Musician missing out on celebrating with Newfoundland wife
This Christmas, Danny O’flaherty is going to be away from two homes.
The musician, who resides part-time in Texas, can’t go back to Newfoundland to be with his wife, Lisa Codner O’flaherty. Nor can he return to Ireland.
But he knows this is the way things need to be in the time of COVID-19.
“I learned the sadness of being away from your family when I emigrated from Ireland. I don’t want to say I got used to it, but Christmas time is a hard time to be apart from your family and friends,” says O’flaherty.
“This year has been a year of hell for so many people all over the planet. And some people can’t come home. And some people probably could go home, but they would jeopardize their families, especially the old people. Love can come in many different ways, and sometimes mindfulness of others is more important.”
Just because he knows he can’t go to Newfoundland doesn’t mean it isn’t on O’flaherty’s mind all the time.
“I’m going to do a concert in New Orleans on the 7th of December, which will be taped to be shown later. So I thought, ‘Keep driving north from New Orleans and just go across the border to Windsor, into Ontario and just keep on going up the Maritimes and take the ferry from Nova Scotia, and just go up there and surprise her.’ ”
The temptation is real, he says.
“The thought comes to me every day to do it, but I would be putting them in jeopardy, especially her father, who’s not doing too well.”
The singer once did that for his mother. Without telling her, he booked a flight from Washington, D.C., to Shannon Airport in Ireland. O’flaherty rented a car and drove the 90 miles to the village of Connemara.
“I wanted to come there at night time on Christmas Eve,” remembers O’flaherty. “I turned the lights off, let the car roll into the driveway, and I got out. I came to the back of the house. I looked in the window, and there is my mother.
“And I'm looking in at my mother, God bless her, she’s not with us any more — she is in spirit — and she’s stuffing the turkey. And I couldn’t look any longer, my emotions got to me, and I knocked at the door, and she answered as she nearly collapsed. It was the best Christmas I ever had in my life.”
O’flaherty misses Newfoundland, a place he’s come to love for its resemblance to his home country, and the family he gained when he married Lisa.
“One of the things I love about Newfoundland and Labrador is the kitchen parties. We would gather around her father, her uncle, and all the family would gather around and sing songs and tell stories. It’s very much like the way we were brought up in Ireland,” he says. It’s become a home away from home for O'flaherty.
“Newfoundland is the closest to Ireland you’re going to get on the planet, for an Irishman. Maybe others would have other [places] but that’s my feeling,” he says. “I love the place. They’re so connected with folk music and their stories.”
The holidays are tied to food. It’s one of our oldest, strongest shared bonds with others. For O’flaherty, it’s part of the soul of Christmas.
“This time last year, up in Torbay, we were making plum puddings, Irish plum pudding. We did one with Irish whiskey. We did one with whiskey and Guinness. We did one with brandy. And of course, sherry,” he says. “I think Lisa and I spent about two days in the kitchen.”
The world changes and it doesn’t change. Like his father before him, O’flaherty is away from home trying to make a living. Unlike his father, he has a way to connect across the space between Texas and Newfoundland.
“This year, we decided we’re going to do it by FaceTime. I'm going to be in the kitchen here, she’s going to be in the kitchen there, and we’re going to do the same thing we did last year, doing different recipes of the plum pudding,” he says.
“It’s not like years and years ago when people immigrated. They left their wives behind and they had to make ends meet to go overseas, like my father did, send money home to Ireland, and then he wouldn’t be home for Christmas.”
This is the final piece in a series of stories from Saltwire Network of some of the families who won't be able to be together this Christmas due to COVID-19, and how they'll celebrate this very different holiday instead.