By: Joe Washoe
The purpose and mission of this Blog is to share with you, dear reader, those experiences that make life worth living. To me, they include Nature, Travel, Relationships, Writing, Nature Photography, Live Entertainment, and Work that is both meaningful and pleasurable. Regarding this last, that includes being an English professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, where I teach courses in Modern Comparative Literature (Hemingway, Proust, and Joyce), Nature Writing/ Environmental Lit, and Classical Rhetoric/ Writing.
Enough by way of an overview. Let’s take a plunge into the heart of the matter. My grandmother, Regina Alice Doyle, was a silent film starlet who was killed while returning from her Hollywood movie set at Universal studios in a collision with a Pacific Red Car (the old electric trolley). September 29, 1931. She was 24 years old.
My mom, who was five years-old at the time, writes poignantly of this tragedy from her perspective in her memoir. “God Makes Wine.” You can learn all about Regina’s story and our efforts to bring her back into the light in the link “Books in Progress.” For that story is the focus of my current book-project, Butterflies in the Rain: The True, Tragic, and Untold Story of Regina Doyle. There, you will also find a link to the slide show my brother Dave and I have been presenting at Silent Film Festivals, including Cinecon 54 in Hollywood.
Recently, my brothers (Den & Dave) and I visited West Ireland, where we not only broke new ground in our decades-long search for Regina’s Irish roots, but had a series of reunions with 30 of our long lost Irish cousins. If there is anything I learned on my travels, it is that you must “expect the unexpected.” In the middle of our first night together in Dublin, I was awakened by a crash, followed by Den’s screams.
He had rolled out of the unusually narrow bed in our room at the Harcourt Hotel and the sharp wooden edge of a bedside table bore the full brunt of his eye-socket! Right, owie! He was wedged between the wall and bed, bleeding from his head and screaming in pain.
“I wanna go home. Take me home IT HURTS!”
It had had barely been 24 hours since his arrival on a red-eye from Chicago’s O’Hare airport.
It took fifteen minutes to get him into a chair and call the paramedics. Within minutes, two robust Irish chaps appeared at the door in their paramedic uniforms. Owen and Allen. Owen sported a full beard and was built like a fire hydrant with a head on it. They had perfected their emergency response, “good cop/bad cop” routine. While Owen tended to Den’s wounds, putting an ice pack to it, taking his vitals, including an EKG, Allen engaged Den in conversation, by way monitoring his cognitive functions. I told him that if he wanted to get Den talking, just ask him about our Irish ancestors.
Thirty minutes later Den was still talking about the Doyle clan, sharing the encyclopedic knowledge he had gained from two decades as a maverick ancestral archivist. Allen couldn’t get a word in edgewise, as Den told him of Regina’s parents, John and Josephine, their siblings, their grand-parents, great grand-parents, great-great-grandparents, and all their siblings and offspring, as well as the exact dates of the births, baptisms, marriages, and deaths of all sixty-five ancestors. As Allen discovered, Den has a photographic memory.
Of the two, he looked the more dazed–as if our Family Tree of Knowledge had fallen on his head. Den meanwhile, went on, glad for his first Irish audience. I heaved a sigh of relief, glad that he hadn’t had the wits knocked out of him by his head-butt with the table corner.
As a precaution, Owen and Allan suggested we go to the emergency room at St James Hospital, for ex-rays and an MRI—just to make sure there was no fracture, hematoma, or internal bleeding. After a 4:00 am cab ride we entered the emergency room, in which 30 patients had fallen asleep waiting for their names to be called. Given the somnolent vibe, I wondered if we had stumbled into the No-Sense-of-an-Emergency Room!
A half hour later a nurse called his name. He disappeared through a door. Five minutes later he emerged, the proud owner of a Category 5 ranking—the lowest the hospital assigned. Of course, being a foreigner without insurance, they charged his VISA credit card $500.
What a first night in Ireland—a trip we’d been planning for fifteen years.
Two hours later, and still waiting for his name to be called, I approached the desk, where I was informed he was 30th on the wait list. “We have 9 category ones, 13 cat twos, 6 cat threes, and 1 cat four. Your brother is cat 5.” “I see. So it’ll be about four hours before you get to him.” “At least!” “But he could have a fracture, a hematoma, internal bleeding . . . .”
She shrugged. “I can have the nurse check him again if you like . . . and perhaps given him a new category!”
“Please do.”
Meanwhile, it was now early enough to call and wake our brother Dave, who was sleeping off the effects of our first night together in the Temple Bar—where a festive mood of New Years eve prevails year-round. Dave is a professional in the medical field, and I was in need of a second opinion about what to do: wait four hours or leave? His answer was decisive: “Look, he’s a foreigner, without insurance, and once they start taking MRIs and x-rays the price will go through the roof. Just take him back to the room, keep him elevated, and put an ice pack on his head.”
I was glad for these marching orders. Den wearily agreed: “I’m not waiting four hours!”
As we headed out the double doors of the “No-Sense-of-Emergency-Room, a red paramedic truck pulled alongside on our way to the taxi stand. The driver-side window rolled down. I was about to learn my second law of travel in Ireland: “When All Else Fails, You Can Always Count on the Kindness of Strangers!”
“Can we give you chaps a lift back to your hotel?”
On the way we told ‘em of meeting their colleagues Owen and Allan. Den took the lead in keeping up the conversation, for which I was thankful, as the adrenaline had long since worn off. Then the fella riding shot-gun asked him if we had any Irish ancestors . . . .
To be continued . . .
$500 for a 5 second check up is kind of crazy, but what’s even crazier is the idea of an eye socket getting hit… ouch! Dave definitely saved the day though, waiting 4 hours would be horrible. I can’t imagine how much it would cost to get the injury checked. Also the whole silent film passion you mentioned is super cool, it makes a lot more sense as to why you mention acting a lot during lecture now knowing your ancestral ties to Theater. 🙂
Professor: Tracing family history is always fun. My great uncle sat down with my great grandfather when he was in his early 90’s and interviewed him via tape recorder for seven or eight hours; his mind was still sharp even in old age.
Also, I think there’s something to be said about the civility of people in other countries. America is far behind most of the world in that regard, perhaps due to a lingering sense of American Exceptionalism, no doubt?
Considering that you mentioned nature is an experience you believe attributes meaning to your life, I would have liked to read something on nature as I, too, have an affinity for nature and the environment. I am familiar with most nature writings from John Muir to Jon Krakauer, and from Kerouac’s “Big Sur” to the Beat poet, Gary Snyder’s, “Turtle Island”. I would say that I have a profound appreciation for nature — almost a Romantic-like sense — that is more refined than the average person.
This blog form is truly inspiring Professor Brown! Throughout my childhood and well into my young adult years, I have suffered through depression, anxiety, and obsessive compulsive disorder. After having studied several career paths in college, I had settled for biological sciences. You see, I love to learn new things and I am often asking my self how, where, when, and why certain things came to be. This was interesting enough, but they simply did not fulfill my interests; instead, I felt worse, because I figured that if everything was simply a probability, then what is the point of it all? I believe that is one of the reasons why I love to read so much- to read stories about experiences and phenomenons that have occurred, as if I was there experiencing it myself. In respects to this story, I find it oddly amusing that the first night you and your brothers had arrived in Ireland, you also got to experience the emergency room of a hospital there (not that the pain your brother was in was funny, just the situation and timing of it). Overall, I am glad to know that you two also got to meet nice individuals there who offered a helping hand and an ear to listen to your brother speak of your heritage.
Hi Laura,
Much enjoyed your genuinely reflective response. Like you, I too have had a “searching” mindset when it comes to finding my right calling. Even the wrong turns (engineering, chemistry major) were beneficial, and the result of interests that cross the humanities/science threshold. Thanks for sharing this. Travel is its own wonderful classroom, with the people and their country as your teachers, mentors, and fellow travelers. Feel free to keep posting. Now that the term is almost over, plan to get back into this running blog. Ireland is very much on my mind. My brother and I just accepted an invitation to give our digital presentation of our silent film grandmother, Regina, in her home village of Knockavoula, Ireland this June. Happy travels. Cheers, Brown
Simply thinking about what happened to Den is horrifying, so I can’t even imagine being there to witness it! His photographic memory and ability to remember so much information, even after getting injured the way he did, is incredible. Call me jealous!
Ancestry is so interesting. Everyone in the world has a vastly different background with varying levels of relationships with the people around them, as well as people in their past that they never had the chance to meet. Getting the opportunity to go and explore where you came from is so special and eye-opening. It gives you the chance to broaden your horizons and see the world in a new light.
This trip definitely had a rough start, but nothing worth remembering was ever easy!
Thank you, Dr. Brown, for sharing this hectic yet inspiring story! I truly enjoyed this blog post because as you mentioned it’s important to relish on the experiences of travel and relationships. Your method of storytelling is truly marvelous and I say this because you intertwine tragedies and comedy. Also, it’s intriguing that you, Den, and Dave were inspired, similar to your mother, by your grandmother’s unexpected passing. I can relate to you and your brother’s curiosity because when I was eight my aunt suddenly passed away. Although I did not have a relationship with her, I began to seek an understanding of her and develop an image of her in my mind. Just as you and your brothers began looking into your heritage, I began asking my mother about her sister. Interesting enough both of our searches introduced us to hysterical moments. While at the moment, Den’s injury wasn’t comical you can now reminisce about your emergency room adventures. Unlike your journey, I didn’t experience the initial moments of laughter but was uplifted by them. My mom explained my aunt to me through storytelling, especial the comical kind which has revealed to me that my late aunt was hilarious! While I could go on forever about how your story is similar to multiple of mine, I’m afraid my enthusiasm would mirror Den’s when asked about his Irish ancestry.
Once again thank you for an amusing story about traveling and kin relationships! I look forward to reading about other excursions you’ve had with Den and Dave.