Fiction, Essays, and Other Things

  I was particularly intrigued by Shamrock for one peculiar reason. I knew so little about Irish diaspora west of the Mississippi. I grew up in the historic stronghold of Irish immigration and since childhood was immersed in its heritage, a legacy that can be felt from Maine to Maryland. So intricately tied to the northeast have I come to see the influence of the Irish in the United States that I never conceptualized it further west. “Boston Irish” is a term that carries socio-historic implications as well as a prototype in the cultural zeitgeist. But what does it mean to be Irish in another state, far away? Shamrock was the place to find out, a city that greets visitors with a stone plaque that could have been interchangeable with any in Southie depicting a leprechaun stating “Top O’ the Mornin’ to Ya!”. Even more incongruous with a city in the Southwest is the piece of the Blarney Stone that was shipped from the Emerald Isle in 1959 and has sat in the center of town since besid...