So, eleven years since we left Dublin - it’s been ten years since I updated this diary. I believe I was about to embark on the NYC Teaching Fellows journey, I was still working in The Ritz Cafe in a seaside village on Long Island and between studying, attending classes, working two jobs and juggling babysitters while commuting 90 mins each way each day, I pretty much stopped writing anything other than academic papers and posts on social media.
I quit the restaurant job a few months into the teaching program. It was just too much. I was leaving on the 6.19 train to go to work in Queens, two nights a week I would have to travel into the city for a class until 8pm. I was getting home those nights after 11pm and then working a double shift on Sundays. I was never sitting down to a meal and hardly ever seeing my kids. I was now employed by NYC DOE though. It was a good, safe, union, job, with great benefits and an even better pension as long as I survived the two year initiation program.
I have been teaching in a District 75 school, which is the specialized citywide district for students with special needs. I hadn’t had much experience with children with such challenging issues before. I had taught back in the Doha days. (there’s a whole book there) but when faced with 30 little kids, a cheery rendition of ‘If you’re happy and you know it…’ will usually get them participating even if it doesn't always stop the tears falling. My new kids didn’t respond to that really. I had to reiterate and adapt - a lot. I did though. I read, I gained experience, I watched, I listened, I got bitten, I got scratched, I got completely ignored, I got accused of being ‘too soft’. I tried things and other things and eventually I learned a big enough repertoire of skills to figure out how to best serve these most challenged students and de escalate most crises without anyone getting hurt. I ultimately became interested in how our kids were engaged by technology and got involved with technology instruction. I’m ten years working in the same school now. That more than doubles my record for any job I ever had.
In 2015, I entered an NYC housing lottery and we were selected to rent an ‘affordable’ apartment on W45th St. I had been looking at options to move out of my mother’s house on Long Island. Although,it is a beautiful home and it was so wonderful to be able to spend time with family there, it was time for us to make our own home. My children had lived there for 3 years by that point. They were both more upset about moving from Northport to Midtown Manhattan than they had been about moving to the US from Ireland. Their friends? Their school?, Their treehouse?, Their pool?’ It didn’t help that we had no choice but to move them and enroll them in a new school on May 1st when the school year is largely winding down. One of their teachers actually went out on family leave a week later and she had already filled in his report card when she did.
Our apartment was in a new building with a doorman and elevator and fresh flowers in the lobby. We were on the fourteenth floor - it was actually the thirteenth but there is no thirteenth floor in NYC buildings - who would’ve thunk Ghostbosters was true? We had a view of the Empire State Building. It changes colour for a different cause every night. We looked it up every day for years. It was a nice apartment. Although it was compact, it was well laid out and we had an L shaped, dining space, kitchen, living space, 2 bedrooms and a bathroom. All the bedrooms and the living room had a Manhattan view. Thousands of lives inside little lit square windows. I liked to go to sleep with the shades up and just imagine I could feel the energy of all those different lives so close to me but yet so removed. That feeling of community living in Hells Kitchen was extraordinary. It is such a diverse community and no one really knows anyone very well. It’s NYC, we mind our own business. But, having kids in school there, sharing an elevator daily, street lockdowns, building Christmas parties, summer block parties, food festivals, playground openings. Later; a pandemic; fear, helpfulness, ambulances, curfews, looting, 7pm cheering and pot banging for a full year...we clung together in a socially-dstanced way.
I was busy, busy, busy during lockdown. As the tech teacher in a largely analogue school, I was one of the only people who had ever even heard of Google Classroom, I was supporting my school with remote teaching. I was also supporting our parents with accessing reliefs. In Queens, many of our families were in dire straits. Our school community lost too many people to COVID. Many of our families were unaware of supports that were available. I did my best to make the accessible. I also volunteered on a tech helpline for students in temporary housing. After a few weeks, George bought me some jigsaw puzzles and I predictably fixated on those until they were done. I then began to relearn to crochet. I’ve made a few things since but with my trademark inconsistency.
Remote school in our apartment was not fun. My younger son got our bedroom, the elder got theirs and my husband, furloughed from work and the only one not in school, didn’t really have anywhere to be as I belted out nursery rhymes to my laptop in the living room like a deranged TV presenter. As much as we loved the area and the apartment - we had outgrown it. Sharing a bathroom with your husband and two little kids is a whole different ball game than sharing it two pubescent teenagers. As soon as we could move, we did.
We moved uptown. We are now in Hamilton Heights in West Harlem. Our apartment has four bedrooms and two bathrooms, almost unheard of in NYC. We also have a fire escape that gets the sun nearly all day. What we lost with our doorman and our city view, we gained in space. Although it’s a hundred year old building with a hundred year old building problems. It is musical where we live. The notes of samba from barber shops and open cars are consistent. Old men play chess in the middle of Broadway, adults party on the stoop while children play in fire hydrant sprinklers in summer. We are five minute walk from Riverside Park where we can watch the sunset over New Jersey. It’s a very pleasant place to live and still so close to the city.
We’ve been here three years and my eldest is eighteen now and going to college this fall. My younger has two years left of high school. I’m very proud of the young people they turned out to be. I often wonder would they be different if they had been brought up in Dublin. Would they be different if they had never lived in Dublin? Who is to know? We are going home this summer, to finally take that canceled 2020 trip. Unfortunately we are too late to see some people again and we have graves to visit and ashes to scatter. But I’m so excited to see the people I miss all the time who are still very much alive. My friends. I may have made new friends but I never replaced them. You cannot replace the people who truly understand you. One of the saddest realities of my life is that the people I truly made connections with are scattered around the globe.
I have so many stories to tell. This is the boring bits really. Maybe I will go into some detail soon. But for now, I’m coming home. Let's hope there’s some nice weather.
Last year, one of the last courses of my Masters was a Teaching Literacy course. It was a hybrid course, half in-person and half online. The professor, Peter McDermott, had an interesting way of going about teaching teachers to teach literacy. He tasked us with projects leaving the subjects completely up to us and merely asked for a set of criteria to be met. In this way he was showing us that teaching skills is far more effective than teaching content and that to truly engage students, they should be allowed to drive when it comes to subject matter.
This performance task was our 'multi-genre project'. It could be about any historical event in the recent or distant past. It had to contain an introductory letter and a research paper with proper citations. It also had to contain visual and audio forms of representation as well as a self-selected form. I had been following the Marriage Referendum in Ireland closely on Twitter and thought it would make an interesting project that would meet these criteria. This is what I submitted. I got top marks and he asked could he keep it to show as an example. I was quite proud of it at the time as I was of Ireland. Thought I'd post it here for longevity sake.
Image by Fiona Hanley
Marriage Equality in Ireland - A multi-genre project by Jennifer Foxe
Dear Reader,
On
the 22nd May 2015, Ireland became the first country in the world to
put the issue of same sex marriage to a public vote. The referendum had the
highest turnout since the early 1970s, as young and old alike voted for
equality. Thousands even travelled home from abroad just to have their voice
heard. The result was an overwhelming ‘Yes’. The recognition of the right to
marriage regardless of gender was a seismic change in a country where the
constitution was largely constructed around the catechism of the Catholic Church
and homosexuality was illegal until 1993. The vote has international
ramifications as it provides a snapshot of how attitudes are changing. Coverage
of the referendum was worldwide and intense. This project covers some of the
highlights of the road to marriage equality.
The visual form of representation I
chose was a photograph of the rainbows that formed over Dublin as the results
were announced. Although, most likely a coincidence, it was taken by some as a
powerful sign from above. I also included a picture of the simultaneous celebrations
in the city. The vote was not just taken as a win for gay rights but as a
victory for inclusion and equality and celebrated by all.
The audio representation I decided
to include was an edit of some of the students of Trinity College Dublin who
organized a campaign on social media known as #ringyourgranny. This highly
emotional campaign invited students to call their older relatives and have a
conversation about the personal importance to them of the upcoming referendum.
Many of these relatives were brought up in a very different time and may have
had hesitancies about voting yes on a subject that would not even have been
spoken about in Irish society in the past. Some of the older generation are
also known to vote no to anything the government supports. I found this
campaign to be very powerful, not only for its ramifications in this particular
campaign but the entire idea that the young can inform the old and how willing
many of them were to change their minds in order to leave their descendants the
world they want. This was the closest I have seen to an actual ‘national
conversation’.
My self-selected representation is
Panti’s Noble Call which is a video of an Irish drag queen who went on the
stage of the national theater to very eloquently speak her mind after she and
the national broadcasting company were sued for defamation by a religious
institute because she said on a chat show that members of the institute, which
was actively campaigning against marriage equality, could be construed as being
homophobic. Her thought-provoking reaction to the furore she found herself in
went viral worldwide and it is thought that it contributed massively to the
huge turnout in the huge turnout in the referendum.
All in all, the entire campaign was
thought-provoking, emotional and powerful. There were many more tear inducing
images and videos I could have chosen to include. Although, I did not get to
vote in it. I could not help but cry when the landslide results became apparent.
For once, the people of Ireland really stood together and made it known that
they have decided to be a tolerant, inclusive society. For the first time in a
very long time, I was proud of my country. I hope this progressive attitude is
catching to the rest of the world.
Yours
faithfully,
Jennifer
Research Paper: The Rocky Road to
Marriage Equality in Ireland
Under
the law in Ireland, any changes to the wording of The Irish Constitution must
be put to a national public vote. On 22nd May, 2015, there was a referendum
to decide whether Article 41 should be amended by the insertion of the line
‘Marriage may be contracted in accordance with law by two persons without
distinction as to their sex’ This amendment would give a marriage of two people
of the same sex the same legal status and protection under The Constitution as
a marriage between a man and a woman.
Ireland
has long been seen as a conservative Catholic country. Many Catholic teachings
were written into the original Constitution in 1937. In fact, in an article
which was amended in 1973, the Roman Catholic Church was originally recognized
as having ‘a special position’. Despite this 5th amendment many
Catholic values are still visible within Irish law. Divorce only became legal
or recognized in 1996. Abortion is still illegal within the state and
homosexuality was only decriminalized in 1993 after a ruling by the European
Court of Human Rights. (Reiter & Suiter, 2015)
In
2010 a Civil Partnership Bill had been passed that allowed domestic partners of
either sex many of the same rights as a married couple. Although an important
step in the recognition of a homosexual relationship, according to Marriage
Equality, a not-for-profit LGBT advocacy group, it fell short in many areas
such as housing, family and taxation. Civil partners were simply not given the
same protection afforded to a married couple by law. There were serious
implications for the children of civil partners as guardianship was only
granted to the biological or adoptive parent.Unprotected by The Constitution, the legislation that had been put into
place to allow Civil Partnerships could also potentially be taken away just as
quickly.
The
current coalition government which took office in 2011 held a Constitutional
Convention to discuss proposed amendments to the Constitution, including that
of a provision to extend constitutional marriage rights to same sex couples.
The report, returned in April 2013, approved provisions to be discussed in the
parliament (Oireachtas) and put to a public vote. (www.constitution.ie) The
timeline was given as early 2015. The official date and wording was announced
in January 2015.
In
the run up to the referendum, all political parties supported a Yes vote. Many
politicians, including ministers, came out as being gay mostly to words of
encouragement and support. Polls seemed to show overwhelming support. The big
issue in Ireland though is voter apathy. After years of budgetary austerity
measures due to the European bailout following the disastrous bank guarantee scheme
of 2008, many citizens have lost faith in the political system in general. Tens
of thousands more have emigrated. The last referendum in 2013 to decide whether
to abolish the senate, had a turnout of only 39%. Other recent referendums and
elections had similarly low figures. The danger for the Yes campaign was simply
that people would not turn out in high enough numbers to counter the minority
that opposed equality.
The
No campaign was largely fronted by a lay socially conservative Catholic group
known as the Iona Institute. (CIA World Factbook) Notorious for their
anti-abortion campaigns featuring distressing imagery, they take the view that
the fabric of society is deteriorating as it moves away from traditional family
values. The group had also previously opposed the Civil Partnership Bill. No
campaign posters featuring the slogan ‘Children deserve a Mother and a Father,
Vote No’ were largely criticized as being offensive to single and widowed
parents. The Catholic Church itself played a very low key role in the campaign.
(Suiter, 2015)
On
January 11th 2015, a drag queen known as Panti Bliss performed on a
Saturday night chat show on RTE, the government funded national broadcasting
channel, promoting her new tour. The performer, Rory O’ Neill then had a short
interview where he discussed growing up gay in Ireland. During the interview,
he commented on two journalists and mentioned the Iona Institute going out of
their way to write opinion pieces arguing against the right to gay marriage. He
argued that if anybody is actively campaigning against equal rights for gay
people that they are homophobic. He stated that that does not mean they bet up
gay people but that they subtly oppress them. (Saturday Night Show 01/11/2015)
The following week, the chat show host issued a very stilted apology for those
comments that he clearly disagreed with, stating that they were not the views
of RTE. It later transpired that RTE had paid upwards of $100,000 of tax payers
money to settle with the five complainants. Nothing was reported in the papers.
Social media lit up. (The Story of PantiGate)
The national discussion of the censorship of RTE spread to parliament. Panti
appeared on the national stage and gave her Noble Call speech in reaction. The
clip went viral worldwide and was translated into 16 languages and a mascot for
the Yes campaign was born.
Suddenly,
what may have been a low key referendum with the usual low turnout largely
fought between LGBT activists and supporters and fundamental Catholics was a
civil rights issue. Largely driven by social media, the youth of the country were
suddenly engaged in political discourse. In large numbers, gay and straight
youth went out and knocked on doors to campaign for a Yes vote. Students
organized to call their elder relatives and ask them to vote Yes. The diaspora,
not allowed to vote from abroad were mobilized. Group fares and transport was
organized for people to return from abroad to vote under the social media
hashtag #hometovote. The former president of Ireland, Mary McAleese, a
practicing Catholic and mother to a gay son, referred to the 1916 proclamation
in wanting ‘the children of the nation to be cherished equally’. The Yes
campaign argued that this referendum was not about surrogacy or the undermining
of the institution of marriage but about equality, about the right of
recognition of love. The slogan Tá for Grá
(Yes for Love) was utilized heavily. It was a campaign largely fueled by
emotion and fought by a demographic who rarely engage in politics.
The
referendum had a historic turnout of over 60% and of those 62% voted yes, with
some constituencies reaching as high as 75%. (Irish Times, 05/23/2015) It was
the largest turnout since the referendum to join the European Union (then the
EEC) in 1975. Very early in the count it was obvious that the Yes side had won,
with only two out of 43 constituencies returning a No vote. The grounds of
Dublin Castle were opened to the public for the count, with a maximum occupancy
of 2000. It was full to capacity all day with lines outside. An atmosphere of
carnival reigned. Rainbow flags flew high all over the city. Ireland, that
small conservative country, with a population of under 4 million was suddenly
center stage again with coverage in mainstream media worldwide. This time it
was for a good thing though. This time it was not a scandal or shameful uncovering
of atrocities in the past. This time the people of Ireland had stood together
and declared themselves modern, liberal and progressive, pro equality and pro
love. The youth of Ireland had spoken and declared what kind of country they
want to live in. This time the Irish had achieved something to be proud of.
Support of the result was given by political leaders in Europe and the US. The
first same sex marriages in Ireland are expected to take place in the late
summer of 2015.
Visual Representation
Image posted on
Twitter by @keysersoz_ie
Dublin Castle: Herald.ie
05/22/15
Rainbows
over LGBT flag in Dublin as results of landslide referendum are officially
confirmed. Meanwhile, thousands gather to celebrate in Dublin Castle.
Audio Representation
The
#ringyourgranny Campaign. Initially organized by students of Trinity College
Dublin, this powerful, emotional campaign encouraged the youngest generation of
voters to open a conversation with the older generation about their desire for
acceptance, tolerance and equality and to encourage them to vote Yes. There are
many, many more videos of individuals having this awkward conversation but it
proved to be very successful.
I
couldn’t not include this short clip of a group of Irish emigrants on a boat
home from the UK, going #hometovote singing She Moved Through The Fair. A
traditional Irish folk song about two lovers whose parents object to their
marriage.
Self Selected Representation
This
is Panti Bliss’ Noble Call. Rory O’ Neill, AKA Drag Queen, Panti Bliss found
herself caught in the middle of a media and parliamentary storm when she and
the national broadcaster, RTE, were sued for defamation after she suggested in
a casual interview on live television that members of a religious institute who
were actively campaigning for a No vote could be construed as being homophobic.
When it was found that RTE simply paid off the claimants with taxpayer money,
she took to the stage of the national theater, The Abbey, to give her thoughts
on the situation. This heartfelt, powerful video went viral worldwide, was
translated into 16 languages and is thought to be the catalyst that led to such
a strong Yes campaign. The performer, who considers herself an ‘accidental
activist’ is now known, rather reluctantly, as a national treasure.
Note:
Video contains some strong language in the last minute and may not be suitable in
its entirety for all audiences, but taken in context, I consider it to be
justified.Sometimes strong feelings
require strong language.
