Often we walked to school, up the steep cut from Sandpit Lane past the horse’s field to a road lined with cherry trees, laden with blossom. I’m holding Mum’s hand as we stream across the playground heading in to school. The other children are all bigger than me in my bobble hat and winter coat. Who is laughing in the group ahead of us? One of the girls has put on her tights but forgotten to put on her knickers! Her tights are bottle green, her coat grey. The image is hazy but the laughter real.
But that is spring, and most of the pictures from the album in my head are of summer – of blue gingham dresses and lacy white cotton socks, honeysuckle tumbling over the wall behind the senior classrooms, bees buzzing – was there a pond? Hanging upside down on the metal climbing frame, all in a row, swinging from our knees. Daddy Longlegs on the wooden wall of the “hut”, a prefab classroom, and inside, that unique hut smell, the sound of our feet on the hollow floor, the spring of the lino, the smell of chalk and dusty blackboards, the excitement of having a lesson somewhere new.
Jumping rhymes and elastics in the playground; and our cycling proficiency, wobbling around the bollards on my huge old-fashioned bike. The years are mixed up, like faded cine film flicking from scene to scene.
And who were the other children in my class? I can see them clearly – in Mrs Cooke’s classroom. Anita newly arrived from Cornwall, her dark curls bent over her knitting needles as her fingers flew, producing tiny knitted mice with faces so lifelike their noses twitched. And Diane – do you remember us listening to Adam and The Ants’ “Prince Charming” on the tape machine in your bedroom? Mark, whose Dad worked on an oil rig, and Leigh whose family was from Malta. Holly who had terrified my mother when we were in nursery school with her huge and very real boa-constrictor snake. We didn’t have pets until years later, so the memories of people’s animals are mixed up with my memories of them. Holly had a cat that slept under her covers on her bed, Maxine had fabulous and fearsome Alsatian dogs. Tiny Jane with her straight dark hair had the most coveted pet of all: a horse.
And my teachers? Singing “Kookaburra” with Mrs Steadman from New Zealand, who hooked her long hair behind her ears and wore long patterned skirts; “Kumbaya” and learning all about Kiwis.
Mrs Woodhead, Mr Peppin in his brown polyester suits and Mr Cliff who sharpened his chalk to a point to produce the most beautiful script on the blackboard. Mrs Cooke, whose brother was part of the St Ives lifeboat crew in Cornwall, and who took us all to the Isle of Wight for a week’s holiday in our last year of school. Needlework with Mrs Green, and finding a piece of fur fabric with Squirrel written on the back that had our little group collapsing in hysterics.
The highlights: 1977 and the Queen’s Jubilee, a long, hot summer with water shortages, the grass on the field parched, the ground baked hard; getting dressed up for the fête (as what, I’ve no idea!) and the precious Silver Jubilee coin in its blue-and-silver plastic cover.
And that Isle of Wight trip, the first trip away from home. Sharing a room with Diane, Maxine and Jane, hot cocoa in the evenings and the outdoor swimming pool, water freezing. Going out each morning on the coach with our lunch in a clear plastic bag, seeing peacocks and water wheels and Osbourne House. This holiday began my love of project work, of research, collecting all the scraps of information together into a record of the trip.
My memories of Skyswood School, of treacle and chocolate sponges with lashings of thick custard, of watching safety films in the dining room, the windows blacked out; of wonderful school plays, the atmosphere backstage serious and alive with excitement, are like scraps in a project, photos in an album. But so much more than just a collection of memories, Skyswood gave me a love of learning and a love of words that began on that first page of my colourful album of memories, with short socks and sunshine and school dinners.
Vanessa Fox O’Loughlin is the founder of the Irish national writing resources website www.writing.ie and The Inkwell Group publishing consultancy. She is a literary scout who has assisted many authors to publication. She conceived and developed the National Emerging Writer Programme for Dublin City of Literature, and is currently working with WritersWebTV.com bringing free, live, online workshops to writers worldwide. She is the Vice Chair of Irish PEN and the Irish and Eurozone Adviser to the international Alliance of Independent Authors. She regularly talks about writing and getting published on Sunshine 106.8fm’s Andrea Hayes’ Saturday Morning Show Live. Vanessa has been writing fiction since 1999 when her husband set sail across the Atlantic for eight weeks and she had an idea for a book.
Story 15: Silvermints
Sorcha Furlong
Friday evenings were always the best nights in our house when me and my sister were little. We used to wait with bated breath for my dad to come home from work. Not only did we miss him like mad ’cos he was a sales rep and he could be gone most weeks from Monday to Friday, but we loved to see him rock in the door with the two brown-paper bags full of goodies! I’m sure you could see the drool rolling down from our mouths!
He wouldn’t be even in the door and he’d have the two of us jumping up on him.
And never more eagerly than the evening I had my special plan . . .
“Daddy! Have you got anything for us?”
He knows by the twinkle in our eyes what we mean. “Eh, no, nothing . . . just me!” (My dad the messer!)
“Daddy, come on, it’s Friday and you always get us our bag of goodies on Fridays!” (I’m eight now so I know what I’m talking about!)
“Oh no, is it Friday?” he says with the most innocent look on his face.
Louisa is only five and her lips begin to quiver. I put a reassuring arm around her (’cos I am eight!). I realise that poor Lou is falling for his act – she’s getting sucked in – but I know he’s only messing – he is only messing, right? He couldn’t have forgotten our goodies on a Friday? He has never forgotten our goodies on a Friday . . . oh, nooooo, my Silvermints!
“Mmmmmyyyyy Silvermints!”
Okay, calm down, keep it together – you are eight! Okay so, what does an eight-year-old do in this situation, when their father is holding their sweets hostage? Answer . . . simple!
“Mam! Mammy!” (Tricia Furlong, the peacekeeper!)
“David, will you just give the girls their sweets, and stop antagonising them!” (Of course we have nooo idea what that big word means, but we know who the boss is, and it isn’t Daddy!)
Dad smiles and looks down at his two little girls, who are looking back up at him hoping and praying that he is only messing. “Well . . . I suppose I haven’t checked my suitcase yet – maybe they’re in there?”
The sentence isn’t even finished before me and Lou are on the suitcase like bees to honey.
“Okay, okay, girls, calm down! I’ll get them for you.” Dad opens the case – slowly, of course! – and lifts out our sugar fix.
There they are! Happy Friday to me! We grab them and begin to race up the stairs to our bedroom.
“Hang on, girls, have you anything you want to say to your dad?” says the voice of reason.
“Yeah! Thanks, Daddy, love you!”
We continue up the stairs, and as I am on the last step I glance back, to see my mam and dad in an embrace.
“I missed you,” he says tenderly.
Mam smiles. “Me too.”
They kiss. I smile.
Okay, so if you were to ask me now who the brains of the family is I would say my sister. We are now in our thirties, and she is someone I admire and love immensely. (Yes, Andrew, I love and admire you too, but you weren’t born for this memory!) Okay, so like I was saying, Louisa is the brains of the operation now, but back then I was the big sister and she was only five, so she had to do everything I said. Because I knew everything. I was eight (have I mentioned that?).
So we race into our bedroom with our bags of sweets. Our bedroom is a typical eighties-style room: two single beds, princess pink curtains (man, I loved them!), Barbies everywhere! Barbie car, Barbie bed wit
h glowing, yes, glowing sheets, Barbie kitchen, Barbie stable – every little girl’s dream!
Anyway, I am on a mission! I have watched my prey for a few weeks and seen her routine. I know what little system she has, and this is the evening I’ll put my plan into action. So, as Louisa spills her entire bag of sweets onto the carpet I know what she’ll pick up first: chocolate white mice! You see, when Dad would get us the bags of sweets, he’d always get each of us the same sweets so there would be no arguments – ’cos, as every parent knows, there’s nothing worse than listening to your child having a tantrum because one child has something that the other child wants. So Dave Furlong had it sussed: get them the same sweets so there are no arguments. Go, Dave . . . easy! Well, Dave, not tonight. Tonight daughter Number 1 is going to bring that theory tumbling down!
Chocolate white mice are Louisa’s favourites – I mean, I think they’re okay, but my favourites are Silvermints – I lurve Silvermints! So, as I spill my bag of sweets onto the carpet they are my first port of call. I brush by my chocolate white mice and the packet of Love Hearts. I grab my beloved Silvermints. I’ve waited all week for these babies so I open them as fast as I can. I love the smell that hits you the minute you open the silver paper. I’d shove two or three in at a time, and before I knew it the packet would be gone! The disappointment! I’d always wished that I could make them last longer, but until this day I was never able to do it, but today I have a plan.
I look over at Lou and she is on her Love Hearts – next on her hit list will be the Silvermints.
Innocently chewing on “Be Mine” or whatever statement was on her Love Heart, Louisa looks at her big sis and gives a smile. This is it, this is my time, it’s now or never, I think, so here goes . . .
“Louisa?”
“Yeah?” says the little innocent five-year-old.
“Do you wanna play a game?”
“Oh, okay. What kind of game?” She begins to open her packet of Silvermints.
“Eh, it’s called ‘Mass’, and it’s the coolest game ever!” I am fixated on her packet of Silvermints.
“Mass? How do you play it?” She places her first Silvermint in her mouth.
“Well, someone has to be the priest and the other person has to be the audience, and the priest has to give them Holy Communion.”
She’s about to reach for Silvermint number two and I’m in a cold sweat.
“Oh, okay. And who’s going to be the priest?” she asks.
“Well, I should be because I’m the oldest. But if you like you can be the priest.” I give her the big-sister smile.
“Okay,” she says as she puts Silvermint two in her gob!
“Okay, so you’ll be the priest and I’ll pretend to be different people coming up for Holy Communion – so you just stand over there and I’ll give you this . . .” I grab a bowl from our tea set.
“What’s this for?” she asks as she inspects the bowl.
“It’s for the Holy Communion,” I answer.
“Oh, and what will we use for Holy Communion?”
I’m sure you all know by now where I’m going with this story, but poor Lou didn’t.
“Oh, good question! What will we use for Holy Communion? Emmm . . .” My best acting ever was used on this evening! “We could use your Silvermints . . . ’cos they’re white and round just like real Holy Communion!”
I stare at Louisa. She stares back.
There is silence. Is she buying it?
“Oh, okay then,” she says.
Sold! To the lying eight-year-old!
I race around the room trying to set the scene for our “Mass” game. I take our bedroom lockers and put them between the beds then I push the beds to each side of the room and put the two lockers together. So that is Louisa’s altar!
Then I kneel in front of the altar.
“Okay, I’m ready!”
I’m soooo excited. In two seconds I’ll be sucking on a Silvermint!
Louisa stands in front of our altar with the bowl of Silvermints and I explain that all she has to do is hold out the Silvermint as Holy Communion, say “Body of Christ” and when I say “Amen” put the Silvermint in my mouth. And then I’ll get up, walk to the back of the bedroom and walk back up as a different person, with a different walk, and a different voice! Genius, if I do say so myself!
Man, woman, boy, girl, I had it all sussed, and Louisa was laughing away at all my impersonations – my plan had worked!
As I walk up pretending to be an old man, Louisa is in stitches. She puts her hand into the bowl and then she realises that all the Silvermints are gone.
“Ah well, sure we can play it again next week!” I say with my belly full and satisfied.
Everything is perfect, the plan has worked. Not only did I get to eat my own packet but I got to eat Louisa’s too, and if she doesn’t cop on I can keep this game going for weeks and weeks! V.I.C.T.O.R.Y!
“Okay, we better get this room back to normal,” I say.
I look at Lou and see her staring into the bowl . . . and then it happens. The Lip! We used to call her “Louie the Lip” ’cos the bottom lip would just start going if she was about to have a meltdown (something my own daughter has inherited).
Uh-oh, I’m in trouble!
“I’ve noooo Silvermints left!”
The Lip was in full action! My first reaction was “Okay, okay, Lou – listen – we just played a game and you used them as Holy Communion, remember? ’Cos you were the priest.” My speech is getting quicker and quicker, ’cos now I’m in a blind panic! I smile and try to calm her down.
“You ate all my Silvermints!” she bawled.
“Okay, Lou, I’m sorry – here, have my chocolate mice – look – they’re your favourite!”
I dart over to where the mice are and land back beside her, trying to stop the crying by tempting her with the mice.
“Noooooo, I want mmmmyyyyyy Silvermints!”
And then it happens . . . the creaking on the stairs.
“What’s going on up there?” Dad shouts.
“Eh, nothing!” I answer.
“Doesn’t sound like nothing to me,” he says, and before I can answer, Louisa legs it past me out onto the landing and straight down the stairs and into Dad’s arms.
Ah man, I’m dead! I follow her out.
“Well?” Dad’s looking up at me for an answer.
I’m frozen standing at the top of the stairs.
“We were just playing a game called Mass and we used Louisa’s Silvermints as Holy Communion, and now she’s crying ’cos they’re all gone.”
Dad is a little confused. “Louisa, why are you crying? You were only playing a game.”
“Sorcha ate all my Silvermints!” she says through snot and tears.
“What do you mean, she ate all your Silvermints? Sorcha, what does Lou mean?”
I lower my head and tell my dad that Lou was the priest and she was giving me Holy Communion and I was playing different people.
“Well, you give Lou your packet of Silvermints then,” he says as he begins to dry little Lou’s tears.
“I can’t,” I say in a whisper.
“What do you mean, you can’t?”
“Well, I ate mine already.”
Dad puts Louisa down and looks up at me.
“Are you telling me that you ate your own packet of Silvermints and your sister’s?”
I’m in trouble now!
“Yes,” I say.
Louisa begins to cry again as if she’s reliving the whole experience scene by scene. So Dad has one daughter at the top of the stairs who’s been greedy and conniving, and another at the bottom of the stairs bawling as if her world just ended . . .
So what does he do . . . ?
“Tricia!” he calls.
Mam comes out into the hall. “What is going on out here?” she says.
Dad proceeds to tell her about the whole incident. I still have the head lowered and my puppy-dog eyes on standby.
“Rig
ht,” says Mam, very matter of fact.
“Louisa, I’m going to buy you your own packet of Silvermints tomorrow. And Sorcha, I can’t believe that you would do something so mean to your little sister. You are eight and should be setting an example for Louisa. I am so sad that you would do something like this.”
I felt terrible!
She continued. “So as punishment you won’t be getting any goodies on a Friday or any other day for two weeks.”
She takes Louisa up in her arms and the three of them stare up at me and then go into the sitting room.
There I am, left standing at the top of the stairs, the outsider, the Silvermint thief. I feel absolutely gutted and ashamed – and slightly sick, ’cos I just overdosed on Silvermints.
So for two weeks I didn’t get my goodies, and then on week three when I got the goody bag and my Silvermints I now sucked instead of biting so they lasted longer.
Lesson learnt!
Sorcha Furlong is best known for playing Orla Kirwan on RTÉ’s Fair City, and is also a founding member and creative director of Smart Blondes productions. She is the mother of a three-year-old little girl called Stella. She was delighted when asked to get involved in this worthwhile project with Poolbeg and Barnardos. It is the first story she has ever written, never mind had published, and she hopes you enjoy reading it as much as she enjoyed writing it!
Story 16: Te Quiero Todavia
Ciara Geraghty
It was the summer of 1985. The summer the Anglo-Irish Agreement was signed. The summer Bob Geldof leapt from his couch and tried to change the world. The summer the Rainbow Warrior sank. The summer Boris Becker became the youngest player ever to win Wimbledon and made tennis fans of us all.
Oh, and Greenland left the European Union.
Greenland? I know, me neither.
That was the summer I turned fifteen.
The summer I fell in love.
My New Romantic era was tapering off, although I continued to sport a Nick Rhodes haircut and could still play – with two fingers – “Tainted Love” on my synthesiser.
If I Was a Child Again Page 9