Growing up I thought I had a charmed life because we had 6 TV channels to choose from. 2 Irish channels and 4 UK channels. I felt so sorry for the kids who didn’t live minutes from the border. Those poor sods in Antrim or in England with only 4 channels, and even poorer souls down South with just 2.
When my English friends talk about kids TV from our youth I feel very much a foreigner. I grew up on the Irish kids shows. Dempsey’s Den and Zig and Zag. But as I got older I began to become aware of how my cultural references were noticeably different from people from the Republic. My cousins across the border were part of a different education system and I was aware their experience of life was different to mine, even if I couldn’t quite put my finger on how.
Moving to London at 18 was fairly seamless in some ways and it got me thinking about my identity in an entirely different way. Here I was in the land across the water, in a different country – but also the same country. Their media was the same as at home. Their language was the same as at home. I wondered if I might have more in common with these people than those in the Republic. The thought didn’t sit easy with me.
After a few years in London I became acutely aware that I no longer really fit anywhere. In London they made fun of my Derry accent. In Derry they told me I sounded English. Being born in Northern Ireland gives you the right to choose an Irish passport or a British one. But I’ve learned that having dual nationality, on some level, means you have full access to neither.
There are those at home who believe partition is an aberration and Ireland should be reunited once again. And there are those who believe Northern Ireland is British and as much a full part of the UK as England is.
I have 4 brothers. There are 14 years between the eldest and youngest. 4 of us are dotted around England and 1 lives at home. There’s variation in our values and approach to life. And we remember things differently too. There are stories from childhood I’ve written about before that some of my brothers contest. It didn’t happen like that. It didn’t happen at all.
In families there are as many versions of the truth as there are family members. And I think that’s ok. Part of growing up involves moving out from under the umbrella of the family identity and the cultural identity to find out who you are without all that.
When we return to our family and cultural traditions from a place of mature, developed – and often complicated – personal identity, we can respect and enrich those traditions rather than be constrained by them.
