Looking Under Stones

by Joe O'Toole

  The wad of money from the sale of the beasts would be handed over without a whimper. It would be held securely in my grandmother’s big safe until the wives came into town shopping or to Mass the following week. As a child I thought those grown men looked so bashful when handing over the money, but when I was older and wiser I realised that the only reason they came into her in the first place was to rid themselves of the burden of carrying the money, so that they could drink in peace and to excess for the rest of the day. A pleasurable, immoderate, intoxicated end to the biggest day out in the month and a break from the constant battle to survive on a couple of acres of farmland and mountain commonage.

  By the end of the day, as the light disappeared westward behind Mount Eagle, the town was a sorry sight, the morning smell of wet wool replaced by the pungent odour of sheep dirt, footpaths and shopfronts spattered with the evidence of the fair. Business people engaged in the dirty work of hosing and brushing clean their patches of pavement. They did it gladly before counting their takings. In Dingle, as elsewhere, ‘where there’s muck, there’s money’. Luckless, downhearted small farmers driving out their unsold animals, facing home without the wherewithal for the winter. Siopa na bPíonna on Main Street long since sold out of Dingle mutton pies. Patient horses harnessed to traps tethered outside pubs. Younger, more skittish ponies at the end of long reins, which trailed their way through a dark doorway to a strong farmer, pint in one hand, reins in the other. Loyal sheepdogs awaiting their masters, their slumbering heads resting on front paws. A noisy and constant intermingling of man and animal. In my memory all the conversations and banter as Gaelainn, the soft, expressive Irish dialect of West Kerry, the language of An t-Oileánach, Fiche Bliain ag Fás and Peig.

  And above the talk, the whinnying and the barking, from every pub door came the wail of sean-nós singing. It would be unheard of for the day’s drinking to conclude without a few sean nós songs. Among the favourites was An Ciarraíoch Mallaithe (The Cursed Kerryman):

  ‘Má leanfaim go dian tú siar go Cairbreach

  Caillfead mo chiall mura dtriallfair abhaile liom’

  (If I follow you all the way west to Cairbreach

  I’ll go out of my mind if you don’t return home with me)

  In West Kerry it was the custom for the singer to ask another man to hold his hand as he sang. This example of male bonding is something I have never seen elsewhere.

  Finally, last stories exchanged and last drinks having been called again and again and again, each would venture out onto the street and head back against the prevailing wind, relying on the pony to find the way home.

  BURIED TALENTS

  ‘You’re going to learn the piano,’ Teresa said brightly. I wasn’t so sure. As far as I can recall, I had shown no particular ‘bent’ for the piano, but music has always been highly valued in Dingle and Teresa obviously saw me going all the way to concert performances. Kathleen Griffin, an elderly, solitary woman who lived in the Holyground, was the organist for the church choir in Dingle. She had a good reputation, which apparently was well deserved. So I was sent to Kathleen for piano lessons. I would have been around eight at the time.

  It wasn’t so much that the understanding of lines and spaces, quavers and semi-quavers was all that difficult, it was just deadly boring and irrelevant. Oh, I got to know that E-G-B-D-F are the lines (remembered by the mnemonic, Every Good Boy Deserves Favour), and F-A-C-E are the spaces. Or is it the other way round? But I was not engaged. I wanted out and I told Kathleen that I was giving up the classes. Teresa would not agree, so I had to go back. The lessons took place in Kathleen’s front room, a dark place, littered with sheet music and the bits and pieces that go with the whole business. There was a smell that I didn’t like. The piano was situated along the side wall, and everything and everyone passing the window caught my eye.

  Seán Cleary, turning into the archway, going around the back of his garage; Garda Cremins coming out the side gate of the station, and heading away home; Begley taking his greyhounds for a walk around Cooleen; Johnson pulling in Ashe’s small lorry to deliver porter to Hanora. Anything was more interesting than what I was doing.

  I sat on the piano stool beside Kathleen. She did her best for me and gave me every encouragement, but with scant success. We both knew that I was there under duress. Things got so desperate that eventually Kathleen was holding my hands and quite literally manipulating my fingers to play the piano keys with them. It was a strange tableau indeed: me looking out the window, Kathleen concentrating on knocking a tune into me, my fingers doing the playing and music emanating. And whereas she could play a very good tune with my fingers on her piano, it was hardly appropriate preparation for my future concert performances. By the time my mother accepted that the piano was not my forte and released me from my torture, I had become reasonably proficient at ‘Three Blind Mice’ and the first few bars of ‘Hail Glorious Saint Patrick’. But that was the beginning and end of it. To this day there has been no improvement.

  Put bluntly, this first venture seemed to indicate that the eldest of the O’Tooles did not have musical talent. My mother’s humour was hardly improved by seeing the prodigious adeptness of my incredibly talented first cousin, Etna O’Flaherty. Etna was a year or two younger than me, but she could paint, sing, dance and play with the ability of a professional. In fact, all the musical talent of our generation of the family went to the O’Flahertys, any one of whom could knock music out of a stone and could master any instrument in a matter of minutes. Of course the genes make their own pathways and both parents of the O’Flahertys were highly talented. Aunty Molly was an accomplished musician, and her husband, Paguine, was a genius at the bodhrán. Meanwhile, to rub further salt in the wound, my closest friend, Pat Neligan, was playing jigs, reels and miscellaneous airs with unrestricted ease on his piano accordion, to rounds of applause from all and sundry. I would watch Pat’s extraordinary coordination in stunned amazement, his arms constantly pulling and squeezing the huge instrument, while the fingers of one hand played the tune on the black and white ivory keys and the other kept the rhythm on the buttons. And all on a brute of an instrument that was almost too heavy to lift in the first place. Impossible!

  The signs were that I was never going to be a virtuoso, but because I have a very poor memory of my shortcomings, didn’t I try again with the school marching band. Clearly I saw this as a great opportunity to awaken my latent musical talent. Nobody pushed me into it. It was all my own idea, though I cannot for the life of me think why. Pat and myself went to Brother Hannon, who was in charge of the band. There was no audition or anything like that.

  ‘Maith go leor, lads,’ he said. ‘Tosnóimís leis an bhfeadóg.’

  So we began our lessons on the tin whistle. Well, more correctly, I began, because by the time I was wondering how to play the High Doh, Hannon was already suggesting to Pat that he should try the fife. I tried it too, but I couldn’t even get a note out of it so I had to go back to the whistle. Meanwhile, Pat moved on and went straight into the band, leaving me behind, still doing scales on the whistle. I can claim that I became quite impressive at ‘Happy Birthday to You’ and a short blast of ‘Fáinne Geal an Lae’ – the tune later immortalised as ‘Raglan Road’ – on the tin whistle, but that was it.

  The general consensus was that my musical talent would not be any great addition to the band. But they let me down gently, and all was not lost because I got the important job of carrying the red-and-white flag of Dingle. I marched on the left of the front row, behind the band leader. Cynics will have their say, but there was a certain amount of skill required. It involved seating the pole firmly into the leather sheath that hung around my neck, placing my hands at the appropriate height and at the right side to allow for the wind. Talented types give you no credit at all for working out these intricacies! On the first day that we rounded the town with me in my new role, I was so proud of myself that if pride could play a tune I could have knocked a concerto out of that flagpole, no
bother at all.

  Once or twice I was promoted to the right-hand side of the band and this meant carrying the green, white and gold of the tricolour. Wow! There was one glorious outing when they were seriously stuck for bodies. The guy who carried the big drum was missing. What would we do? We had to have a big drum. Who would do it? I began to dream. Hannon called me. Was this it?

  ‘Billy Dillon will take the big drum.’

  I was devastated!

  ‘Can I trust you with the triangle?’

  Yes!

  ‘Of course, sir. I know what to do, sir. I’ll strike it in time with the big drum.’

  I was doing fine at the beginning, striding along in step behind someone’s younger brother who was my replacement on the flag. I struck, tingled, beat, or whatever is the appropriate verb for playing the triangle. I was full of myself. I had been promoted into the percussion section; sure it was only a matter of time before I got a run at the cymbals. I’d love that. My day-dreaming interfered with my concentration on the job in hand. Jimmy Flannery, who was at the back playing the side drum, brought me back to harsh reality. Jimmy was one of the main guys.

  ‘Toolie, for Jaysus’ sake, would you strike the triangle in time to the drum, not to your step, or else put the fucking thing down altogether.’

  After that, I became so intent on the drumbeat that I found myself completely out of step.

  So, as things turned out, that day with the triangle was the pinnacle of my musical career.

  Pat Neligan went from strength to strength, and years later when he returned to settle in Dingle he took charge of the band as bandmaster. He never asked me to coach the guy with the flag.

  As in every other part of Kerry, Gaelic football was the sport in Dingle. The football team also played a very significant role in school life. It was the ambition of every boy, including myself, to be on the team. A seven-a-side tournament was held in school in order to give everyone a chance to impress the selectors. The seven captains were appointed more or less by popular acclaim and the teams were then picked according to merit and by lottery. The names of the captains were put in a hat and when his name came out, that captain chose one boy for the team, until all places were filled.

  We all sat around the room, nervous with excitement and anticipation. I had got my first new pair of football boots. I was going to make a name for myself. None of the captains picked me as their first choice, but then again we were younger than some of the lads selected; we could wait. The second round of choices came and went. No joy there either. Neligan was picked in the third round. He didn’t even say goodbye to me as he tore across to his new team-mates. I consoled myself by thinking that it was their loss – they could have had me!

  But nobody else saw it that way, and I was still standing there like a wallflower when even younger guys, like John Martin and Tommy Dowd, were selected. Then, kindly Tom Shea from Ventry called my name. He’s my hero forever. I was the seventh and last person chosen for my team. Football, along with playing the piano, was apparently not my forte.

  Tom chose Fanairí Fionntrá, the Ventry Rovers, as our team name. Tom Shea was soft-spoken and easygoing. Everyone liked him. The day he picked me, he made me, because I can claim to my grave to have played on the same team as the Sheas from Ard a’ Bhóthar. That’s a story that doesn’t lose in the telling, and if you didn’t listen closely I could easily leave you with the impression that my footballing skills were so well remembered and regarded that even Páidí Ó Sé as Kerry team manager might have felt it necessary to seek my advice the odd time on team tactics and the like. After all, wasn’t I a mainstay of his brother Tom’s team years ago? Of course I wasn’t, but the Sheas are far too nice and decent a family to let me down by telling the world the truth about me – that I couldn’t kick a ball out of my way.

  Tom protected me right through the school competition. He tried me everywhere on the field: as a forward, a back and finally in goal with big Muiris Scanlan from Burnham guarding me as full-back. Poor old Muiris had to be both full-back and goalkeeper. To say that I failed to impress would be a euphemism. I was an utter disaster and the principal reason why our team failed to take the honours. To his eternal credit, Tom never complained. He was seventeen and the only boy who drove a car to school. It was so American to see Tom drive up in the Ford Prefect. I’ll never forget it; the registration number was BIN 77. Tom was also the only boy who smoked reasonably openly. They had given up trying to stop him; he only smiled when they gave out to him. Tom went on to represent Kerry as a minor, as did his brother, Micheál. They were all noted footballers and their little brother, Páidí, became a Kerry footballing legend. To think that I patted him on the head when he was a baby and none of it rubbed off on me!

  I was still keen to be a sportsman. I tried the golf as well; there was the old nine-hole course in Doonshean, just about a mile beyond Beenbawn. Even women could play golf. Aunty Phyl and Aunty Sheila played, so I reckoned it would be no problem to me. Unfortunately, even though we played a good few times, my skill levels remained static. Put it this way, I was not the best at driving or chipping, but I learned a lot about divots and sods. I just could not get excited about the game. From where we played, there were wonderful views of the Short Strand, Dingle Bay and Carraig an Mhionnáin, and I found the scenery much more attractive than what was happening on the greens and the fairways. One day, going up the hill of the long par 5, I lost my ball again. While I was poking about the bushes and having no luck locating it, the light finally dawned. This was a total waste of time. There and then I decided to give it up. I picked up the golf bag and headed home, leaving Pat Neligan, Eoin Kane and Thomas Lyne to finish by themselves. I was sixteen. I haven’t played golf since.

  It became clear to me that a career in sport was unlikely to be successful, so it was around this time that I took up snooker. Snooker was different. There was a cost per game, but you only had to pay if you lost. This created a completely different motivation; it required me to be cautious and careful. Soon my proficiency improved. The lads who hung around the snooker hall might not have been the preferred role models of most parents, but they were decent and likeable, even if a little roguish. They certainly taught me the importance of the rules, particularly where they were of use in gamesmanship; lulling opponents into a fatal error, despite their much better ability. Controlling the ball was the test. To be effective and successful you had to put a spin on it. I quickly learned the value of putting the correct and most effective spin on the ball. Now there was a transferable skill – controlling the spin.

  I did manage to acquire a few medals over the years at school. I could run pretty fast and I put a lot of effort into the high jump. High jumping was a lot different in those days, none of your fancy foam rubber or cushion-soft landings. There was a sandpit that Mikey Houlihan, who worked for the Brothers, would dig up and fill with fresh sand at the start of the summer term. Then it was up to ourselves to make sure it was forked and raked each day so it was mounded three or four inches above the surrounding ground level. There was no question, however, of landing on your back unless you wanted to be crippled for the rest of your natural. You had to land on your feet. Only then, after the fall was broken, was it okay to collapse over into the sand. In other words, there were two skills required in our version of the high jump – to get over the bar and to land safely. Nowadays, athletes only have to clear the bar and it doesn’t matter a whit how they land. In fact, the comfort zone of three feet of cushion to land on must be a psychological boost. Like jumping on to a bed.

  We had a choice of three jumping styles. The traditional way was to run from your favoured side and try to clear the bar sideways. Olympic athletes at the time were all using a technique called the Western Roll. After the run up, the trick was to lift the foot furthest out from the jump first and then, just like it sounds, the idea was to roll over the bar. Another emerging fashion involved running straight at the right-hand upright, then just before the final step, swer
ving to the left while at the same time swinging up the right foot. The theory was that the impetus of the swerve and swing gave you greater lift over the bar. It was called the Eastern Cut-Off. We had great fun experimenting. Of course this was before Dick Fosbury won gold in the Mexico Olympics by going over backwards, thus creating the revolutionary technique known as the Fosbury Flop, used by virtually all high jumpers nowadays. We didn’t think of that one.

  My lack of prowess in the sporting arena was brought home to me again during the first week of lectures at teacher training college when I met Commandant Joe O’Keefe, who was in charge of Physical Education. He was nicknamed ‘The Jeweller’. As far as I know, this arose from his habit of cautioning the protection of certain male anatomical parts during the course of vaulting or other risky PE activities, by advising us to ‘mind your jewellery’. He went around the group, asking each of us what our favourite sport was. He was a loud, garrulous man and macho to boot. He discussed rugby, hurling, football, boxing and other manly sports with my classmates. When I named snooker as my favourite sport, it did appear to silence him briefly. But he recovered quickly and delivered the predictable lecture on a misspent youth. My argument – that the experiences and surroundings of snooker constituted a most appropriate preparation for life – caught him off-guard, but left him more than a little unconvinced. The rest of the group sniggered, but it raised my stock significantly because they took the view that I was poking fun at him. That is, until they discovered that I was useless at everything. There was no snooker table or club in the teacher training college.

  THE BEST OF TIMES, THE WORST OF TIMES

  ‘Make sure you tell this in confession and ask forgiveness.’

  Canon Lyne was on impurity patrol, and had found an over-zealous young couple in a remote, dark corner.

  My teen years coincided with the beginning of the 1960s. All the written evidence now confirms that the early years of that decade were ‘the swinging sixties’. Later in the 1960s there was free love; people made love, not war; the hippies helped free the young generation of inhibitions by letting their hair grow and sticking flowers in it. They smoked stuff as well. Except that nobody told Canon Lyne, who refused to go with the flow and continued to use the crook of his walking stick to extract clinging, fumbling couples from dark corners around the town on dance nights. His dire warnings of hellfire and damnation made him a figure to be feared. Singlehandedly he held back the tide of ‘corruption’ into which we were only dying to jump; we thought we would never get to participate in the ‘swinging’ bit of the sixties because of him. But his rule only lasted until people got a little more ‘cop on’ and the couples realised that the whole exercise was far more comfortable in a bed, which had the added advantage of being well out of reach of Canon Lyne’s walking stick.