It Occurs to Me: Being there for the people

When Father John Joe Duffy was asked by RTÉ's Miriam O’Callaghan how he could even begin to console people in the face of such a tragedy as Creeslough, he simply said: “You just have to be there for people.”
Those words came back to me last week when - during a telephone conversation with Father Duffy - he told me about the breaking news of the tragic death of Seán Rooney in Lebanon.
As regards Seán Rooney, his loved ones already know that the Defence Forces are by way of a second family for so many of our brave and dedicated soldiers. That second family will be a huge comfort to Cormac, Natasha, Holly and others as they come to terms with the death of such a wonderful young man. The words of Father John Joe in one of his many moving homilies are just as applicable to the circumstances of Seán's untimely passing, as they were in Creeslough a few months ago:
“Life is a great journey, one which we travel on our own in our own way. We journey through life on a path we neither design nor control. We can shape the path with our decisions and choices, but the final direction of life is beyond our control.” God give them all strength.

107, NOT OUT!
In 1938, Charlie McCarry from Devlinreagh, Carrigart, was one of 50 defendants summoned at Milford Court for having no dog licence. Charlie’s son, James, reported in the local newspaper as “a sprightly youth of 70”, appeared for his father for whom the journey was too long. He told District Justice Walsh that they had recently obtained a licence, and that his father would be 107 years old on his next birthday! On hearing this, the judge imposed no penalty. James said his dad enjoyed excellent health, reading newspapers daily, and doing odd jobs around the farm.
As Angela Gallagher reminds us in her wonderful Mevagh/Rosgoill Connections page:
“Charles McCarry of Devlinreagh, Carrigart enjoyed national fame as possibly Ireland's oldest man in the late 1930s. He was featured in many newspapers across Ireland as well as on local and national radio. He was still living in the thatched house overlooking Mulroy Bay in which he was born, up until his death in 1940. Charles was born in 1832 before civil registration so his birth certificate is not available. “
William Conaghan from Letterkenny gave a talk about Charlie called “107, not out” on Radio Éireann at the time. Charlie’s regular daily diet was a boiled egg, tea and white bread for breakfast; three to four potatoes for dinner; very strong tea and more white bread for tea, followed by a bowl of Indian porridge before going to bed. He was a fluent Irish speaker, singer and seanchaÍ, and although he was dead some 17 years before we went to Carrigart, his memory and legend were very much alive.
Next time you’re sweating over the amount of ‘roughage’ in your brown loaf or drooling over your fat free turkey, remember young McCarry!

HOCHEN HICHEN… DICHEN DOCHEN!
Charlie McCarry’s dinner of spuds reminds me that long before we got ‘swanky’, we ate the dinner in the middle of the day. If my father was next door in the Garda Station in Carrigart, he’d be by the range at one o’clock sharp, with his back to a pot of spuds on the range, and as befitted a Cavan man, he could keep his hands folded behind his back and still peel one or two before my mother put them on his plate! Neighbours of ours, bachelor brothers, albeit some years later and in south-west Donegal, never deviated from this habit, but one of them fell in love a wee bit late in life and subsequently got married. She was nothing short of a saint, and didn’t insist on the husband’s brother living elsewhere. She looked after him like a sister but he wasn’t entirely grateful, and shaking his head in disgust one day, he informed my father thus:
“Do you mind when me and himself was just ourselves? We had the dinner in the middle of the day, the ‘wee tae’ at 6 and the ‘big tae’ about 8? Well, you won’t believe it, Mick, but she’s gone and switched the dinner to 6, and she’s ‘emolished’ the ‘wee tae’ altogether…emolished it!”
And what, my father enquired, happens now in the middle of the day? “A feed o’ f..keen tomatas!” was the reply, “the brother’s gone all swanky himself and calls the f..keen tomatas ‘lunch’!”
In the early 1970’s, the area became a magnet for hippies and drop-outs, many of them professional people from the US and Germany. A veterinarian from Bavaria moved in beside the two brothers and in no time, his head was ‘deeved’ when his neighbours found out he was a ‘vit’, and by way of a bonus he also had a car which became a very busy hackney service transporting the lads to their local.
One night before Christmas, the ‘vit’ and his partner were driving home with the two merry men in the back, when they began conversing in German. One of the brothers took great umbrage at this, thinking they were trying to hide something from him, and informed my father the following day: “the more he tried his hochen hichen, dichen dochen, the more I gave him Stranakirke, Meenaneary and Barr a Bhogaigh!
“And when I faded, the other brother went at him with Meenacharvey, Umeriwiirrimam and Port a h’Amhlaigh!”
Unsurprisingly, the Teutonic ‘vit’ went back to the middle class pleasures of Munchen.

ACTING THE ‘GOAT’!
Ah for God's sakes, I thought...you're taking the Bisht!
After the best World Cup Final ever, not only does the Emir of Qatar drape a yoke called a Bisht around Lionel Messi, but Infantile Gianni hogs the limelight again, by literally hanging out of the wee genius!
GOAT has been thrown about in the media for the last month and has become the football acronym for 'Greatest Of All Time'. I know nostalgia makes the heart grow fonder, and so watching the 1970 World Cup convinced me that Pele was the greatest footballer ever, and having the pleasure of seeing him live once, George Best wasn’t far behind..

Didi Hamman gave Ronaldo a right going over on RTÉ about his treatment of the wonderful Morocco team, refusing to shake hands and storming off down the tunnel.
As we say up here, a ‘good slap’ would tighten him.
Hamman, Sadlier, Brady, Duff have been super pundits throughout, and our own Shay Given has been a breath of fresh air. Hats off to RTÉ 2 for super coverage again, and much as we miss Dunphy, Giles and Billo, the craic was particularly good when The Duffer, Shay and Liam Brady were together.
The best pundit on the English channels was also Irish…Roy Keane on ITV was head and shoulders above his bland BBC counterparts, and Piers Morgan won the trophy for ‘Best Half-Eegit’ of the tournament.
Because his interview with Ronaldo caused Man Utd to get shot of him, Piers is obsessed with the Portugese Prima Donna, and in a tweet, claimed the best ever top 5 footballers were Ronaldo, Maradona, Messi, Ronaldinho and Ronaldo (Brazil). No Pele in the top 5!
Now he's claiming that the French team were poisoned before the Final! Well, thank God Kylian Mbappe found an antidote.
As they say in Derry, Piers…”Away and boil your head!”
Messi makes the team around him play better…Ronaldo doesn’t.