Country Boys

by J. P. Diamond

  “Right – are we ready to start again soon?” said Gerry. As the workers slowly got to their feet, Kevin whispered to Sean and Patsy, “Wait till the big doll starts to gather again and see if we can hit her on the ars with a spud.” “Who’s goin’ to shoot first?” asked Sean. “I will - and if I miss, some o’ youse throw one after me.” As big Grainne bent down to gather the potatoes she had left in her section of the drill before teabreak was called, Kevin lifted a small potato and threw it. Though Grainne’s bottom presented an adequate target, Kevin’s shot, perhaps made more with power than accuracy in mind, landed several feet from her. It didn’t stop her from looking around her shoulder though. Kevin whispered to Sean, “Right - you try.” Sean, who suspected that big Grainne would be intent on retribution, decided that he would make sure that Grainne wouldn’t see him. He lifted another small white potato, took careful aim and immediately the potato had left his hand, assumed potato-gathering position. He didn’t even see the potato hit Grainne square on target. The other two did however and chuckled to themselves. As big Grainne assumed upright position, she looked around and noticed Patsy and Kevin giggling. She threw down her basket and made her way towards the two boys. Sean could see out of the corner of his eye that she was clearly quite angry. “Ye wee bastard - wait till I catch ye!” shouted a clearly upset Grainne. Her pace quickened as she got nearer Kevin and it became clear to Kevin and the others that she was blaming him. “Some of ye’s hold him for me!” shouted Grainne. Brian McGonigle, who was giggling himself, caught Kevin in a bear-hug from behind. “McGonigle – let me go ye big bastard,” pleaded Kevin who was caught firmly in the bigger boy’s strong grip. “It wasn’t me – it was him,” panted Kevin as he nodded his head in Sean’s direction. Because his arms were pinned to his sides, he couldn’t point Sean out. It wouldn’t have mattered anyway as Grainne had already pronounced him guilty. Brian let him go just as Grainne caught his arm and wrestled him to the ground. “It wasn’t me!” repeated Kevin who clearly wasn’t enjoying this large girl sitting on top of him. “It was you – I saw ye throw the first one,” replied Grainne. “I’m goin’ to give ye a wee massage – would ye like that?” she inquired as she lifted a piece of soft sticky clay. “Naww –don’t - ahhh Jaysuss!” exclaimed Kevin as big Grainne rubbed the clay around his neck and down the front of his tee-shirt. She then rubbed what was left of the clay on his face. “That’ll teach ye – ye boy ye!” remarked Grainne, who, satisfied with her revenge, got to her feet and walked back to her drill. Once she was out of earshot, a dirty-faced Kevin picked himself up. “That big doll could rassle Mick Mc-Manus,” he muttered. “She’s the junior shot-putt champion at the convent,” replied Sean. “Maybe I should have told ye that before ye got yer bright idea.” “Maybe we should stop talkin’ about her or she might come back,”joked Patsy. “I think she had it in for me after I insulted Donny Osmond,” noted Kevin.

  “Have you boys not got some work to do?” shouted Gerry from the cab of the tractor. The three took their pre-teabreak positions and work resumed as normal.

  CHAPTER 6

  Thursday 26th October

  For Sean and all his schoolmates, the main event of Halloween was the fancy-dress disco. For the boys in the town, another source of entertainment was door-rapping, though out in the country where the houses were farther apart and nearly every house had a long lane or a cross dog (or both), it wasn’t done as much. Also, the parents of the area would have strongly disapproved of their children tormenting their neighbours – especially elderly people who lived alone. Sean remembered too that in the late 1960’s, before the Troubles started, fireworks could be bought in the local shops. He remembered his father bringing home a selection of squibs, rockets and Catherine wheels to light in the back garden and he recalled the distinctive, pungent smell that lingered after the firework had been lit.

  Back to the present though, and solving a problem more often encountered by members of the female gender – what to wear? If only he had a guitar he could borrow his sister Mary’s wig and dress himself as Marc Bolan, the pop-star. Still – the guitar would be damaged as there would be no safe place for it with everyone jumping about and dancing. Suddenly an idea grabbed him. Why not make a dummy guitar with some wood, paint and a black marker to colour in the strings? His daddy had a small workshop at the back of the house, with a vice and some tools. There was a strip of wood about one-and-a-half inches thick which could be used for the neck. His sister had a big poster of Bolan with his guitar in her bedroom and he could use that as a plan to shape the guitar-body. Time to get to work! Working out how to look like Bolan could come later, but his sister Mary was a big fan and she could give him some help and advice. There was only five days to go so he went out to the shed right away and laid down the basic design for the dummy guitar. Drawing the strings onto the neck would be fairly easy. The awkward bits would be joining the neck to the body and making a headstock to join to the neck. He’d have to get his da to help him. Peter, who had spotted the light in the shed and had gone in to turn it off, appeared behind him. “Da – will ye help me make somethin’?” “What are ye lookin’ to make, son?” “I want to put together a dummy guitar for this fancy-dress disco on Tuesday night.” “That’s a bit short-notice son.” “Well – it doesn’t have to be anything fancy – here’s what I’m thinkin’ of doin’”. Sean explained the layout to his father who agreed to fashion the body of the guitar. Then they worked out a way to join the neck to the body using four small screws. At 11o’clock, Peter said “I think we’ll have somethin’ ready by Tuesday night Sean. We’ll call it a night.” “Ok da – thanks for helpin’ me out.” “No problem – I only hope it dosen’t fall apart come Tuesday.”

  The following evening after school, Sean was back in the workshop. He had the Bolan poster with him as he wanted to copy the headstock design from it, or get as near to it as he could. The guitar on the poster was a beautifully contoured shape with a red and yellow body. On the head-stock of the guitar he could see the words “Gibson” and “Les Paul”, written in italic writing. The first two periods next morning at school were woodwork and he’d asked the teacher to borrow a piece of discarded pine with which he hoped to fashion the headstock from. When he arrived home from school on Friday afternoon, Sean went straight out to the workshop. He drew an outline of the headstock on the piece of pine with the marker, put it in the vice and proceeded to cut away the outline with a coping saw. It took nearly an hour to do. At one point his mother had called him in to do his homework but he told her that he was doing a woodwork assessment. He then wrapped a slice of rough sandpaper around a small piece of wood and proceeded to sand the rough edges of the newly fashioned headstock. Though he preferred the practical side of woodwork to the theoretical side, he’d never really been passionate about the subject until now. He then took a 6” ruler and marked the points of the 6 machine heads with a pencil which he drew in with a black marker. He then cut a groove in the headstock and joined the neck to the end of the groove by applying some wood-glue. He tightened the finished article in a vice and left it overnight to harden.

  On Sunday evening, Sean knocked on his sister Mary’s door. “Is that you Sean?” she called. “Aye- Mary. Mary, I’ve been meaning to ask you a favour.” “You’re bound to be loaded after all potato-gathering you’ve been doin’, Sean.” “Naw – I’m not lookin’ for a lend of money.” “Well – what is it then?” “Ye know this fancy-dress disco this Friday. Well I’ve been thinkin’ of goin’ as Marc Bolan. In fact I’ve already started makin’ a dummy guitar. But I need your help to dress up like him and ye know he wears stuff on his face an all.” “What put in in yer head to dress like Mark. Bolan I didn’t even know ye liked him.” “Well – I don’t mind him. Some of his songs are OK. To tell ye the truth it was he only thing I could think of and I know you’ve got a curly-haired wig I could wear with one of yer white blouses.” “I have. Mind you – I was thinkin’ of goin’ as Yvonne Goolagong the tennis player with tha
t wig.” “Could ye not go as Chris Evert instead. Goolagong is an Aborigine y’know. It’d be easier to look like Evert.” “S’pose I could do that OK. Leave it to me and I’ll get ye dressed up like Marc.” “God bless ye, Mary,” replied Sean.

  The following evening when Sean came home from school he set about painting the guitar body. His father had finished shaping the body the night before for him and he had done a pretty accurate job with it. Sean decided that, instead of trying to copy the red and yellow colour of the guitar in the Bolan poster, he’d use a tin of blue paint perched up on one of the shelves. He had seen blue guitars in magazines and all rock-stars owned more than one guitar, he reasoned. He mixed some turpentine into the blue paint, stirred it well and began to apply the paint in even strokes along the wood grain, taking care to wipe any dust off the body first with a cloth. After doing the front and back, he left it to dry for a couple of hours. He then gave both sides a second coating. Rather than paint the edges, he would get a roll of black, plastic adhesive tape in town the next day and do the edges with that. He took the head-stock and neck out of the vice and waved it in the air a few times to see if the headstock flew off. It stayed on OK. So, the only piece of woodwork left to do was to join the neck to the guitar-body. Peter had cut a groove at the appropriate position so Sean reckoned he could let his father do that bit for him, given that he had already started it. He would draw in the pickups, the bridge, the switches and the strings the next day when the paint had thoroughly dried and everything was joined together.

  He met his father in the yard as he was coming out of the shed. “Can I show ye what I’ve done here, da?” “Let me see son.” “Could you do that bit there, da?” “Aye – I’ll do that for ye son. I’ll join it with four wee screws from the back, so ye won’t see them from the front. I’ll do it tonight so ye can finish off everythin’ yerself tomorrow evenin’”.“That’d be great, da.”

  Lying in bed that night, Sean was thinking about all sorts of things. Mainly he was trying to think up a plan for asking Geraldine Donnelly out. He knew she’d be there and this was the perfect chance. He was also a bit worried about making a fool of himself by dressing up as an effeminate looking pop-star, as he instinctively knew that he wasn’t possessed of the same confident, extrovert personality as Patsy or Kevin. But then he reasoned that everyone, not just himself, would be in fancy-dress. He also had an idea to play a trick on his Granda by not saying anything to him to see if his Granda could recognise him in fancy-dress without hearing his voice.

  On Tuesday afternoon, Sean bought the roll of PVC tape on the way home from school. After finishing his dinner, he went out to the workshop. His father had done just as he had promised. The “guitar” was sitting on the bench ready for completion. After admiring his father’s tidy woodworking skills, he set about putting the PVC tape around the edge of the body. He had two black markers; a thin one to draw in the strings, which he did by using a spirit-level; and a thicker one to draw the bridge and switches to the body. He looked at his watch when he was finished. It was nearly eight o’clock. He really appreciated that his father had gone out of his way to take the time and trouble to help him and was eager to show him the finished article. He noticed that his father has even screwed on two small screws at opposite ends of the guitar to attach a strap to; something he himself had forgotten about.

  At six o’clock on Tuesday evening, Sean and his two sisters were all focused entirely on achieving the same objective; making their fancy-dresses look as realistic as possible. Mary, who had long blonde hair like Chris Evert, didn’t have to wear a wig. So, apart from getting her tennis outfit to fit, she was mainly preoccupied with getting her skin to glisten a golden–brown colour like Miss Evert’s. “I’ll sort you out as soon as I’ve got this stuff on Sean,” shouted Mary from her bedroom as she applied the orange-coloured fake-tan to her left thigh. Sean was busy cleaning an old pair of his big sisters platform shoes, which he intended to wear. They were a little tight but a surprisingly good fit nonetheless. He’d have to be careful if he was up dancing, though. His other sister Siobhan was going as a nurse.

  About an hour later, Mary, having checked herself in the mirror for at least the thirtieth time, emerged from the bedroom. “Ye really look the part Mary, but I hope for your sake that it dosen’t rain on ye tonight. Things could get a bit messy if that orangey stuff starts to dribble onto yer tennis outfit.” “Just as well ye said that Sean. I’ll remember to bring me rain-mac with me. Now; let’s get ye dressed up.” Mary took Sean into the room and sat him down facing the mirror where she did her own make-up. His face was clean, as he had bathed an hour previously. Firstly she rubbed on some moisturiser, followed by a little foundation. She then applied some blusher to either cheek. For Sean, this was a new and somewhat un-nerving experience. Even the perfume-like smell in the room was foreign to him. This was followed by the application of a little mascara to both eyelashes, Mary expertly dabbing away any excess with a small piece of cotton wool. Finally, she applied a little lip-gloss and the make-up phase of the transformation was completed.

  “Now – let’s try on this wig!” said Mary. By now Siobhan had entered the room in her nurse outfit and was enthusiastically offering Mary advice. “Well – what do ye think?” she asked, pointing at the Bolan poster on the wall. “Not too far away?” “It’s as near as I’ll get – or want to get. Next year I’ll go as a cowboy or caveman or some-thin’”. “Aw Sean – don’t be scared to get in touch with yer feminine side,” joked Siobhan, as she stroked his wig. “Siobhan could you go out and get me the guitar. It’s out in the shed. I don’t want Granda seein’ me ‘till I’m leavin’”. “Why not?” “I want to see if he’ll recognise me. My voice’ll give me away if I have to speak to him.” “We’ll call ye Fidelma, ” laughed Mary. “Put a tee-shirt under that blouse to keep warm Sean. It’s a cold night,” instructed Siobhan, as she went to fetch the guitar.

  CHAPTER 7

  Halloween Night 1972.

  The disco started at 9 o’clock, so at half-past eight all three of the young Dalys were sitting in the living-room, waiting for their father to leave them into town. Granda was in his usual seat watching the TV. Finally Peter appeared. “All ready everybody?” “Ready as we’ll ever be,” said Mary excitedly as she made for the door to the front porch, outside where the car was sitting. “Bye Granda – come on Fidelma,” said Mary to Sean. “Bye-bye love. Don’t you wee hussies be stayin’ out too late tonight now,” replied Granda. “I’ll be collectin’ yous at half-eleven sharp,” instructed Peter. Sean was amused by the fact that his Granda had thought he was a friend of his two sisters and did not recognise him. About two miles outside the town there was an Army checkpoint, so the journey took about twenty minutes. When they arrived, a line of people in fancy-dress were queuing outside the hall.

  “Have ye’s got money for the ticket?” inquired Peter. “Yes,” spoke the two girls in high-pitched unison. “I’ll meet ye all here at half-eleven. Have a good time.” Once the three had got inside, the disco had already started. Sean’s two sisters went off to look for their friends, as he did for his. His cousin Patsy had been unwell since the weekend with a dose of flu and wouldn’t be here. He looked around in vain for Kevin, but with the dim lights and the fancy-dress it was hard to discern who was who. Out of the corner of his eye he saw someone come in the door. They were dressed in tight, black trousers, black tee-shirt, with a long black wig and a face decorated with copious amounts of mascara. The persons gait and absence of breasts indicated to Sean that it was a male. But what really made Sean laugh was the fact that around his neck he carried a large, green, rubber snake. As Sean moved closer to see who this character was, he noticed that, imprinted on the tee-shirt in Gothic writing, were the words “Schools Out For Summer”. It was someone dressed as the crazy American heavy-rocker, Alice Cooper. Suddenly a flicker of recognition came over Sean’s face as “Alice” stepped into the light. “Kevin – is that you?” “Hey Sean – I didn’t reco
gnise ye boy. Jesus – what have ye done with yerself?” “I could ask you the same question,” laughed Sean. “Hi Sean – us big-time rock-gods are gonna pull tonight. Look – we’re gettin’ eyed up already.” Kevin took the head of the imitation snake with its large, protruding, rubber tongue and shook it at a couple of young girls who were looking over at him. The two girls put their hands to their mouths and broke into a fit of giggling. As the song ended, the DJ said, “I see we’ve got Marc Bolan and Alice Cooper here tonight. Here’s a couple of numbers that they might recognise.” The chugging, hypnotic opening bars of “Get it On” had the immediate effect of enticing many of the female attendees up onto the dance-floor. “Hey Sean – come and dance with our two new fans.”“OK. ”. Sean looked around and slid his guitar under an old sofa in the corner. He wasn’t just as keen as Kevin about being the centre of attention, but he went along anyway. Kevin led the way and started dancing with the taller blonde; Sean with the smaller, black-haired girl. The two were dressed as schoolgirls, with miniskirts, plaited hair and imitation freckles. “What’s yer names!” shouted Kevin to the blonde, trying to make himself heard above the loud music. “I’m Juicy Lucy - she’s Naughty Dotty,” retorted the blonde. “Aye”, laughed Kevin, “but yer real names.” “I’m Fiona – she’s Gemma.” “Lookin’ at you two makes me wish we had girls in our class,” said Kevin. “Do youse two do yer own make-up?” asked Gemma, pointing to her own face to make herself understood. “I had my sister do it for me,” said Sean. “Yours is a bit tidier than his. I think that friend of yours is a bit of an eejit,” remarked Gemma. Midway through the song, Kevin was holding the snake in the air, pirouetting and singing the words of the chorus. Gemma looked at her bemused friend then asked Sean, “why dosen’t he leave that thing down?” “He was goin’ to put it under that sofa over there but he was scared it might frighten somebody,” said Sean with a straight face. “I think you’re as daft as he is,” replied Gemma. Sean laughed. He sometimes got himself tongue-tied on the dancefloor and loud background music made chatting up girls difficult anyway. He surprised himself at his own wit. Gemma had nice eyes and Sean thought she was the prettier of the two, though Kevin probably thought otherwise.