Irish Twins

What do you write about when when everything in the nation and world appears to be one big fat mess? Irish twins of course

While sitting in my dentist's reception room recently, I could not help overhearing a conversation a lady was having with the receptionist. Before accusing me of being nosey, I must add that the reception room is very small and the only way to ignore conversations is to wear ear plugs. In fact this particular room may well be in violation of patient privacy regulations. So while trying to ignore the conversation that was going on I overheard, " did you know that she has Irish twins?" What in hell could she be talking about. Did her friend adopt twins from Ireland? Why tag her friend's twin as Irish? Judging from the put down tone of her question , I surmised that there was more to "Irish twins" than a reference to twins. I couldn't wait to get home to research " Irish twins". My research took all of two minutes thanks to Google.

"Irish twins" is used to describe two children  born to the same mother within twelve months of each other. What a disappointment! Why the Irish tag, it could happen to anyone. Just a bit more research revealed that that in the 1800's in the land of freedom and religious tolerance, the children of our forefathers concluded that such births could only only occur as a result of uneducated, poor Irish Catholic families' lack of birth control as well as as self control.

I still wonder about the Irish tag since there are many uneducated, poor Americans who have no self-control when it comes to sex. Make that Americans of all economic means who have no self-control. Obviously the term was originally meant as an insult which Americans of all economic means too frequently apply to fellow Americans who they deem as different.

In modern use, the term Irish twins is not intended as an insult, but rather a description of siblings born close to together. How nice! It still sounds like an insult. Was the Planned Parenthood Society formed to reduce the frequency of Irish twins?

Now that I have succeeded in taking my mind off everything that is really important for a few minutes, let me not be a coward. Time to get ahold of that self-control thing, turn on the TV set and watch the roller coaster ride called the economy. Better yet that old movie on TCM, "Cheaper By The Dozen", looks a hell of a lot better.
.