Nico's Diary of a Young Man · Nico's Diary of a Young Man
I’ve been rewatching Game of Thrones over the last several weeks. I watched it for the first time when it came out from 2012-2018. I’m generally not in favor of binge watching. Well, I’m human, I love to binge watch. I just mean as a practice and a term I think its insane to distribute things in bulk to be churned and burned through like the little piggies at the trough we all are. I digress…
The reason I bring up that I am binge watching Game of Thrones is because it struck me quite differently on my second watch. Game of Thrones is such a massive show with so much going on, its hard to see the connective tissues when you’re just trying to remember who killed who and who’s related to which house. Now rewatching and generally knowing where the story is going, I’m seeing it in a different light, a more emotional light.
Game of Thrones is a dark show. It doesn’t shy away from the brutality of its world. Its a show about power and ambition. All of the core characters are vying for power, striking deals, chopping off the heads of their enemies. And nearly all of them have the same justification for what they do: the family. Everything is about protecting and serving the family name. The lineage of the family dynasty must carry on through time. What does it mean when the family line dies? What does it mean when all the people you knew and who knew you are dead?
A few weeks ago I went upstate to my grandparents hay farm to visit them and my dad’s side of the family. I come from a line of Irish American hay farmers. Its a small family farm. My grandfather was born in the house he and my grandmother still live in. His father was born in that house. And his father’s father came from Ireland and built the house.
My grandfather is a 85 year old Irish Catholic hay farmer who doesn’t spend much time reminiscing on the family lineage. I asked him how old the house was and he said he wasn’t sure he’d have to check the deed in the cellar. I wish I made him go get it because I’d love to see a deed from the 1800’s. Real life history!
Gramp Carney on the farm a few weeks ago
On Friday, my younger cousin came up to the farm with her husband and new one year old baby Ella. Its amazing how long a group of adults can be entertained by watching a baby walk back and forth across a room. My cousin and I talked about how meaningful it was to see the next generation of our family playing in the same house we used to play in, running around the same farm we used to run around as kids.
I don’t see myself having kids. I don’t know if I think that because I’m 28, because I’m trans, because I’m a broke artist, because I’m a depressive, because the world is increasingly scary, because I coached kids soccer and know what those little gremlins are really like. Regardless, I don’t see it in my future. Even still, seeing my cousin’s baby on the family farm; seeing the traces of my family in her eyes made me want to save money for her college fund. I was immediately wishing for a future where I make enough money to set up college funds for all my siblings’ kids and my cousins’ kids. I felt the tug of the family line. The need to participate in its upkeep. Like a little lord of Westeros, I pledged my life to House Carney.
What is that instinct? Do we all have it? Are we hard wired to see our kin and protect them? I think so - I’m no scientist but that feels like an evolutionary trait.
My family has been discussing the sale of the farm a lot recently. My grandparents are old and no one in the family wants to take over the business. Its not the kind of work people generally want to do, its something our family had to do and its the reason any of us are able to decide we don’t want to do it now. When we’ve had this conversation in the past, I’ve felt very removed from it. I understood why it would be a hard decision on my grandparents but it felt like the only logical thing to do. Now, being back there with my cousin and her baby, I felt the crisis of losing the farm. This is our family’s farm. Its been in our family since 1890. Carney’s from Ireland crossed the Atlantic Ocean and settled in Upstate New York because it was really rainy and cold there too. They picked rocks out of the fields by hand, they raked and bailed the hay, sold it to local Mennonite communities and small horse farms. Decades of poverty and making ends meet, generations of alcoholism and Catholic repression. My grandfather started working the farm full time at 15 and last summer he put in his millionth bail of hay. And now its time to let it all go.
I found myself again praying for a future where I make a lot of money and could buy the farm outright. Own it for our family forever. Let the fields run wild or let the Mennonites harvest the hay from them. Frame the deed and put it in the living room. Gather all the cousins once per year and toast to House Carney, long may she reign.
Without the down payment to buy it outright, in order to keep the farm in the family it would require one of us in my generation to take over the farm operations. But when it comes down to it, none of us wants to do that. Even though I just spent the last several paragraphs talking about how much I want to keep the farm in the family, I don’t want it bad enough to give up my career. Is that selfish? Or is that what our ancestors moved here for? Did they move here with the hopes of future prosperity for the family? Did they feel the tug of the family line and desire to provide for the generations to come? Did they have any idea the family line would berth a transgender standup comedian? Did they have any idea what any of those words mean when they set sail for Upstate New York?
Without the farm, we can still gather. We can still share stories of our family and watch the younger generations grow into their own iteration of the family line. None of us will live forever, the farm won’t live forever, at some point the name Carney may fade away; but we won’t be here to see that. Maybe in 100 years my descendants will find the remnants of this Substack and talk about how one of the Carney’s actually lived up to his family name.
so what’s the deal with circus peanuts?
SONG OF THE WEEK:Mr. Jones by Counting Crows
I keep forgetting the segments of this newsletter that I came up with… Anyways! Song of the week, a classic!
North Carolina dates being moved because I’m going to a friend’s wedding :)
As always, if ticket price is a barrier to entry for you (especially if you are trans) please fill out this form and I will do my best to get you in! Comp tickets are first come first serve and can be limited depending on the venue.
Last but not least, watch BOYS CLUB! All five episodes of season 1 are out now on Youtube and you could watch all five in about 30 minutes. Perfect for your lunch break.
This month has been going so fast I don’t even remember which of those books I read in May. IF ANY! Thank you for all the recs, they’re going on my list. I’m recommending a TV show today:
Widow’s Bay on Apple TV - This is a comedy horror its super funny and scary! Really enjoying this. First four are already out and the last two come out tonight 5/27!
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