by Alice Taylor
Praise for Alice Taylor’s other books
THE WOMEN
‘Like all of her books, it’s a thing of gentle beauty.’
Irish Independent
‘A book that will grip you by the heart.’ U Magazine
DO YOU REMEMBER?
‘A journey into nostalgia with spiritual overtones.’
Irish Independent
‘Abounds in anecdotes of Irish rural life in former times, told in Alice’s Taylor’s distinctive, homely style.’ The Opinion
THE GIFT OF A GARDEN
‘Illuminated by the glowing photographs of Emma Byrne, enriched by such stories as the tree-planting meitheal, the gathering of manure and the history of the garden shed, The Gift of a Garden is itself a gift.’ Irish Examiner
AND TIME STOOD STILL
‘Anybody who has lost someone can find solace in this book.’ Arena, RTÉ Radio 1
Dedication
For Gabriel, in grateful appreciation for the love of this place that you nurtured in me.
And for Tim Gabriel, the newest arrival in our village.
Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Introduction: Under the Apple Tree
Chapter 1: The Corner House
Chapter 2: Aunty Peg’s Press
Chapter 3: Goodbye, Kate and Lolly
Chapter 4: Poor Me
Chapter 5: Rejuvenation Time
Chapter 6: The Colour of Memory
Chapter 7: Johnny’s Skip
Chapter 8: The Split
Chapter 9: The Parish Picnic
Chapter 10: The Presbytery
Chapter 11: The Rising Sun
Chapter 12: Back to Simplicity
Chapter 13: Buried in Books
Chapter 14: The Impossible Dream
Chapter 15: Friendship
Chapter 16: The Blue Fountain Pen
Chapter 17: Watch Your Step!
Chapter 18: Away with the Fairies
Chapter 19: Planting History
Chapter 20: Our Parish Chronicle
Chapter 21: When They Return
Chapter 22: Home Is a Community
About the Author
Copyright
Introduction
Under the Apple Tree
It is a beautiful day, and the garden is snoozing in the warm afternoon sun. A blackbird scratching under a nearby fern keeps a wary eye on the neighbour’s cat who has just wandered in. But this cat is too old and too well fed to bother with a disturbing encounter. So the blackbird, absorbing the surrounding lethargy, fluffs out its wings and sits on the warm grass and sunbathes. The garden is a pool of relaxation and peace. You are welcome to join me here in my garden, my home, my own village.
Come out the back door. Take time to meander around the backyard, which has no illusions of grandeur. It is peopled by an assortment of ancient collectables called out of retirement to act as containers for impulsively purchased garden-centre enticements. The result is a riot of unimaginable colour and confusion, which leads you to the conclusion that the gardener here is either a genius or a green-fingered eccentric, but probably the latter.
Your eye is caught by a rose-smothered arch, which suggests that beyond this could be the real garden. Arches in gardens are an invitation into another section. Having come through this arch you are hoping to find a decision point, but more arched pathways lead left, right and straight ahead. A trifle confusing. You wish that the gardener here could make up her mind as to what direction you are meant to go. You feel sure that it is a woman! No man would garden like this – men think in straight lines, don’t they? So you go straight ahead towards a stone, weather-beaten St Joseph holding a lily in his raised hand. But the lily is broken, leaving Joseph with half a lily. Typical! Then another rose-covered arch leads off to your left, so you take it and arrive under an ancient apple tree, where a rug-covered garden seat invites you to take a rest. This is Uncle Jacky’s apple tree. You sit down and relax. Belying its antiquity, the seat is surprisingly comfortable. This is heaven. Just sit there quietly now and enjoy the experience. Soon I will bring you tea in the garden.
I dress the tray carefully with china cups and Aunty Peg’s silver teapot. After all, this tea in the garden is not just a casual affair, it is a ceremonial event of elegance and decorum. Because, in the course of this tea, we are going to exchange good conversation, and I will tell you interesting stories about this place where I live.
Over fifty years ago I came to this village of Innishannon. I was young and foolish, but the village was old and wise, and over the years this ancient place and its people have taught me many things. I was lucky to have married into a family who loved this place and had lived here for several generations. From them I learnt the old names of the townlands around the village, Gaelic names that run off the tongue like onomatopoeic poetry – Clouracaun, Dernagasha, Rathnaroughy – their murmuring sounds a meandering stream against mossy banks.
The placenames around the village tell the story of its roots. There is a little lane at the eastern end of the village known as Bothairín an Átha, which, translated, means ‘the little road to the ford’. In ancient times, waterways were the arteries of the country, and while roads were still dirt tracks and before bridges were built, river crossings were of huge commercial importance. The Bandon river is tidal up to our village, and when the tide withdraws down to Kinsale harbour where the river enters the sea, it is fordable. The village grew up around this river crossing, which was the first point of access for the rest of the country into West Cork.
Time inevitably brings change, but the retention of the old placenames incorporates the past history of Innishannon into the present. It makes this village a historic and interesting place to live. It is probably one of the reasons why this garden breathes of another era.
I was a blow-in, of course, but loved the village from the first day that I came here and the village opened its arms to me. That was over fifty years ago. Let me tell you of my life here now in this house and in this village.
But first, would you like another cup of tea?
Chapter 1
The Corner House
This morning, having had a leisurely breakfast, I picked up the daily paper for a general perusal. Never a good idea if you wish to maintain a sunny outlook on life. International upheavals screamed from the headlines, competing with home-grown conflicts. All of which could convince one that we are living in a crazy world. Then a news item caught my eye: ‘Older people to be encouraged to downsize in order to ease the housing crisis.’ What a good idea, I thought. Then, like chain lightning, came the realisation that they were talking about ME. Now, that was a horse of a different colour! The thought of leaving my own comfortable corner had never entered my mind.
The original name of this old house was the Corner House, which very aptly describes it, as it is plonk bang on the village corner. It feels like part of the village and of the community all around it. This house would give Dermot Bannon, of the TV programme Room to Improve, a heart attack as it defies all the rules of good house design. Also, most callers find their way in through the side door, never the front door, a practice Dermot declares to be a totally weird Irish phenomenon. In my case, though, there is worse to come, as this side door leads not into a well-laid-out hallway designed to impress, but into a utilitarian storeroom full of uninspiring clutter, with three steps leading down into the kitchen. Not exactly the scenario for good first impressions. However, my friends have been using this route for so long they never even see the state of it. At least, so I hope!
If a knock comes to the front door I sometimes may not even hear as it is so far away from the kitchen, and when I do hear one I immediately straighten myself up and wonder what they m
ight be looking for. This is probably a hangover from my childhood when nobody except a policeman or a drainage inspector knocked on the door at all. Everyone else just walked in. One grand old man always came with the salutation, ‘Peace be to this house.’ What a lovely blessing he brought with him. I now have one friend who, when she comes in, simply calls out, ‘It’s me.’
If I go out to the garden, I have an antique wooden sign informing callers ‘I’m in the Garden’ which I leave on the centre of the kitchen table. This was given to me by an irritated friend who on a few occasions, having searched the whole house, finally ran me down outside. That sign now directs callers out the back door (not the side door, which opens onto the street) and into the garden, as that is usually where I am to be found if the weather is kind.
This house once creaked at the seams with people, as it began its life as a guest house. It then adapted itself as a rambling family home, and now I am home alone. Yet I never feel alone here. This is a comforting place to be, and in a strange way this old house has changed with the varying needs of the times and has somehow stretched and shrunk to meet requirements. I have never felt that it was too big or too small, always just right for the times that were in it. It is perfect for holding fund-raising coffee mornings or impromptu meetings, and because of its location it is very easy for newcomers to find. It’s a wonderful base for family gatherings such as christenings, funerals, or during weddings for that awkward stopover period between church and reception – and if certain family members need distance from each other this can easily be achieved.
It is also an Aladdin’s cave of all kinds of everything, things that are invaluable if we in the village are hosting a folk day, a church concert or anything requiring candles, containers or decorations of any kind. If I lived in a tidy bungalow I simply could not harbour all these wacky requirements. There is a cupboard full of candles of all dimensions and varying colours: these are the result of candlelit church concerts and a once-off candle-making enterprise to aid a village fund-raiser. To assist in that enterprise the butts of years of leftover church candles found their way to our temporary factory. Earlier this year when an American friend celebrating Thanksgiving experienced a power failure, this stock of candles quickly solved his lighting problem. So the candles remain, and the room holding them smells like Rathborne’s.
Then, accompanying them are the oil lamps. Maybe because I was reared in the glow of these I am fascinated by them and have collected some over the years. They are mostly elegant and useless, but lovely to look at. I bought the first one when we purchased this house as it was in the auction of contents and I simply could not resist it, even though at the time we were jumping to the shrieks of an irate bank manager. It cost the princely sum of eleven shillings which in today’s money is a tiny amount. It has required occasional polishing to keep a smile on its face but, strangely enough, I like doing that because polishing old brass and silver can be quite soothing. And, as it is not good for one lamp to be alone over the years, it has acquired a number of lighting companions that have never shed light on anything because candles come to the rescue much more quickly when there is a power failure. The lamps, however, are perched around the house like the decorative ladies of earlier times, giving the look but not the light of other days.
Chapter 2
Aunty Peg’s Press
It had been bugging me for years. Every time I opened it to take out a tablecloth, place mat, oven glove or cloth of any description, I recoiled in dismay at the chaos within. To quote my father: ‘There was not head, arse nor tail to it.’ He was not into genteel statements of understated delicacy but graphic pronouncements that hit the nail dead on the head.
When Aunty Peg passed away in the late seventies, her press was passed on to me. Previously it had resided in one of her little parlours and had been maintained in exemplary condition. Strange as it may seem, she had three tiny parlours which, if all were rolled into one, would still have been a small room, but the three separate rooms evolved because with each addition to the back of their house when another little room was added, the walls were considered too wide to be movable and were simply left in place. The result was that the middle parlour had no window, and this large oak press occupied most of the space. It was originally described as a ‘press bed’, and how it evolved from being a bed to just a press I have no idea.
Here Aunty Peg kept all her tablecloths, curtains and bedlinen, and because she was fond of such things she had accumulated a sizeable collection over the years. It was long before drip-dry and non-iron fabrics, so much of her time was given to washing, bleaching, starching and ironing. I loved her linen press. It always smelt of carbolic soap, Robin starch and lavender from the garden. After her death, the press moved across the garden into my storeroom off the kitchen. Into it went all her beautiful cloths plus my own accumulation, all arranged in pristine order.
The contents of the press grew and grew over the years because I am an antique-fair addict. And when I visit an antique fair I make straight for the linen table and drool over the hand-embroidered cloths, visualising robed sisters in convent gardens and elegant ladies of leisure in great houses gracefully engaged. These skilled needlewomen created beautiful heirlooms. All such ladies are long gone but have left behind them drawers full of delicate needlework now finding their way into the hands of the hurried masses coming after them. Such acquisitions deserve impeccable care. Hence the guilt when viewing the chaos of Aunty Peg’s press in recent times. I could no longer bear it; Shakespeare was wise when he told us that conscience makes cowards of us all. The day of reckoning had come. Today I would tackle the press.
As soon as I opened my eyes this morning I informed my brain that today was the day for the press, and as soon as I came downstairs into the kitchen I went up the three steps that lead into the storeroom, a relic from my catering days. I opened the double doors of the press as far back as they would go and steeled myself to view the three deep shelves of disorder facing me. All this was about to change, change utterly, because order and beauty were about to be restored.
I left the door down into the kitchen open so that the press was in my face during breakfast. This was to combat any last-minute change of mind. Having eaten, I cleared the table and the dresser tops and pulled back all the chairs from the table. A casual caller could have thought that an operation was about to take place or that I was about to kill a pig! Beginning with the top shelf, I lifted out armfuls of cloths and dumped them down on the kitchen table until it was submerged. This particular table is no miniature, having been made big and ample by cousin Con when its forerunner collapsed. He was no mean carpenter, and he made it inside in the kitchen, and if it ever has to be evicted it will first need to be dismantled. During my tenure it will remain where it is as it is ideal for hosting family gatherings, sorting papers or conducting impromptu meetings. A table brings immediate law and order to a meeting, I believe. Now it would hopefully bring the same to my unruly press.
By the time the press was empty, the table had disappeared beneath a deluge of cloth, every chair was occupied and the dresser tops were laden. I had made a resolution not to sort anything before or during transit but to land everything and then begin. I allocated a chair for oven gloves, a chair for tea cosies, a chair for aprons, a chair for table runners, a chair for place mats, a chair for serviettes. Then I ran out of chairs. The phone rang. An intermission.
I soon had to create space on the dresser tops to carry the overflow of place mats. How many sets of place mats does one need? I asked myself. I had no idea that I had so many. They had accumulated over the years and got buried. Tea towels too good for everyday use but with scenes that I ‘might one day get around to painting’ rolled out before me. They were lovely, but I vowed that I was never again going to visit a kitchen design shop. There were oven gloves, some of them well past their safety date. And there were scorched tea cosies, kept and treasured because I loved the knitter. I had definitely reached a place called �
��Stop’.
With all the chair contents sorted, it was time to tackle the table. Now, where to start? At the very beginning, as Julie Andrews advised, was a very good place to start. So the first tablecloth that ever came my way was burrowed out to lay the foundation for the restoration. It brought back memories. During my first year of marriage, two long-lost American cousins came to visit Aunty Peg, and she decided that this saucy young new arrival living next door, who was married to her nephew and thought she knew everything, could do the entertaining. So she moved them in with me. I thought they were ancient, but they were years younger than I am now – age is relative! We got on fine, and when they went back to America they sent me an enormous banqueting tablecloth with matching napkins. I was very impressed, and during my early years of domesticity this cloth graced christening tables, First Holy Communion tables and birthday tables. A good-quality tablecloth makes a statement. When the big parlour table on the home farm where I grew up was draped with a white linen tablecloth, it immediately proclaimed celebration and entertainment. It heralded a big event. To this day, I am a sucker for a quality tablecloth and serviettes. But sorting out Aunty Peg’s press now made me realise that I had gone way past the bounds of normality in this sphere.
The door opened, and a neighbour’s head appeared. ‘Are you having a jumble sale?’ he wanted to know. ‘Do you want to help?’ I asked, and he disappeared.
Cloth stacks of different sizes began to grow around the table like high-rise tower blocks. I dug out matching serviettes from the general clutter. Long gone are the days of matching serviettes, but I had inherited them, and they deserved respect. Then I had bought another special Christmas set with my sister in Toronto, and they had the names of all Santa’s reindeers embroidered on them. Though used every Christmas, some spares still remained in pristine condition in their original beautiful box, but when I tried to put the laundered ones back into the box, I failed. Then I remembered the instructions of Sr Ita, who, many moons ago, taught us the art of good laundering in Drishane convent: a linen serviette, she had shown us, should be folded in three before ironing. I now did exactly that, and they slid perfectly back into their box. Good old Sr Ita! When I checked the names in the box, I discovered that Rudolf was missing, and I remembered that he had been absent for the previous Christmas dinner as well. I rooted and searched, but Rudolf was nowhere to be found. He must have strayed up into the hot press. I would unearth him and have him back on the team for next Christmas. The phone rang again, and a long conversation ensued. I was glad of the break.