored bulbs

that looked good enough to eat. The old suitcase

full of fragile decorations, buried treasure found

every year on Christmas Eve and set free again.

The baby Jesus alive and well!  Herod thwarted!

 

This called for presents.  Toys, games, maybe

a watch or a knife.  Along with Jesus came the whole

cast of Yuletide characters—Santa, Rudolph,

the Chipmunks, Bing Crosby, Frosty, Scrooge. 

I’m surprised the Easter Bunny didn’t crash

the event.  My father put out apple pie

and a glass of milk for Sanny, the remaining traces

of which on Christmas morning were proof enough

for me and my brother Jimmy of the entire

supernatural infrastructure of Bronx Irish culture.

 

But it was the party after Midnight Mass

that I remember most.  Relatives and neighbors

would pour into our apartment for an all-nighter.

My mother would get the percolator going,

and start making breakfast for half the parish.

Bacon, eggs, blood pudding, plates of fresh rolls

with poppy seeds bought that day

in the Treat Bakery on Tremont Avenue. 

 

Eating breakfast at two in the morning!

This was a miracle for a ten-year-old boy. 

Bottles of Seagram’s and Canadian Club

stood at attention on the kitchen table,

silver ice bucket ringed with penguins

awaiting duty beside them.  Ladies smoking

and gossiping.  Glasses clinking.  Laughter

throughout the house.  The smell of pine,

the delicious aroma of sizzling bacon,

all welcoming Jesus back for another year.

 

Then the music and singing would start up,

my father on the banjo, P. J. Conway on the box.

The Stack of Barley, The Lakes of Sligo,

medleys of marches, waltzes, and polkas.

Theresa McNally, from my mother’s own town

in Galway, would sing “Galway Bay.”  Steps would

be danced, jokes told, more drinks mixed and gulped.

 

I would go to bed so filled with the spirit

it seemed impossible to believe that life could

ever return to normal.  Lying there exhausted,

but anxious to sneak down the hall at the earliest

opportunity and tear open the tantalizing packages,

I believed in everything: Jesus our Lord, Santa

our magic benefactor, my parents the immortal source

of the ongoing celebration that could never end.   

 

 [from Boy Drinkers, Hanging Loose Press, 2007]

 

Celebration, read by Pat Broaders of the Chicago-based band Bohola

 

 

P.J. Conway, my father Paddy Winch, and Brian Keenan in 1958.  P.J. and my father performed locally in NY as "The Two Pats."  If they had a drummer for any particular gig, it would either be me, my brother Jesse, or P.J.'s nephew Brian Keenan, who immigrated from England in the '50s.  Brian went on to become the drummer for The Chambers Brothers, who were popular in the '60s and later.  He died pretty young, and lived pretty hard, as I recall. I am the steward of P.J.'s Walters D/C# accordion and my father's Vega tenor banjo, seen in this photo. I used to have one of those green plaid tuxedo jackets, too, but it has vanished.

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The Chambers Brothers

Comments

[Laura Orem]

Lovely poem! And Beannachtaí na Nollag to you and your family!

[Dave Beaudouin]

Terry:

This poem always makes me weep-and did again. I must be Irish. A very Merry Christmas to you and your family.

[Robert Zuckerman]

Gave me goosebumps Terence. Brought me back to my own youth where, though the labels were different, the feeling was much the same.

THANK YOU for putting it in words,

Robert Z.

[Jesse Winch]

A great poem that really captures that wonderful time.
I have to say, in my recollection, it was my father who cooked the breakfast after midnight Mass. This sticks in my memory since he didn't usually do this. Terry and I will have to duke this one out, Bronx-style.
Also, for those interested, this piece has been recorded by Jimmy Keane and his Chicago-based group Bohola on their Christmas album.

[Stacey]

Terence, Thank you for this. It reminds me of my first Christmas away from home (and several more), with the big noisy welcoming extended family of my Irish boyfriend (also a Terence) in Cohoes, NY. I was nervous about how I, a Jew from NYC environs, would be treated.
I needn't have been. It was a great lesson for me, one that I have never forgotten and for which I'm still grateful.
And, by the way, I have a "silver ice bucket rimmed with penguins"!
Stacey

[Mary Winch]

Terry - I shared this great poem and Mick Moloney's reading of it with my mother's Galway Irish Clan. The loved it. Thank you for sharing the wonderful memories of Uncle Paddy, Aunt Bridie, you and Jimmy in this uplifting and wonderful poem. Cuz Mary.

[Tina Eck]

One of my favorites of your's Terry. Thanks for sharing. What a great vivid picture of those days :) love it, happy Christmas, Tina

P.S. see you for breakfast at your house tomorrow night ...

[Toby Thompson]

I love the suitcase full of treasures. Merry Christmas, Terence. Toby

[[email protected]]

Terence,
A classic, and like all great classics continues to give pleasure, and offer new ones, every time I read (or hear) it.
Michael

[eileen]

I love this poem. All the memories that it brings back are the best kind of memories. I see the scenes unfolding in my mind's eye and can feel the pleasure and love shared by one and all. It makes me love you more each time I read it. Eileen

[Bill McPherson]

Terence, this is lovely. You reveal the beauty of the ordinary in a most extraordinary way.

[Christopher Griffin]

Terence and all the Flynn-Winches, Greetings from your Loughrea neighbours in Gort! Chris Griffin

[Ted McGraw]

Oh, the power of the written word - Thank You Terry!!! Sure, some of the names would change up here. It would be Jimmy & Tom Finucane from Tarbert Island, Kerry, on the boxes, and Marty O'Keefe, from across the river in Clare on the fiddle, with John D. singing the songs he'd make up for the occasion. Then a few days later, we would all make sure we got to the Harps Club (GAA) in time to help blow up the balloons for New Years Eve with the Harps Band of Jim Finucane, Tarbert, George Walker, fiddle, Limerick, and dummer John Park from Scotland, and another wonderful all-nighter would start!

[Barbara Talbot]

What a lovely poem. It captures a simpler time that we would all love to recreate. How lucky you are to have such wonderful memories. Merry Christmas

[tom clark]

Terry,

Ah, sweet poem, sweet memories, I knew not whether to laugh or cry... but I've got a couple of broken ribs, so the laughs are on hold for now.

You've brought back to me the mysterious enchantment of Christmas mornings at the home of my grandparents, a Kerryman and a woman of Westmeath.

One morning, unable to bear the wait, I snuck down early, opened several packages, among which was a small bottle of red nail polish (certainly not meant for me!), with which, in my excitement, I proceeded to paint all the other packages and their contents a very bright red.

Ah well, where are the snows & c.

Thanks very much for the beautiful post. In return, may I offer, in a perhaps not dissimilar vein, Ghosts of Christmas Past (1936-1942)?

(Your ur-memory may recognize one or two of those celebrating merchant seamen.)

[Terence Winch]

Dear Tom:  Thanks for the link to all those wonderful photographs. And for your comments here.  I hope you get all the nail polish on your Christmas list.

[Jim O.]

Wonderful recollection. I remember being shipped off to my great aunt's home in Rutherford, NJ nearly every year between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Margaret and her siblings were all raised in lower Manhattan and loved NYC. A trip to Macy's to see Santa was always included. The city was full of decorations and lights and was truly magic to young rural eyes.
Maerry Christmas to you and yours.

[Stephen Reichert]

"I believed in everything"

Terry, you're a gem.

For video of a fantastic Winch reading: http://www.smartishpace.com/media/next/15/

Cheers!

[Doug Lang]

Terry, this is one of my favorite pieces from the magnificent Boy Drinkers -- one of my favorite books. "Celebration" settles the glorious, fleeting beauty of life, and restores clarity to the old cliche about love being all we need. I think I need a drink.

[Michael Meuers]

Curiously, I was just talking about this with some friends on our way to church at 4 PM Christmas eve. I was telling them about when I was a boy, we would head out to Grandma Kelly’s farm near Corcoran, MN. We’d be joined by several of my Mother’s siblings, and my cousins. Off to St. Thomas Church we’d go for midnight mass, how strange to be up so late to go to mass, I thought the whole thing pretty cool. Then we’d all head back to the farm house, and a huge breakfast would be made and eaten before we’d head home in the middle of the night. We’d wake a few hours later to what seemed hundreds of packages under the tree, and all kinds of unwrapped gifts from Santa. It was so festive, so memorable. No wonder it is so difficult to recapture that feeling today.

[Joe DeZarn]

Terry, your memories and depictions are gifts to your friends. Thanks so much.

[Terence Winch]

Dear T:
Thanks for the comment.
I hope you had a great Christmas.
See you soon (Brendan's?).
yrs,
T

[Peter Kissel]

Terry - "Celebration" is just as wonderful each time I read it. It captures the great Irish family Christmas that I never knew but still imagine. I live my missing Irish childhood vicariously through your work like this.

- Irishpete

[Beth Rake]

Ah Terry, I am so grateful for the memories you have stored in you heart and for the gift you have of giving them life on the printed page. Thank you!
I loved the photos too.
Best wishes for the brand New Year
Beth

[Keith Keenan]

Terry,
It hardly seems real now: PJ, your dad and my brother Brian. The poem and photos are great. Hope you and your family are well.

Keith Keenan