This post should be sub-titled “I’m an American, I don’t care” because that was the mood that CAM, in his best jet-lagged, grumpy, cynical teenager mode, was projecting as we stood in the crowd before the General Post Office in Dublin waiting for the ceremony to begin. I have to say, even though I’m an expat, I felt a surge of pride seeing the Irish Tricolor billowing in the wind against the blue, blue sky over the G.P.O. I’d never been in Dublin on Easter Sunday before and we’d stumbled on the official commemmoration events truly by accident.

Having arrived in Dublin at 7am, we’d dropped our bags off at the hotel, and gone for a walk simply to stay awake as long as possible and thereby get a jump on jet-lag. The sunshine was a welcome surprise and Dublin looked shiny and clean. Standing in College Green waiting to cross the street, my husband and I bickered over whether an Irish flag was usually flown over the Bank of Ireland building. I took photos anyway. As we walked around, it seemed that there were flags and green-white-and-gold bunting everywhere we looked which was nothing either of us ever remembered seeing in Dublin. I pondered aloud as to whether it was because it was Easter Sunday. Always listening in on our conversations our boys wanted to know what we were talking about so over breakfast we gave them a potted history of Irish rebellions and why the Easter 1916 Rising was so important. They were only half listening to us.

As we walked over the Ha’Penny Bridge, an icy blast of the wind coming off the River Liffey brought back not-so-fond memories of how damn cold it can be in Dublin – even on a sunny day. We wandered towards O’Connell Street to show the boys the bullet-holes on the statues from the day of the Rising. Unwittingly we almost walked right into a parade of soldiers marching to a drum tattoo. As CAM gave us a mini-lecture on how drum tattoos were used historically to fool warring parties over the size of their respective armies, the Gardai waved us through a trivial security barrier and we waited for the celebrations to commence.

The order of proceedings was listed on the flyers provided as:
1. Dignitaries (Mayor of Dublin, Taoiseach, President) arrive.
2. President reviews the assembled troops.
3. Flag is lowered to half-mast and the Irish Proclamation of Independence read aloud.
4. Wreath laid and moment of silence observed for the dead.
5. National Anthem sung.
6. Air National Guard fly-by.

The boys started grumbling almost immediately but too tired to come up with a brilliant idea for what to do and actually interested in observing the proceedings we stuck to our guns and let them complain. As the flag was lowered, I leaned in to BigB saying “This is really important, Bud.” I got a scathing look of boredom in response. When the reader started reading the Proclamation, I whispered, “If Easter 1916 hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t have an Irish passport and neither would you.” Please excuse the sensationalism and simplification of historical detail I took in making this statement, it’s always a good idea to make the issue personal when you’re trying to get a child interested in something. “But would I still have an American passport?” he asked. “You probably would honey” I answered trying to play forward a set of historical circumstances which never happened in my head and picking the simplest answer. “But your other passport would be British instead”. He looked shocked. I’d hooked him.

Now he was reading the reprint of the Proclamation in the flyer in his hand and listening intently. “We hereby proclaim the Irish Republic as a Sovereign Independent State” the reader said. “But Ireland isn’t a state” BigB whispered to me, obviously thinking about states in his familiar, American sense. “A state is a word used to describe countries that are free to govern themselves” I explained. Ignoring me, he said “But 1916 is only 94 years ago, America was born in 1776”. “That’s right, honey”, I said, “The U.S. has been a free country for longer than Ireland. That’s what this is all about, celebrating Ireland becoming it’s own country.” “At least when we celebrate the birth of our country we use explosives” CAM stated loudly from behind me. I hadn’t realized he’d been listening in and had to stifle a laugh – as did another American couple standing beside us.

The grumblings from my older son re-surged in the silence of the wreath-laying. “We can’t leave now, you’ll miss the fly-by” I said, “I bet it’ll be just like the Blue Angels”. The promise of a surprise sighting of an F/18 Hornet was enough to keep him quiet just a little longer. Or maybe I just didn’t hear him over the hearty rendition of Amhrain Na bhFiann from the crowd. At any rate, as the proceedings ended we heard the putt-putt-putt of turbo prop engines approaching. The four Pilatus PC-9M of the Irish Air Corps buzzed by. We were silenced. “I think that’s the whole Irish air force” my husband quipped. Our boys collapsed into giggles.

Over the rest of the day, our kids alternately berated us for “forcing” them to stand in the cold outside the G.P.O. and pondered on their new realization that Ireland really was a very small nation. They’ve been to Dublin many times. They’ve fed the ducks, played in the parks and learned about vikings. But they’ve never thought about the differences between being “Irish” and “American” in a geopolitical sense – understandably. They live in Seattle. Seattle is a city and Dublin is a city. Seattle has bigger mountains than Dublin. Dublin has grand-parents who buy treats. Through the day, even as they joked about the relative sizes of Irish and American military forces, it was easy to see that they were processing what they’d learned. In all our travels, we’ve always talked to them about how important it is for them to be good ambassadors for their country when traveling. We’ve done so while explaining that because they are American and because America is such a powerful nation, that they have a greater responsibility in this than children of other nationalities might have. I think today they really understood the weight of that message.

And they loved the fact that the Blue Angels are orders of magnitude more impressive than the Irish Air Corps’ display team. I’ll give them five minutes with their cousins on Thursday before that little gem gets trotted out.

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