I recently finished watching FX's Say Nothing (Official Trailer | Disney+). I was looking for something to watch and saw the graphic, ignored it a few times, then checked it out. Saw it was about Ireland and The Troubles and started watching it.
I’ll admit, I was initially unsure of its angle or intent, but by midway, or sooner, it had raised some compelling points and offered real food for thought.
I’ve been engaged with 'The Troubles' since the 1970s (long story). But when I first learned I was part Irish from my father, it wasn't long after I learned of the ongoing Troubles there from reports on TV in 1969 and 1970. I was deeply affected and wanted to go to Ireland (as a 15 year old) and help on the Republican side (something kind of the opposite here in how we understand "Republican"). I tried to educate my friends in high school. All of whom looked at me like I was nuts.
Alas, life took over and I was working nights at a drive-in theater. I had my own worries to contend with. But I always tried to keep track of things in Ireland. I grew up loving the British, their films, and music and fashion and so much. Learning of the Irish problems with the British was, disconcerting. But I decided I would love them both, as problematic as that could be.
Some years ago, I even started a novel that began in Ireland and involved the IRA years ago and researched it. It began as a short story (Harbinger), but then I expanded it, thinking of turning it into a full book (or screenplay). Eventually it ended up as a short story in my book, "Death of Heaven.". I just never got around to finishing it. It's my only unfinished novel sitting and waiting for me to return and finish it. I think of it often.
So for my birthday in 2015, I spent time in Ireland visiting various historical sites. I've written about this before. I wrote a blog about that trip and the music, with photos.
Putting my fingers in the bullet holes at the GPO in Dublin, left there unrepaired for historical purposes, was affecting. All the stories about how those bullet holes got there, reading about it, watching films on it, to stand there and FEEL them, affected me far more than I had ever anticipated.
The Irish Troubles were difficult for many to understand from afar—and perhaps even up close. But as our own divisions have deepened in recent decades, it’s become easier to grasp how such conflict can take root and escalate. The difference is, ours has unfolded over a much shorter span and is largely self-inflicted—though not without outside influence. Figures like Putin have played a role here too, just as he did in helping stir the Brexit chaos in the UK.
Overall, it was a trip to spend with my youngest adult child who had previously traveled Europe alone for nearly a year, once alone, once with a friend. They had convinced me for my 60th birthday, I should DO SOMETHING. And so, I did, but if I was going and they talked me into it, I wanted them to join me. I tried to get my other son to go but he couldn't make it do to work. Sadly, my companion had to cut short our trip together because of a new job.
It was also a trip for me to explore part of my heritage. And experience what I had studied all my life. I wrote a bit about it some years ago.
I listened to the Irish music that I had listened to for many years from various homes in Washington state in the United States. Irish Republican music like from the Wolfe Tones. But also bands like The Pogues, Dropkick Murphys, Flogging Molly, and others. A wide variety. Music my kids had grown up hearing from my home office where I'd intermittently blare that music along with rock, classical, experimental, all kinds really, as long as it's good. Not so much country western, however. I raised them to appreciate music, and both played in the school band all through junior and high schools. My youngest even paid their way through Europe, twice, busking.
I had been conflicted since I first learned of my Irish heritage, that of my father's family and in how I learned of that. So, I wrote more on my Irish connections in 2019.
Watching Say Nothing reminded me not just of Ireland’s painful past, but of my own lifelong attempt to reconcile identity, history, and justice—especially when they're not cleanly separated. For me, it was never just about politics or sides. It was about people. About trying to understand, trying to care, and maybe, somehow, trying to help—at least in spirit, if not in direct action.
The series stirred something old in me, but also something newly sharpened by our current global tensions. We’re watching democratic norms erode in places we once thought immune. Just as The Troubles were difficult to reduce to good versus evil, so too is the challenge of making sense of our own political and social fractures today.
But remembering, witnessing, and telling stories still matter. They connect generations, challenge assumptions, and—in the best cases—remind us we’re part of something larger than ourselves. Whether that’s a heritage, a people, or a fight for justice, it’s never just history. It’s personal. And it lives on, in scars and in songs, in films and in fiction, in places like bullet holes in stone, or in a story left unfinished—waiting to be told.
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