Banking west over Dublin and climbing steadily, the Boeing 747 shook as its gigantic engines pulled and roared. The TV monitors vibrated like they were about to drop into the aisle as we slowly broke through the clouds and emerged into the midday sun. It was my first plane ride and I was going to America.

Little did I know this was a journey I would make many times, as the 1980s became the 1990s and beyond.

After several hours we circled and banked, slow, steady and low over the Boston suburbs. I grabbed an empty window seat to catch a glimpse of backyard swimming pools, four-lane highways and what I suspected were baseball fields. This was a sight to behold. In a few short hours I’d travelled from a cloudy, grey Ireland to a place where heatwaves, sun-soaked beaches and trips to Cape Cod were inserted into daily conversations. Work was plentiful and money was easily gotten rid of. With my J1 visa tucked neatly into my freshly-minted green passport, I stepped out into America.

It was June 1983. Those first few days I kept walking, looking and listening; listening to the voices on the street, observing the police officers, guns in plain view, directing tourists and waving at traffic. I couldn't believe it: police with guns. Dallas and Hill Street Blues were the popular television shows then and it was like I was walking through a television set.

As I struggled with a handful of coins that first day at a public payphone, an old lady walked up to me and gently picked the correct change from my open palm, then smiled and moved on. It was true. Those pictures in the family album of uncles, aunts and cousins in bright clothing, smiling in the sunshine had happened– in a place called America.

Turning point

I had asked my father to come with me to Boston for the summer, but he declined, which astonished me. I had forgotten he had travelled west in the 1960s and again in the 1970s. Maybe the fun of travel had just dried up for him, but I was having none of it. This was a turning point for both of us: the beginning of a physical distance between us but the start of an unspoken closeness.

For me, it was also the beginning of a relationship with America that has since gone through many stages: from not wanting to purchase anything more permanent than a TV set, to sending my children off to school on huge yellow buses.

Within days of my arrival in 1983, I was working in an Irish bar cleaning the cellar and doing odd jobs. An immediate promotion saw me handling the cash at the door and from there it wasn’t long before I was behind the bar. But I quickly ended up cleaning again, this time on an Irish building site, earning more than my dad’s weekly wage. That shocked me at the time.

Boston in the 1980s was an exciting place, soaked in sunshine and covered in easy money. Each dollar was worth one Irish punt and a Guinness could set you back $5. It seemed like a fortune. My weekly room and board at college had cost £13. (That was how I measured money then.) My immediate plan was to make enough to drink my way through to graduation, and beyond.

Competing for work

The exodus from Ireland had begun, however, and on later trips west I found myself competing for work with students and recent immigrants looking to escape unemployment. What most of us Irish had in common were nightly drinking sessions and listening to Irish traditional music in downtown bars. Names like the Black Rose, the Midnight Court and Limerick's hung over their doors. At closing time we moved on to apartments in suburbs such as Dorchester, Brighton and Quincy. There we listened to Mary Black and the Waterboys until the wee hours. Then off to a pancake house for breakfast and straight back to work. I'm sure this scene was repeated in every major US city, wherever the young Irish gathered. The Wolf Tones were singing about us and I was now part of this movement whether I liked it or not.

There were actors, students, scientists, plumbers, fitters, carpenters and painters all working together in bars, serving drinks we had never heard of and black pints that looked and tasted like treacle. Everyone seemed to be having so much fun and nobody was too worried about the future.

Hiding pain

But of course we had worries and were hiding pain, being so far from family and friends. Most young Irish migrants spoke and sang about nothing else but moving back to Cork, Donegal, Mayo or elsewhere. Many made it back and with a greater appreciation of family and place, but many never did.

Over the years of travelling back and forth, I get used to the fact that a 5am flight arrival time means spending more than two hours waiting at Dublin’s Terminal 2, before I can catch the first bus home. The Irish breakfast takes up 30 minutes and slow coffee sips do the rest.

The bus arrives on time, into the town square and dad is there as always, parked in the bus stop and holding up the bus lane. The chill is in the air early on a summer’s morning. He shakes my hand and nods his head, as if no time has passed.

“Did you get him now?” says the station master. Dad nods and waves his hand. Then off we go, past the brewery and down the Ecco road. A left turn onto the Castletown Road and then a straight shot home. Not too much talk. The same discussions on the economy, who’s hiring, and how the boys have a place in the local school. Time flies by and then the hidden tears in the early hours on departure, and the inevitable “be back soon” discussions.

Longing to return

So when did it change? That longing to return. When does it change?

I don’t think it was suddenly or gradually but it happened in stages. One day you forget what that longing feels like. You can remember the pain, but like pain itself you cannot recreate it without deliberate action.

This process began with the arrival of children. Suddenly this is their home and so it must be yours too. This is their city, as they tell me over and over again. This became vividly clear when my ice hockey playing son refused to play for the next town over. Their rink was considerably closer to our house and we could nearly walk there. As we passed the rink I’d say, “If you only played for Somerville we’d be there now.” This went on for weeks until he told me that playing for Somerville was like me playing for England against Ireland. That stopped the conversation and the subject was never broached again.

They love visiting Ireland and know a lot about its history and culture but their home is Cambridge, Massachusetts, and they belong to America. For me I still enjoy both places but my home is America, where the boys are. It can be no other way.