by Des Bishop
My first performance. I was in kindergarten or first grade and I got cast as Humpty Dumpty. I can’t remember much about the evening, but I remember everyone thought the costume was hilarious.
But the truth is that it is also part of who we are and I am not going to look at my personality and say, ‘Aren’t you the needy fellow that needs your life validated with applause?’ It is not the whole truth, because there is also a beauty to it: there is something lovely about the joy that comes from holding court. I certainly enjoyed it at times when watching my dad. It is not like you are burdening the audience with your needs. You are bringing something to them. There is an energy that exists there, and when it’s flowing it is a beautiful thing.
So really it is more about the silence. In the absence of applause is there joy in the silence?
I think that for a long time, for both myself and my father, there was only longing in the silence. In the absence of applause there were only questions like ‘What is wrong with me?’ In the absence there was only insecurity, disappointment, loneliness and the past. Booze and drugs can fill up the silence, but only for a while.
For us in the end there was joy in the silence. More importantly, there was joy in togetherness. I think it is a new way for me to understand the expression ‘We made peace’. It was not as if there was major conflict to resolve. It was more like through being open to appreciating our time together in his illness and working together on the show, it brought us a peace that was very deep.
The show – the peace – was something we made together. We brought it to an audience. That is what we do. It wasn’t because we needed to; it was because it was something we loved to do. It might also be that we were each other’s audience, and we impressed each other a lot.
As for my dad and what he brought to me, it was all about the liberation from the fear that I could not advance beyond what I had already achieved. By the time we did the show I had got over my fears around leaving Ireland, and by this stage I had performed all over the world, but I thought it was quite poignant that it was the show I did with my dad that was the first really successful thing I had done anywhere outside Ireland. Our show in Edinburgh was a resounding success: everyone was talking about it. When we got a five-star review in the Guardian, I knew we had achieved something at the highest level of international comedy and performance. I just thought it was great that one of the main sources of my fear and anxiety actually helped me to conquer them. I thought it was great that for him he was doing the same.
I know he was going to the grave more fulfilled than before he got sick. My mother is convinced it was all he lived for in the end. The TV documentary came out eight days before he died.
A few days before my dad died, I came home to say goodbye, and though he could hardly speak he grabbed my hand, and the first thing he said to me was, ‘You pulled it off, man, you pulled it off.’ He said it twice so I knew it meant a lot. I knew he was talking about Edinburgh and the TV show.
I think what he meant to say was, ‘We pulled it off!’, but he was too humble on that occasion to give himself the credit. The whole family pulled it off. We were open to it. We went with that experience as a way to get through it all.
36
The day we were told my dad had cancer and my mother said, ‘Desmond, I can’t handle this, you need to handle it,’ it was as if she was handing me the baton of control in the family and I was grabbing it and running a stage of the relay of our lives together. Michael John was living in America full time, and when I went on tour to Australia or back to Ireland he looked after everything. Really, once my dad got sick we both took on strong roles, because Michael John had also just been through it with his father-in-law and had a good idea of the right questions to ask. He was the only one who was a father, so he already understood the responsibility of caretaking.
But Aidan got his time to look after our dad at the end. Like myself, Aidan also stopped drinking at the age of nineteen. Before he had finished college, he started doing open spots in New York City, trying to break into comedy there. He did not tell anyone in the family, but when I found out about it I suggested that when he finished college he should move to Ireland and help me run the International Comedy Club, a night I ran every week at the International Bar on Wicklow Street. I thought that he would come over for a while and become a better comedian and then move back to New York. He moved over at the beginning of 2003 and ended up never going back to New York. He was the opening act for me during the Irish tour of My Dad Was Nearly James Bond.
When my dad stopped chemo and took a bad turn with pain, Aidan was the one who went home and grabbed the baton, and he was the anchor in the end. He really got stuck with the shit job, literally. He was the one who had to put my dad in diapers. He had to learn how to move my dad around in a way so that his bedclothes could be changed. He was the one who watched as my dad slowly faded from coherence. By the time I got back to New York, my father was waving his hands in the air, cheering the presence of death like some never-ending Mexican wave.
Aidan had helped him to get to that place comfortably. He did a great job. It was wonderful that he was able to do that because he had taken a back seat before, which is what I think the youngest commonly does. There seems to be some subconscious hierarchy in his head that makes him feel like his input should come last. But he did it despite the fact that he had to cancel loads of work.
Aidan jokes, ‘Des gave Dad a documentary and put him back on stage, Michael John gave him Kieran, his first grandson, and I gave him suppositories that helped him to shit for the first time in two weeks. All of those things brought my father pure bliss in those final days.’
For us this is extra funny, because when we were kids we used to make Aidan clean up the dog poo from out in our front garden because he was the youngest. For a while he hated it, but we used to try and cheer him up by calling him POO MAN as if he was a superhero. ‘Aidan, you better go out in the garden. I think this is a job for POO MAN!’ It was nice that that poo man got to put his cape on one last time.
Michael John does not drink anymore either, but he stayed out there a little bit longer. Although I find him hilarious, he did not take the same route as me and Aidan. He became a teacher. This is not to say he was not like my dad, because he was always incredibly good at sports, particularly soccer. Sports were always a huge part of his life and he went to college on a soccer scholarship. His sporting prowess was always a source of great pride for my father, though I think at times Michael John had too much pressure put on him as a child. My dad pushed my brother hard but, worse than that, later he held on to thoughts that my brother could have done more with his talent in sport. That was the unfortunate thing about my dad: he saw everything in hindsight in terms of what could have been better. It was as if he was programmed to see life in terms of regret.
The tension between my father and brother on that front was never overpowering and was very much between them. Eventually my father could not have been prouder of what a wonderful teacher my brother became. More importantly, though, he could not have been prouder of what a wonderful father my brother became. I could not be any prouder of those things either. I could go on for a long time about the things I love about my brother Michael John. I could go on for a long time too about why he drives me crazy, and I know he could say the same about me. I love his kids more than I thought an uncle could love his nephews. Plus it helped to watch Kieran grow as my father faded away. It helped to make sense of what life is about. It did not need to be said, it just helped me to see that the journey continues regardless.
My dad with Kieran on the day of his christening.
Michael John is the only one of us who is married, of course, and I think that is an indictment of the unstable world of comedy. It has never been great for sustaining relationships.
But we made a great team, my mother included. We all did our bits at the right time and we didn’t have too many
fights. Funnily enough, the only fight I can really remember is the fight I had with Michael John over the eulogy on the morning of the funeral. Of course we were going to clash when it came to the performance. We were our father’s children; we wanted to make sure that the audience left thinking it was the most amazing funeral ever. It is the way he would have wanted it, and I was not going to live my days regretting how it went.
People always ask me how we were able to be so open at that time. It is really simple: we just let go. We were inspired by my dad letting go. ‘If I snuff it tomorrow, I will die a very proud man!’ It hits me even more now, what that meant to me and my brothers. That pride is inspiring.
All of us in the Hamptons, around 2005.
It washes away all the disappointment. It neutralizes all those conversations about money. It cleanses Michael John of the stresses of having to be the best damn footballer in the world just to feel good enough. It makes Aidan realize that he does not have to be famous to be good enough. It says to a little boy wandering away from the pitch after walking out of the goals that you don’t have to be ashamed anymore.
It was more powerful than any standing ovation. I mean, it was great that we got one every night in Edinburgh, but honestly, after what we did together as a family, if I snuffed it tomorrow I would die with the same pride.
My dad was found out by my brothers and myself. He had conned himself into thinking he was less than he was. He lived by that con and passed it on to us. We found out that he was much more impressive than we thought. In light of that, we found out that we too were much more impressive than we thought. A cloud of shame was lifted from our family. Our togetherness was an inspiration: it was a sense of family I had never really known was there.
37
I was not meant to come home for Christmas 2010; my parents were meant to come to Ireland. The incredible December weather in Dublin stopped that plan in its tracks. My parents’ flight was officially cancelled at around 3 p.m. on 20 December. They had been due to fly out that night. I remember the moment because I was stuck in the most unbelievable traffic on the M50, and I broke down crying at the thought of not seeing my father for what was going to be our last Christmas together.
It turned out to be a blessing because he never even got out of bed that day. The week leading up to him coming to Ireland was actually the week when my mother began to realize that the chemo was not really working at all. In the end it was just a fluke that the flight got cancelled due to the snow, because I don’t think my dad would have been able to get on the plane.
It was sad for me though, because my dad had been going on about getting back to Ireland and looking forward to being wheeled down Grafton Street on Christmas Eve. He had loved the last time we all did that as a family, a few years earlier when we spent our first Christmas in Ireland together. It was one of the best Christmases we’d ever had. He was hoping to listen to the buskers again and meet up with all the people you bump into on that day in Dublin.
Really, I was lucky that he did not make it over because this time I had been telling anyone in Ireland who would listen very embarrassing stories about my dad. So now it would not just be me people recognized on the street, but also him. They would have shouted, ‘Mayday! Mayday!’ back at him or even reminded him of the Black Bob story.
When I finally got off the M50, I turned the tears into action, and myself and my brother Aidan got a Newark flight out of Shannon on Christmas Eve. I deliberately picked Shannon because it had not been snowing on the west coast. It was a good call because, even though flights left Dublin that day, it had snowed the night before and it would not have been worth the stress. I was taking no risks. So, on the night of 23 December, in the middle of one of the worst snowstorms I have ever seen in Ireland, we headed to Shannon.
It was a bitter-sweet thing to be home with the family, knowing that the end was very near. It was great to get there, but I could see how much my dad had declined since the end of October when I was last home. He was very weak and struggling to get out of bed. My nephew Kieran’s cuteness and development into the most fun ever added to the sweetness. It helped to turn the sadness into celebration.
This was really the second time we were having Dad’s last Christmas. I have a picture of my mom crying at Christmas 2009 because she thought it was going to be the last family photo at Christmas. We all thought that back then. It was sad to know that he would not pull it off for another one, but it was wonderful to be having one more Christmas together. This was our consolation Christmas.
Christmas 2009.
On Christmas morning I was getting my dad ready to get up and take the slow trip down the stairs. He had not been down there for three days, but he was feeling better in the last two days and had saved his energy for Christmas Day so he could have dinner and enjoy the company. I don’t know how we got on the subject of songs, but he asked me if I knew the song, ‘Dublin in the Rare Auld Times’. He sang a bit of it but I only knew the ‘ring a ring a rosie’ bit and that was all he knew, too. So I got out my iPhone and looked it up. There was a version by Ronnie Drew on it and I played him that and he sang along. I found it very sad because I knew Ronnie had died of cancer and I know his son, Phelim. It brought it home to me that my dad was not going to be around for very long. I felt sadness for Phelim, who is such a lovely guy, and this fed into my sorrow that I would soon be part of that club. But my dad sang away, happy to be alive for that moment.
Listening to Ronnie Drew reminded me that my friend Cathal had bought my father a Luke Kelly CD for Christmas, so I thought that I could play him ‘Raglan Road’ on the iPhone to see if he liked Luke Kelly.
While we listened I got my dad’s sneakers to put them on him. I had a routine with all that, so getting them on was no big deal. But, for some reason, as I was tying his laces my eyes began to tear up. ‘Raglan Road’ is a sad song anyway, but just being there listening to it while tying the laces of the man who tied mine when I was a boy was heartbreaking. I loved him very much at that moment. I was so happy I was able to take care of him. I kept my head down and did not let him know that I was crying.
We got downstairs and opened the presents. Dad loved his Luke Kelly CD. We then broke out the flip camera and tried to capture some memories. Aidan put the camera on Dad and I leaned in with my hands and said: ‘Dad’s Last Christmas, Take 2.’ CLAP!
38
When we had already done My Dad Was Nearly James Bond in Edinburgh and my father was back doing chemo from the end of August for the second time, with less than promising results, I asked him why he was bothering doing it again when he was only delaying the inevitable. He still wanted to be around for longer. I told him that he had done everything a man could do in his situation. He had made sure his wife would be looked after once he was gone. His children were all educated. He had a grandchild. He had been back on stage in a show about his life that people loved. He had wonderful friends and in his time of need he was surrounded by his family that loved him deeply. I asked him if there was anything else that was on his mind that he wanted to do before he died. He immediately said that he wanted to have another crack at the musical and make sure that he recorded the songs he had written that had not been recorded already.
For us three boys this was a bitter-sweet desire, because none of us had much faith in the musical. We saw it as cheesy and a waste of time. Michael John had done his part and had brought the script to a few people at his school who were into theatre. Michael John and I had a belief that the focus should be on the characters. I was very honest with my dad and I told him that the musical was a fantasy story about a boy whose mother was taken off him. It was also a morality tale about the horrible effects of greed. The consequence in the musical was that Michael Ryan cut corners on a building site, which caused an accident that killed Ned, the man who took him in after his mother was sent away. I knew that my dad had spent most of his life wishing he had made more money. It was as
if he was trying to prove to himself that he had made the right moves, I suppose.
I told him that if he wanted to have one more go, he should forget about most of the musical and see if he could be inspired by the true story: that Michael Ryan was not on a boat with his mother, but was, in fact, with his ‘Uncle Ned’ who had come to England to take him away from his abusive mother. The story of his mother being taken away at Ellis Island was a myth that his uncle and himself had decided would be the story they told for life. The story of his father being dead was part of that lie too, because he was never able to make sense of why a father could let that kind of abuse happen to a son. Michael Ryan’s greed was driven by his need to feel like he had achieved enough and was good enough in the eyes of society because, when push came to shove, he held on to the secret of his own abandonment and rejection.
The same secret was the very thing that drove a wedge between himself and everyone he loved because he feared getting close to anyone, lest the same thing should happen. His greatest fear was being found out as a phoney. He would go to any lengths to ensure that didn’t happen. Inevitably, those desires caused him to kill the very man who had saved him.
The rest doesn’t really matter. I just wanted my dad to stop turning his mother into an angel. I wanted him to stop pretending that he was not the victim. I really did not care about how the story panned out, I just wanted him to stop writing the fantasy and be inspired by the reality. The redemption in the story would come when Michael finally admitted to his wife and daughter that his silence and greed were motivated by a secret about his parents he had kept all his life. He admitted at times to feeling so distant from them because he resented the very peace he had provided for them that had been so cruelly taken from him.