SERVICES

Tuesday March 7, 2007

A Rockwellian To The End

Patrick and Christina McCarthy were wed in Toms River NJ

Patrick McCarthy, 1959-2007, RIP

By Seán McCarthy - National Union of Journalists, Dublin

This past Friday morning in the still of the night, my big brother Patrick McCarthy passed quietly away at the Atlantic Coast Rehab & Care Center close to his own home in Toms River, New Jersey. Never one to endure suffering, Patrick McCarthy gratefully cheated the onslaught of the ravages of cancer that had attacked his once youthful soccer body. Patrick, a professional drummer whose lengthy career included musical collaborations with Davey Arthur & The Fury Brothers, Phil Lynott and Thin Lizzy, and a host of Irish traditional bands and songsters across Dublin and The Arran Islands, leaves behind a legacy of music and sport now hidden in the archives of his family, true friends, and colleagues the world over. I am one of those, thankfully, and would like to bid a safe and peaceful farewell to the big brother who gave me everything he had, through his love and protection, laughter and friendship, Irish language and Celtic expressions, hard-grafted ways and soft-spoken words. Many people across Ireland will always remember Pat, from his outward manly mannerisms to his inner childlike heart. Many people will also cherish and hold dear the memories of the Irish lad who brought home, through his skill and everlasting 'will power' on the soccer, rugby and Gaelic football fields, a myriad of trophies and team successes for Rockwell College's Junior and Senior sports teams as they played in all-Ireland championships for the prestigious college. Cashel, County Tipperary will also remember Patrick, the grandson of Dermott McCarthy, County Manager of Cavan, and the great great Grand nephew of General Henry Phil Sheridan whose statue graces the Sheridan Square area of Manhattan. I would visit the statue often, and look up in awe of the resemblance between my brother Pat, and the Civil War General. Even to the moustache.

Traditional Irish Musician Patrick McCarthy with sister Pauline and child

Patrick was educated at Rockwell College, Cashel, County Tipperary, and following a lengthy career in the private investigation sector in Ireland, moved to the United States some years ago, where he worked in a similar capacity in Des Moines, Iowa. He relocated to New Jersey in the late Eighties, working first for the Sussex and Essex Hotel in Spring Lake, New Jersey, then finding his feet in construction in the Woodside area of Queens working alongside many fellow Irish architects and construction gurus in the mid to late 1980s.

My brother was never afraid of work, and worked successfully all his life. He could be found in Manhattan, Coney Island, Brooklyn, The Bronx, and further afield in Asbury Park NJ or the flashy casinos of Atlantic City. You'd also find Patrick out and about in the Irish traditional pubs and clubs of Manhattan and Queens playing the bodhran drum with many's a fellow musician and Irish traditionalist. Every Irish pub in Woodside would have enjoyed his presence, and I'm sure he is raising his glass now to each and every kind-hearted Celtic spirit who came across him and his bodhran, his pint of Guinness gently frothing his trademark moustache, and his spoken ability to weave an Irish tale of wisdom for you before you parted ways with him. In Manhattan, a widespread group of homeless shelters sadly miss his charitable ways, for Patrick McCarthy could often be found feeding and clothing the homeless of the City of New York, on his own personal journey through life to give to others in the spirit of how our parents, Vera McCarthy, and my father John (Jack) McCarthy gave to him. He was a 'grafter' as they say in Ireland, a good old soul. His illness with sclerosis of the liver and a relentlessly mean-spirited cancer that did not win in the end, for Patrick did not suffer, may have taken him at the youthful age of 47. Yet Pat lived the life of a traveling man, a Pavee, spreading the word and wisdom of Ireland and Irish mentality through his music and song to hundreds of thousands of us.

In the book 'Traveller Ways Traveller Words' (Pavee Point Publications 1992 - FAS sponsored European Union funded) written and photographed by Patrick's close colleagues at the Dublin Travellers Education and Development Group, it is said about Saint Patrick's Day by Travelling woman and writer Nellie Joyce:

"An' the Seventeenth o' March is a very special day because they (The Pavee Citizens of Ireland) would burn their shelter tents an' throw away their heavy coats. They'd say that Saint Patrick turned a cowld stone an' the winter was gone. They believe that once the Seventeenth o' March come, that all the cowld was gone an' there was no more need for it until next year again. They often burned them because they'd be too heavy to bring along the road with them. Too long a wait. So they often set fire to them."

My Brother Pat

by Seán McCarthy

My Brother Pat was ever strong.
He'd play the football all day long.
By Evening's Time and Bahrain Song,
He'd weave us all into a dream
Of long-lost roads by Doolin's pass,
Where willow read and glinting grass
Play Ireland's soft lament.

My Brother Pat was brave and proud.
His voice, so soft, was seldom loud.
He'd say things like: "Go on, get out."
And I would go, but not without
A stride of pride 'neath ruffled hair
From where he'd placed his hands on me,
A Tenner for a pint of stout,
Assured he was protecting me.

My Brother Pat stands tall for all,
As large as life was great to him.
His photograph upon the wall,
His latest drum kit sitting din.
His fishing rods as wet from wear,
His Bahrain strung along the hall,
The memories of Stephen's Green,
Clondalkin, Cavan, Donegal.
His Rockwell Days, his Island Ways,
A chatter with him on a call.

But here forever, now and all,
And through his passing sad,
He journeys ever, as a child,
An all adventurous lad ...
And I can hear him calling back
"I love you Mam and Dad."

Patrick McCarthy will always be with us, in song, dance, traditional Irish ways, words and wisdoms. He is survived by his loving wife Christina McCarthy of Toms River NJ, his father and mother John (Jack) and Vera McCarthy of Dublin Ireland, his brothers Dermott, Seán, Derek and Joseph McCarthy and their spouses and children, his sisters Pauline, Veronica, and Rebecca McCarthy and their families, his uncles and aunts in Dublin and County Cavan, Ireland, his numerous friends including Massimo Tollini, Director of Financial Systems / Associated Press in New York, Paddy Pidgeon of the Sunday Business Post in Ireland, Conor Flood, Anne Louise Kelly (U2's Principal Management), Phyllis Lynott and The Lynotts of Dublin, and all who knew and loved him dearly.

My big brother always would say, "Seán. Never panic!" As I walked away from the room in the Kimball Medical Center in Toms River within which he was living his last days out before being transferred to the Atlantic Coast Rehab & Care Center, I blessing him with a kiss on his face and forehead and told him I would see him within a day and we would begin celebrating his birthday, the 17th March ... Saint Patrick's Day. He would then, were he not in a hospital bed, have blessed himself with his little holy medal and said: "Don't get me anything for me birthday Seán! You know what I would like though ... a pair of those traveling boots ... or a new fishing reel! But don't be getting' me anything Seány! See ya man. And do something with that hair! Ya look like a monk or something! Never Panic!"

Patrick, we love you, we miss you, and we will always be with you.

Slán Leát Pat. Save us a spot on the trawler of your Arran Island dreams.