The Important Facts About Leprechauns

Today, I learned very many interesting things about leprechauns. By far, the most interesting fact was that they don't flush. I'm sorry, but it had to be said. Ian's classmate - and "first real girlfriend," as he once described her in a wonderful home video - filled Ian in on the leprechaun scoop. Apparently she has had many direct encounters with them, as well as some indirect ones. The most memorable indirect one was a visit - she didn't witness it, but was privileged to review the highly savory forensic evidence - where apparently a leprechaun used the commode, but didn't bother with the final flush, as is their wont. I have come to suspect that most public restrooms for men must be plagued with a vast infestation of leprechauns. They may be invisible, but their wicked deeds linger.

Other compelling leprechaun facts:

1. They're "about as old Daddy, but they're about as big as Madeleine."

2. Several children in Ian's class have caught them, or otherwise encountered them more-or-less directly.

3. Even Mrs. McGee believes in them, as does most of the class.

4. Ian himself is leaning toward belief, in spite of Mommy's persistent, shrill denials.

5. You can trap them with some intricate gadget, using a potato as bait. This was tried in our house today.

6. You can catch them anywhere in the world on St. Patrick's Day, but you can only catch them in Ireland every day of the year.

Ian asked me whether I, myself, believe in leprechauns. A year or two ago, I made the mistake, very casually, of denying them, only to be told that I was wrong - Ian saw one himself in school (or it may have been another of these elusive phantom visits). That's when I resolved not to deny leprechauns, the Easter bunny, the tooth fairy, or even Betty Crocker. So today, when he asked me, I said, "That's a very interesting thing," or something to that effect, which Ian took to mean that I'm in his camp, rather than Mommy's. I then told him that when I was a boy, my own mother went to Ireland and sent me a postcard with a photograph of leprechauns in a field, which is definitely a true story. Ian asked me if they were real. I said that they looked real. I didn't bother mentioning that they looked real to me because I was five years old at the time.

Now Ian is fascinated by Ireland as well as their main non-alcoholic export, those little men in green. I told him that Ireland is a beautiful country. He wasn't expecting that factoid, but it made him only all-the-more excited about it. As well as being really cool and having leprechauns, it's also beautiful. He wants to go there. All of us - for about a month. I didn't have the heart to tell him that when some friends of mine went their, they discovered that there was no daily maximum mileage on their rental car because... uh... there's pretty-much nowhere to go. You're stuck on a little round-ish island. I told him that Ireland is very green. That only reinforced his association between the country and the color.

He told me that Liam is half-Irish and Brendan is three-quarters Irish. I told him that I'm half-Irish. He didn't know that. I said, "Don't you know that you're a quarter Irish?" He did. I don't know how he thought he acquired his Irishness; he might have thought that Mommy was Ashkenazy-Irish... But when he found out that I'm half-Irish, he was puzzled, because I don't talk like Brendan. Brendan has an exotic accent. I asked him, does he say things like "hahhd" instead of "hard"? He does. I explained that Brendan's brogue doubtless comes from the other Ireland: Boston. If you're French around here, your people are from New Hampshire, and Quebec somewhere way back. If you're Irish, your people are very recent state-income-tax-fugitives, or cheap-real-estate-seekers from some earthy suburb of Boston. I told Ian that I, too, had a Boston brogue when I was a small boy. Ian was quite surprised to hear this, and then surmised, quite plausibly, that when Brendan is my age, he'll probably end up talking exactly the way that I do now.

Ironically, I'm the one with the brogue, albeit a phony one. I'm not making this up: I tried to talk a little fancier from college on, and I ended up with this bizarre ersatz-brogue, such that lots and lots of people who meet me think I'm from Ireland. It's almost second-nature now... One guy I worked with, before he knew my name, identified me as "the foreign guy."

A younger sister of mine once asked my father where our grandmother was from. He said she was from Maine. My sister asked, "Does she speak... Maine?" I would venture to guess that Brendan speaks Massachusetts, but it's understandable that our budding young anthropologist would conflate speaking Massachusetts with speaking Ireland.

Ian was surprised, and he surprised me in the retelling, that the youngsters in his class were not aware as to who Saint Patrick was. Ian knew who Saint Patrick was before going to school today, but I have to give the institution some credit. He knows a great deal more about leprechauns, and now, happily, so do I.

(March 17, 2011)