(February 2, 1979)

“Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday to You! Happy Birthday, dear Mary Patricia, Happy Birthday to you!”

The family clustered around, for once, the entire group had made it for one of her birthdays, and with Luke holding the baby of the family, finally off the monitors, and with Mama still weak, but sitting in her rocker right next to the table, it was enough to make the tough little girl cry from happiness.

“Ready to blow out all the candles, Mary Patricia, and make your wish!” her Dad encouraged her, leaning over her, his arm across her shoulder affectionately.

Mary Pat looked around at her family, the tall older ones, Matt and Mary Beth holding their own babies, Joey and John jostling against Mary Fran while Mary Kate tried to keep feisty Angel and Jamie out of the candles with the help of Matt’s pretty wife Julie and cheery Mark, her second biggest brother, who came down on the train from college just for her birthday.

“Wait, Dad! She needs the Birthday Princess Hat!” Luke called out. “Mary Beth, do you know where it is?”

“In the hall closet, top shelf,” Mary Beth answered in her musical voice.

Before Luke had taken two steps, little Danny clinging to his shoulder like a monkey, Mama interrupted, “Oh, Luke, there’s no need for that silly thing. Just light the cake, Mary Pat is fine without the hat, aren’t you, love?” Mama smiled at her brightly, and Mary Pat, much as she really did want to wear the Princess Hat, was ready to agree and make her Mama happy, but her Dad stepped in.

Luke paused, not sure what to do, since he was pretty sure that even his sister was still young enough at ten, and girly enough despite her tomboy ways, to want the traditional hat with all its fluff, but he hated to go against his Mama. He looked to his father for guidance. Pat’s eyes met his and Luke relaxed when his father gave him a knowing smile.

“No, Luke is right, Rose. Got to do this up right for my girl. Luke lad, you’ve got those long arms, go on now and reach up and get the birthday hat for my Princess Pat, what are you waiting for?”

“And listen to the man, calling her after himself, like he’ll be doing, like he needs another boy in this family!” Mama exclaimed, setting them all to teasing and laughing, saying Mary Pat might as well be another boy, she was such a tomboy. But Mary Pat just grinned up at her adored father, who took the hat from Luke and placed the shiny pink and fluffy cardboard hat on his fourth daughter’s curly black hair. He then kissed her forehead.

“There you go, darlin’ and a fine princess you make, too.”

“Angel’s Hat! Angel Da’s Princess!” Angel started to screech, reaching for the hat.

Mary Pat looked anxiously at her Dad, not sure what he would do – Angel was his special pet. But her Dad frowned at Angel and said two words that little girl rarely heard.

“No, Angel!”

The little beauty of the O’Keefe family was so surprised by her father’s stern tone, which was never directed at her that she stopped crying at once. She sat in her big sister’s lap blinking, so startled it was comical. Baby Danny began clapping and laughing, which set the rest of his brothers to laughing. Even Mama’s lips were twitching, Mary Pat noticed, her deep dimples, that so many of Rose’s sons had inherited but not many of her daughters, showing, despite her efforts to repress her amusement.

Big Pat O’Keefe ignored them all, but knelt down beside Mary Pat instead, and said,

“Well, I think we’re ready for this cake now. Are you ready for your birthday wish, my Princess?”

Mary Pat nodded, her heart too full to speak. She knew what her birthday wish would be – that she’d always make her Dad proud of her, and that he’d always love her as much as he did right then!

 

********************************************************************

(May 18, 1985)

Mary Pat looked at the letter in her hand. Acceptance to medical school. It had been a dream come true. But the road not taken, in her case.

Her Dad didn’t believe in girls becoming doctors, and hard as she’d tried to talk him around it, she’d not been able to do it. Nursing – that was something he could understand. Caring for others. Little Danny had been so mad for her sake, calling Dad a male chauvinist pig. Mama hadn’t said much up until then, but she’d stopped Dad from punishing Danny – so like her. That was when she’d spoken up on the topic of her fourth daughter’s dream. But, it wasn’t Mary Pat who concerned her – it was Danny. As usual.

“Don’t punish the boy for saying what is true, Pat. He’s made a good point. Mary Pat is a smart girl, and for you to stop her from going on to medical school, well, it’s just foolishness, which is what that male chauvinism is, I think. I’m not saying she should have kept it quiet that she applied.” Mama had given Mary Pat an odd look then, and Mary Pat had been left to wonder if her mother would have helped her more with her father if she’d let her in on her secret ambition, or if she would have put the kibosh on it sooner. “But the fact is, it isn’t easy getting into medical school and she did it. You should be proud, not telling her she can’t go.”

And in the end, Patrick hadn’t said she couldn’t go – he said it was her choice, but made it very clear he’d be very disappointed in her if she did go. So, there wasn’t really any choice at all. Not for Mary Pat, who was as ambivalent about her mother as her mother was about her, but who adored her father. If he would be unhappy if she went to medical school, well, then a nurse she would be. And a damn good one too.

Thus, after graduating number one in her class in the nursing department at Penn State, she’d entered the field of nursing with a vengeance, putting all her zeal for helping people into that honored profession. But, it was quite a while before she learned to be happy with it. It was just hard for her to let go of her dream. She’d always wanted to be a doctor, ever since she’d been a little girl. Somehow, being a nurse felt like second best to her; she couldn’t see it for a first all in its own right. And a big part of that came from the simple fact that she saw nursing as being her Dad’s choice for her, and didn’t let herself realize how much she was suited to nursing and how much she really, really loved it. So, for several years, she did it well, but her heart longed for the white coat of a doctor, instead of the cap of a nurse.

“We don’t even get to wear the caps anymore,” she griped to her little brothers, when she drove them home from soccer practice and they were a captive audience.

“Well, I’m glad I’m a boy because I’m going to be a doctor,” would be Jamie’s usual response, which only made her crazier.

Danny would tip his curly head – which would need a haircut – and say something on the order of, “but you’re a really good nurse, Mary Pat. Maybe the cap fits you?”

“She just said she doesn’t wear a cap, dummy,” Jamie would have to point out, which led to a discussion of metaphors and who was the real dummy and before the ride was over, Mary Pat’s nursing skills would be needed.

Eventually, though, the comment sunk in, and Mary Pat stood in California, a few hours away from accepting her Master’s Degree in Oncology Nursing from the University of Southern California. She really was good at nursing, she’d come to realize. The right type of nursing. It wasn’t work everyone could do, but her no-nonsense ways, her strong, fit body and even her quick wit, honed by years of jousting with all those brothers, made her a favorite with patients facing a tough opponent. They liked having a nurse they felt was tougher than the cancer, and who wasn’t afraid of the doctors either. So, at twenty-seven, Mary Pat was finding the right cap for her.
 

********************************************************************
 

(September 11, 2003)

“Come on, Dad, it’s getting cold, come with me and I’ll buy you a beer, how about that?” Mary Pat linked her arm with her father’s and rested her cheek on his shoulder. She noticed how stooped he was – used to be she wouldn’t have been able to reach his shoulder wearing sneakers as she was today, even though she was fairly tall for a woman – his former broad, tall figure was a shadow of its former self.

“Sad day, Princess...sad, terrible day.”

“I know, Dad, I know.” And Mary Pat did know. While many might think that Pat O’Keefe might have been referring to the terrible events of September 11, 2001, which indeed, were horrible beyond belief, to Patrick O’Keefe, no grief would ever be as great as the loss of his beloved Luke, his son who went off to serve his country and was reported missing in action, presumed dead. The government sent word today that they were declaring Luke dead, as they had no reason to believe he had survived the last mission he went on, the mission that saw him shot in enemy territory, no opportunity for his body to be recovered.

“You’re tired, Dad, let me get you inside somewhere. No need to stand out here in the cold. A grave yard is not a good place for you. Come on.” She tried again to gently pull on his arm.

“You’re cold princess?” Her Dad seemed to wake up a little bit. He looked down and smiled at her, a trace of the old Patrick in his eyes. “What kind of Dad am I? Letting my Princess Pat get cold? Here...you wear my hat.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out his old beat up cap and placed it tenderly on her head, tucking in her curls. He brushed her cheek with his work roughened thumbs, ignoring the tears that ran down her cheeks.

“You’re my good girl, Patty. I’m counting on you to wear my hat, now, you understand? The others, they’re not as trustworthy as you and they all have their own concerns, their own families, which I understand. But...I need someone I can count on to watch over your Mama.”

Mary Pat wanted to protest, to say something, but she just looked up at her Dad and was quiet, her eyes filled with tears, her teeth biting down on her bottom lip as she swallowed hard, trying to get the lump in her throat to go away. Patrick stood tall as he placed his hands on her slim shoulders.

“You’re my girl, Mary Pat...you always have been. And I thank you for that. I know it hasn’t always been easy...not easy at all. And your Mama isn’t always easy to get along with...not for you. But, you’ll try, won’t you?”

Mary Pat wanted to shout, to deny what she saw in her father’s eyes but she’d been a nurse to seriously ill people for too long now and loved her father too much to do such a selfish thing – she did the only thing she could do – she nodded her acceptance of the charge placed on her.

Patrick O’Keefe smiled then, and seemed to relax. “Shall we go get that beer then? It is a mite cold out, I’m thinking.” Father and daughter turned and headed off for the pub.

Mary Pat wore her father’s cap to his funeral that winter.

 

Return to Hat Challenge