If it weren’t for Americans, nothing would get done.

Not in my house, anyway.

And not all Americans, just those who visit.

And not nothing, exactly.

It’s a weird part of the post-colonial Irish psyche that turns us into manic cleaners days before an American is due to visit.

Irish visitors warrant a surface clean and a general tidying up. The same for Hungarians and other Europeans. Indians, too. You’d want the place clean and tidy, but homely and lived in.

But when the Americans say they’re coming, something else kicks in.

Many lifetimes ago, when working in a retail bank in Dublin, one of my customers came in looking for £700 to put in a new Piranha pine kitchen (that’ll tell you how long ago it was). She seemed anxious. I asked her why the hurry. Interest rates weren’t great. She might be better waiting a while. But no. Her son was coming home from New York with his American girlfriend. It had to be done.

The crazy part was that I fully understood her angst.

Not that I’d ever had kids returning from the States warranting a new kitchen, but I understood.

Look at any Irish literature that features an emigrant returning from abroad (mainly America, but sometimes Africa like Jack, the priest, coming home in Brian Friel’s Dancing at Lughnasa) and you’ll see this crop up.

Mary Lavin. Seán Ó’Faoláin. Frank O’Connor. They’ve all written about it.

We have a thing about being judged. And we don’t like to be judged by those who’ve been to places we’ve not been and done things we might never do. The irony is, though, that we’re not judged; the returning emigrant often feels caught between two stools – neither one nor the other.

I’ve been there.

I heard myself sound critical, while knowing inside that the criticism masked insecurity and uncertainty.

I used to joke that I survived two years in California but had to go into therapy when I came home.

It was a difficult readjustment. The BTA (Been to America) tag was loaded with all sorts of meaning.

There’s also the whole class thing.

Many of those who emigrated from Ireland were from the country. So their return from big cities, in fancy clothes, with lots of money, became symbolic. No matter that in New York or Boston their clothes weren’t fancy and their money wasn’t a lot…back in the village or town they’d left, they’d made it.

Those at home had to do something to show that they, too, had moved forward in their absence. Hence, the new kitchen. Or the fresh paint. Or the clean presses.

Our homes, be they houses or flats, rented or owned, are often extensions of ourselves. They are seen to reflect our state of mind.

The Mahers, in John Murphy’s The Country Boy, scrub the house from top to bottom in preparation for their son Eddie’s return with his American wife, Julia.

Oh, the pressure. The pressure. The pressure.

My friend lands tomorrow.

All week I’ve been cleaning with the help of another friend.

Windows. Walls. Doors. Drawers. Presses. Floors.

I’ve himself mithered with hanging this and moving that.

And all the while I’m laughing at the idiocy of it all.

First of all, they’re American. Not Irish.

Second, I’m not in Ireland anyway.

And I know my American friend won’t give a tuppenny damn about the state of the place. They’re coming to see us. To help out with some projects. To catch up. Cobwebs might even add to the charm.

But still, deep down inside of me, inherited from my grandmothers and great-grandmothers, is that hardwired DNA clean gene.

Because the American is coming.

Tomorrow.

And I am grateful that they are.

Coming.

Tomorrow.

Because if they weren’t, I’d have an awful time washing those windows in August, when the next Americans arrive.

PS View is out over the Kis-Balaton from a newly washed upstairs window.