Reach out for a Dream

On the snow covered streets of Dublin, two young lads were in a serious snowball fight by Paddy's Pub. The boys weren't allowed inside due to their age but in trying to keep warm, their fight was helping. They were bundled up in rags with layers of frayed socks on their hands for gloves. They didn't offer much cover and soon their fingers were burning from exposure. Sean and Danny O'Brien were waiting for their Da to stumble out of the doorway. It was a Friday night ritual that Kathleen had them do to keep Da from passing out somewhere and freezing to death.

They would take Da to Uncle Ryan's where hot coffee was poured into him before heading home.
"How much money do you think he's got?" Sean asked.
"Ma will cry if it don't get Katie milk," Danny sighed.

Katie was their new baby sister, tiny with soft yellow curls. Ma didn't have the breast milk to feed her. The boys heard the neighbors talk; it was because Ma didn't eat enough. Kathleen, their mother was back to scrubbing other people's floors when Katie was barely a week old. Ma was so tired her eyes looked like they were smudged with coal. The ribs in her chest showed. She prayed as she worked, hoping the precious Virgin Mary would bless her family with enough to eat and stay warm. If only God could stop Johnny from drinking. But she had made her wedding vows before God so she would do what she must.

Kathleen's sweet boys were mature beyond their years. She was sad that they had to work rather than play like other children. They gathered tin to sell. When they were only five and six and small for their age; they used their big elfin smiles, and danced like Da had taught them. People sometimes tossed them coins. Right now the weather was so frigid, people hurried past.

Now there was a problem because the boys had begun to steal food from O'Reilly's General Store. At first, Mr. O'Reilly didn't call the coppers because he knew the situation. But when he was losing quite a bit of money from their theft, John O'Reilly went to Kathleen to talk about it. He was a man of sixteen when she was born. He had watched her grow up. Now lovely Kathleen was getting paler and thinner and he would have beat the stuffing out of Johnny if he could.
Damn the man that can't care for his family cause the pint comes first.

Kathleen had once been a breath of fresh air with her large jade eyes, dark eyelashes, rose colored cheeks and dimples. Her burnette hair was like silk and came to her waist.Her body was tiny but had curves in all the right places. She had a kissable mouth and O'Reilly wished but O'Brien had her heart. Many a man would have been fortunate to love her.

It was the talk of the village that their Da was a drunkard. When Johnny worked he was a good chimney sweep. If you could keep him from the first pint, there was money for coal and food.

Here came their Da now, not quite knee walking drunk but pretty close. They could tell by his grin, he was in a grand mood! Danny and Sean each took an arm to steady him. The warmth of his body warmed them up. Johnny took his flask out of his coat and gave them each a sip to warm their bellies.
"I love you laddies. Don't be tellin your Ma."

The three of them sang 'Danny Boy' all the way to Ryan's. They had coffee ready. Ryan didn't touch the drink, he had watched their Da die at forty throwing up blood. He and Eileen were expecting their first baby.

The boys really loved their Da. He was funny when he was "in the cups". He told of leprechauns and fairies that he met in the forest. He had a hundred great stories about one legged dogs, dwarfs, hidden treasure and pirates. He made their Ma cry though.

Kathleen remembered a time when Johnny made her laugh. When they dated he had taken her to dances. How he could dance. Everyone else stood back and let the two have the floor as he would swing her around, then pick her up. The whole room clapped. He brought her candy, chocolates and poetry. He wrote songs for her and played the guitar as he sang them. She was swept off her feet. If anyone said a bad word about Johnny she would have taken a swing at them.

He got down on one knee.

"Kathleen, you are
as perfect as a snowflake
on a sunny windowpane.
Beautiful as a rainbow
after a Spring rain."

"Say you will be my bride.
I will show you love so fine.
All your dreams will come true.
Tis happy you will be
if you say yes to me".

She blushed and the crowd watched in awe. Her lovely Johnny with the emerald eyes of Ireland, the coal black hair she loved to pull her fingers through. He promised her a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.

He was full of dreams; it was nothing but dreams of a fool she thought as she scrubbed floors. They had never had a home of their own, always living in someone's back room doing their dirty work to pay the rent. Da worked two days and Kathleen put in a back-breaking seven days.

Danny and Sean dreamed of going to America, working to pay their way on one of those big ships they'd see at the docks. America was known as "the land of opportunity".

But for now on this bitter night in Dublin, they helped their drunken father home with a few coins for milk. Kathleen met them at the door with a quiet baby.
"You're too late; the lot of you. Katie has gone to be with blessed Jesus."

A couple of years later, a drunken Da stumbled and was run over by a wagon.
Johnny had stopped coming home. He knew how it would all end and didn't want his family to deal with it. The neighbors pitched in for a Christian burial so he wouldn't be just a number in Potter's Field. Kathleen mourned for the Johnny she had married not the man she didn't know.

It wasn't a surprise when Mr. O'Reilly came calling on Kathleen. She waited six months then wed again. It was a happy time for all of them. Kathleen had her own home and she kept it so clean, you could slide across her floors. It wasn't the same passionate love she had with a younger Johnny but it was good. Soon she had twin girls, little but healthy rosy cheeks. She breast fed them and named them Katie and
Mary, after Kathleen's mother.

The two boys, now young men, waved good-bye to their family and took the ship to America. They saw many burials at sea from dysentry and other illnesses. It was a long rough voyage but they were healthy now and strong.

They saw the Statue of Liberty through the mist and knew the O'Brien family would prosper here. Johnny O'Brien was smiling down wishing them the luck of the Irish, sending a four leaf clover through the clouds to the boat deck.
What stories they would have to tell their children.