Page 151 - Gonzaga at 60
P. 151
‘BECAUSE
IT PASSES’
I let Gonzaga in 1989 and studied Chemical Engineering at UCD. That was a bad idea. I had litle
interest in it going in and even less coming out. But it was the ime of the brain drain so it seemed
a sensible hedged bet.
Far less sensible was running of to America with no job in sight ater geing a green card in
the lotery. I was the 52,000th person to be ofered one from the quota of 14,000 – that’s how
many Irish people didn’t bother illing out forms for the next step!
I ended up trading oil and natural gas futures for a variety of banks, Morgan Stanley
primarily but, all the while, I was living in the Lower East Side of Manhatan, surrounded by
storytellers, arists, musicians, burlesque dancers and comedians. I found myself onstage soon
enough, telling stories, performing under the moniker ‘Legal Alien’. At irst, I could hardly stand
straight, I was so nervous, but New York is a city that loves the spotlight and there is part of all of
us that, given a prod, would dip a toe or two in there and never want to leave.
In an odd way, I found the combinaion of life downtown, performing at hole-in-the-wall
spots and trading in glistening skyscrapers on Wall Street all highly complementary to one
another and it appealed greatly to my sense of the strange and obeat. Which was one of the
things I enjoyed most in my ten years in Gonzaga. I count myself very lucky to have been in the
Prep School with Miss O’Kelly and Miss Molloy, as she was back then. The year in the basement
next to the art room for Prep 4 was paricularly wonderful. Craning our necks, we could peer
upwards and just about.make out the playing yard outside. All those hours of playing football
with a tennis ball, tossing marbles, crashing into each other at “Briish Bulldogs” and “Philisines
against Barbarians” and then the scalding powdered soup and half packets of biscuits from
Brother Barry to look forward to. It was a ime of dreams.
Litle wonder I was so sorry to leave all that behind and enter senior school. Having a fresh
set of boys join us took some geing used to.
Gonzaga, to me, always seemed to encourage the unusual. This is so valuable. Without
that encouragement, there is no way I would be in New York today, wriing plays, acing in them,
direcing them and generally living life at 135 miles per hour. From Fr Keane’s gentle prodding us
through the realms of Horace and Carthage to Mr Cusack’s headstands on the table to illustrate
the perpendicular and his constant repeiion of “rubbish in, rubbish out” and “puing it through
the sheep-wash”, educaion became something to savour and cherish. Learning was a joy. Life
was something to relish. Certainly, there were exams to be done but the emphasis was never on
that. We all did well enough in those but that was just a footnote to the real story. Which was this
– Life goes by fast. Try and see and smell and hear. Try and dance and sing and laugh. Because it
passes. And there will come a ime when you can’t do any of these things.
IT PASSES’
I let Gonzaga in 1989 and studied Chemical Engineering at UCD. That was a bad idea. I had litle
interest in it going in and even less coming out. But it was the ime of the brain drain so it seemed
a sensible hedged bet.
Far less sensible was running of to America with no job in sight ater geing a green card in
the lotery. I was the 52,000th person to be ofered one from the quota of 14,000 – that’s how
many Irish people didn’t bother illing out forms for the next step!
I ended up trading oil and natural gas futures for a variety of banks, Morgan Stanley
primarily but, all the while, I was living in the Lower East Side of Manhatan, surrounded by
storytellers, arists, musicians, burlesque dancers and comedians. I found myself onstage soon
enough, telling stories, performing under the moniker ‘Legal Alien’. At irst, I could hardly stand
straight, I was so nervous, but New York is a city that loves the spotlight and there is part of all of
us that, given a prod, would dip a toe or two in there and never want to leave.
In an odd way, I found the combinaion of life downtown, performing at hole-in-the-wall
spots and trading in glistening skyscrapers on Wall Street all highly complementary to one
another and it appealed greatly to my sense of the strange and obeat. Which was one of the
things I enjoyed most in my ten years in Gonzaga. I count myself very lucky to have been in the
Prep School with Miss O’Kelly and Miss Molloy, as she was back then. The year in the basement
next to the art room for Prep 4 was paricularly wonderful. Craning our necks, we could peer
upwards and just about.make out the playing yard outside. All those hours of playing football
with a tennis ball, tossing marbles, crashing into each other at “Briish Bulldogs” and “Philisines
against Barbarians” and then the scalding powdered soup and half packets of biscuits from
Brother Barry to look forward to. It was a ime of dreams.
Litle wonder I was so sorry to leave all that behind and enter senior school. Having a fresh
set of boys join us took some geing used to.
Gonzaga, to me, always seemed to encourage the unusual. This is so valuable. Without
that encouragement, there is no way I would be in New York today, wriing plays, acing in them,
direcing them and generally living life at 135 miles per hour. From Fr Keane’s gentle prodding us
through the realms of Horace and Carthage to Mr Cusack’s headstands on the table to illustrate
the perpendicular and his constant repeiion of “rubbish in, rubbish out” and “puing it through
the sheep-wash”, educaion became something to savour and cherish. Learning was a joy. Life
was something to relish. Certainly, there were exams to be done but the emphasis was never on
that. We all did well enough in those but that was just a footnote to the real story. Which was this
– Life goes by fast. Try and see and smell and hear. Try and dance and sing and laugh. Because it
passes. And there will come a ime when you can’t do any of these things.
