February 17th, 2000

Today is Holy Childhood Day. Dedicated to all the children of the world.
We had a special mass for the children of the Good Shepherd School, next door to the Parish church. We have children representing all five continents, and today they carried their national flags on to the altar and asked for prayers for the children of their countries.
We have children from so many of the trouble spots of the world.
The children read the lessons and special prayers for children and families who suffer from wars and strife.
Then Father John came down from the altar to talk to the children at their own level. I'm sure he knows the name of every child in school, and they don't even know how wonderful it is to have a priest they can talk to, with the patience and kindness to listen and advise.
I sat there in the church, listening to him speaking to the children, but my mind was taking me back to my childhood, my school and our parish priest.
Like another life. A different planet.

My mother died when I was five years old.
She was thirty nine years old. I had a younger brother and sister, four older brothers and a sister. Delia was thirteen and a half years old. She had to take over the care and responsibility of the family. It didn't matter that there were brothers older and younger than her. It was always the oldest girl who had to take charge. I knew many young girls, clever and intelligent, who had to leave school and become slaves to their families and got little appreciation.
My brothers never did any work in the house. They milked the cows and fed the calves, and worked on the farm. I never saw my father boil a kettle or make a cup of tea in his life. As for cooking a meal or getting the shopping, that was well outside of their capabilities.
Delia washed, cleaned, cooked, minded us. Mary was only a year old. She knitted, sowed, made and mended. She knitted the pullovers, made the dresses. She made all the butter the family used, and sold the surplus, along with the eggs and chickens. To buy the materials for knitting and dressmaking, she put new fronts and turned collars on my father's and brother's shirts, she made little suits for my small brother. In her 'spare time', she did crochet work and embroidery. She had gifted hands, but now she is eighty four years old, and her gifted hands are getting stiff.
We never really appreciated her when we were young, we thought that was her job.

Our school was three miles away, no transport, except 'shank's pony'. We had two choices - across the fields or by road. The land we had to cross was grazed by twenty or thirty big bullocks, and if one started to paw the ground and bellow, we were in trouble. It only took one to get the herd going and we had to run for our lives, we were adept at clearing fences, hog holes or any obstacle in our way. Going by road was not much safer. There were few cars, but there were always horses and cattle being driven.
One day, we three youngest ones were going by road, when a flock of sheep came towards us, driven by a neighbour. One of them singled me out; he rammed me with his head and landed me in the ditch, then came in after me and pummeled me into the ground, until he was pulled off me. Ambulance?Casualty? You must be joking. I brushed myself down, and we had to run the last two miles to school and were late, which got us a good telling off.
Dogs were another hazard. Every farmer had two or three dogs, and more were child-friendly. WE always had to make a detour past the really mean ones. Our own dogs were no better. We always had mean ones, except for Fly - she was a grand dog. One evening our younger brother hadn't come home from school, so we took Fly and went to look for him. We thought he might be waylaid by the bullocks and there he was, up a tree, surrounded by the beasts. We told Fly, go get them. She scattered them in all directions. Christy climbed down and said, "I thought you'd never come."
We never bothered to tell any of these things at home. It was just an everyday story of country children. Today's children have no form of adventure. Or bare feet or freedom.

Christy, Mary and I were great friends. Being the youngest of the family, nobody took much notice of us so we ran wild in the summer in our bare feet. We were always hungry. Fresh air is a great appetiser. Late summer and autumn was a fine time for natural sustenance. We ate nuts and crabapples that would poison a goat.
But winter was a lean time.
Coming home from school, no school meals then, a crowd of us would go in a farmer's field and dig up some turnips, wipe them on the grass, skim them with our teeth and feast. We even ate raw rhubarb. I think now, it was a great source of vitamins.

Our school was very basic. We had one teacher for the infants and one for the older classes. We only had about sixty pupils, but we had a wonderful grounding. No child left our school who could not read and write. But sadly, not so with the history of our own country. Oh, our heads were full of dates of battles of long ago. Brian Boro, and the Red Branch knights and the high kings and all that. We were taught nothing about the famine years, nor about the recent troubles. Nothing about nineteen sixteen and about nineteen twenty-two, and the division of Ireland. Only later, with the help of books, I learned a little of history.
When I left school at fourteen, there was no further education without money and influence and there was little of either. There was no library within six miles, many cycled to the library in Ballinasloe every couple of weeks and took out as many books as she was allowed, so there was intensive reading for a few days. We also 'borrowed' books from the older brothers. I always loved reading, I read anything I could lay my hands on. The trouble I got into for reading when I should be doing my chores. The children today don't realise how wonderful it is to have a library within walking distance, with hundreds of books on every subject, and all the modern technology.

In all my young years I don't remember seeing a young priest. Our parish priest was not a child-friendly man. He was a big man, always in full black. He rode a black hunter, wore black gaiters and if we saw him in time, we took good care that he didn't see us. Unfortunately, he and my father had a disagreement about money, at a house mass, the priest threw the money on the table, my father put it in his pocket and said when you get it again you'll take it, but we children paid the price. Each time he came to our school, he reminded us by name to tell our father to pay his dues. It went on for years. We never bothered to mention it at home. We had the 'mission' in our church about once a year. Two mission priests came to preach. They preached about hell and damnation, sin and evil. There weren't many courting couples to be seen around the roads while the mission was on. I often wondered afterwards how they knew so much about sin and the devil, and so little about the wonderful love of God, and yet all of us who left home brought with us a strong faith to hand down to our children's children.

My two oldest brothers were builders. Eddie was great, he used to give us young ones money to clean his shoes and brush his clothes. My brother Martin was a lovely man. We were a noisy family, always shouting and rowing over something, Martin used to calm the troubled waters. I never heard him raise his voice to family or neighbour. He died aged fifty two years.

Well, we grew up, as families do, lacking a decent education. I went to work for a family. I only stayed there for a year. Then I got a job at Galway hospital where there were proper wages and lots of people to socialise with. We worked hard, but the beach was only ten minutes away, and dances and the cinema down the town. It was a great life. I spent four happy years there, but then I got itchy feet and came to England. I looked after the children of a Jewish family. They were wonderful people. I stayed there until I got married five years later.

I went home to Ireland for my father's funeral. All the family were together once again. On the boat coming back, it was very crowded, and Mary and I couldn't find any seats. This man got up and gave me his seat and that was how I met Mylie. Little did I know that we would be married within a couple of years. We had a wonderful family. Six boys and two girls, of whom we were and are so proud.
Mylie was a lovely man. He did the gardens for all the old ladies, he cut our boys' hair, so their friends came to have theirs cut and he mended all their bikes and always had time to chat with the kids around the gate. Our lads were always bringing young people, especially on Saturday nights. On a Sunday morning, I'd find two or three young people in the living room and Mylie in the kitchen, making them tea and toast.
Mylie died very suddenly and all these young people, (now grown up) came back to support the family and pay their respects to a grand man.

Well, life had to carry on. In the house that was bursting at the seams with ten of us, now there was only me. It was awful. I could hear from my bedroom the clock ticking downstairs, never heard it before. The family got together and asked me would I like Patrick and his family to come and live with me. Well he came with his wife Sarah, little Lucy and three cats, and left after four good years with Lucy, two little brothers and one cat.
My daughter Anne lived in Spain for years with her family. I flew out there about three or four times a year, first to Alhaurin near Malaga, then to Madrid. It was great. But then Anne and her family came home to live with me after Patrick moved to his new home, and that put a halt to my gallop.
Shortly afterwards, Martin went to teach in Australia. I went to visit him and stayed five weeks. Adelaide is the most beautiful place. Now he is in Milan and I am looking forward to going out there. I went with Lorenzo, Mary and Jennifer to stay with Lorenzo's family in Puente Genil, and last year I went with Patrick and his family. We rented a house on the top of a mountain, twelve miles from Malaga. At night when the lights were on all over the mountains it was like fairyland. We've booked again for this year. Mylie came to Spain when Anne lived there. He used to go to the pensioner's social club and played cards and dominoes with the old boys. He got on fine without a word of Spanish, and got invited to their homes. They used to phone Anne to come and interpret for them, which pleased Anne if she wasn't busy.

I have been so lucky, I have always been close to children. I worked at our parish school for ten lovely years as a lunchtime supervisor and playground duty. I loved every day of it. I looked after my grandchildren for years, still do, so I haven't had time to grow old and contrary.

Now I'm reading the history of Ireland from the famine years. Emigration to America, the coffin ships, etc. And more recent history which we should have been taught at school. I think a lot of people of my age who left Ireland are very ignorant of its history.

Christmas was great when we were young. Wherever the brothers were working or wherever anybody was, everybody was home in the house by twelve o'clock on Christmas Eve night. We ate a midnight supper. Everybody sat around the kitchen table. We had everything except meat, at that time it was a day of abstinence. Everything was homemade by Delia. Potato cakes, apple cakes, currant cakes. Everything was organic then. We celebrated three holidays. Christmas Day, New Years Day and Epiphany (January 6th). On each of these three days, Delia cooked a goose, and what a goose. I have never tasted anything like it anywhere. She cooked and mashed a pot of potatoes with lots of chopped onions, pepper and salt, all bound together with flour. She stuffed the inside and craw of the goose and then made stuffing balls to put all around the goose, then she made a flatcake of the remaining stuffing and made dents all over it. Into each dent she put a little sugar, then spread the cake over the goose and stuffing balls in the pot oven, covered the lid with coals and left it to cook for about two hours. It was out of this world. Writing about it, I can still smell and taste it.

I don't know where Delia learned all those things. Nobody taught her. She made great bread and her butter was so good that the housewives around Kilconnell used to ask at the shop if Delia brought in any butter. I was about ten when I made my first bread. Delia said it was fine, but I expect it wasn't good. I was never much good in the house. I hated sowing and knitting. I knitted one pair of socks for a brother. They were so hard and stiff, they could have walked on their own. End of knitting days. Delia and Mary could do anything and everything. Well I have learned a lot since then. I have certainly done a lot of cooking in the last forty five years. I've had a great life. Enjoyed it all, with its highs and lows, sorrows and happiness. I've got my wonderful family and keep in touch all the time, my own home and good health.
The thing I hate most about getting old is there are so many places I would like to see and flying time is getting short, I haven't been to America yet, or flown Concorde!
Thanks to all the nice people I have met along the way, the ones who stopped and smiled when I was sad, or gave a little help. My wonderful neighbours and friends. May they all be as lucky as I.