Over this morning’s coffee, Judy and I raised our cups to the memory of

Sally McCabe, Judy’s grandmother. Sally McCabe. Could her name possibly have sounded

more Irish? Apparently her red hair and freckles were a dead giveaway when she boarded

the ship…. alone, at the tender age of 16.

Her teenage despair, her abject poverty was no longer tolerable. The details are sketchy as to

how Sally managed to become a passenger on that ship. Was she a stowaway? Did she arrange to mop the deck every day? Or, was her fare a more sordid ticket? Whichever, Sally

McCabe was on her way to America for a “better life”.

I have tried more than a few times to get my head around this story. As a kid, I worked like a dog, but, at age 16, to board a ship, leave home , cross an ocean where I knew not a soul

and never go back…what kid does that? One with shear will and determination, to say the least!

Indeed, Sally McCabe found her “better life” in America. It was not one of wealth or extravagance, but it ran circles around the misery that she left in the old country. America afforded her a glimmer of sustaining hope with which she lived the rest of her days.

Happy St. Patty’s Day Sally McCabe.