[vienna]

One memory of St. Patrick's Day goes back to my senior year in high school, 1968-69, in San Francisco. There were two great and very highly celebrated occasions in the City: Columbus Day (there is a very large Italian population in the City) and St. Patrick's Day (an equally large Irish population). The City throws big parades on those days. It seemed as if the whole city turned out on those days. All the schools and all the local military installations sent units to participate in the parades. I was in the Jr. ROTC in school and was a staff officer, so I had to march at the head of our unit along with the other senior staff officers. The parade route was only about a couple of miles or so, but, since this was San Francisco, there were quite a few goodly hills to climb along the way. The crowds along the parade route were very much in the Irish spirit and some of the WW2 vets would come out of the crowd, bottles and glasses in hand, and offer us a drink of whatever libation they had. Although we were below legal drinking age, the authorities would turn a blind eye on St. Patrick's Day. For a bunch of high school kids about to have to register for the draft and the possibility of going to Vietnam, the opportunity to have a drink of booze was a big thrill...


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