St Patricks Day With A Little History Thrown In

I'm not Irish and if I am, it's the smallest amount of all of me. I do recognize the holiday by wearing green, which also happens to be my favorite color. I don't do the green beer or partying but, I think it's fun to dress the part. Must be the woman in me?!

I looked up St.Patrick to see what all the hub bub was about and some of the things I knew over time and some things were a little surprising to me. St.Patrick's day was a religious holiday back in the day. Not surprising since it's an Irish national holiday celebrating a saint. Traditionally, "Saint Patrick's blue" was worn to associate St.Patrick but, the term "wearing of the green" was long associated with Irish nationalism and/or loyalty to the Roman Catholic church. Some protestants have begun wearing orange on St.Patrick's day in defiance. Interesting.

A surprising fact is that it became a national holiday in 1903 in Ireland and the pubs were ordered to be closed on March 17 but, it was changed in the 1970's. Surprising because I'm sure that many people that celebrated this as a religious and national holiday would be amazed at the amount of debauchery that goes on now! Some think that the reason so many have turned this into a secular holiday is this coincides with a pagan festival celebrating the god of wine. Yet another new one for me.

According to wikipedia, St.Patrick was a Roman-Britain born a christian missionary and was captured by Irish raiders and made a slave to Ireland before he escaped, about six years later. There is much more information and even some theories, but I won't type all these up. Happy St. Patrick's day however you celebrate it. Just don't celebrate TOO much!