Category: Me - Reading the Signs

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A Headstone Jigsaw

9/12/2022

Written In Stone ≠ Forever

Last Sunday, a trip to west Clare, brought me face to face with a phenomenon new to me.

In the Church of Ireland cemetery in Kilrush, many of the headstones appear to be of local Liscannor stone, a lovely, dark and grooved stone. I am familiar with its use for hearths and paving. My graveyard rambles have not extended often to County Clare so I cannot recall seeing many headstones using this stone. Its proximity and availability most probably accounts for the number encountered last Sunday.

The main purpose of my visit was to view the Famine Memorial and shortly after, I stopped.

Initially it looked like pieces of stone were dumped on top of a flat headstone. More investigation suggested that a layer of the stone had delaminated. In doing so, the thin layer had broken into many pieces.

I really enjoyed Jean Sprackland’s book a few years ago. My copy has many hand-written notes – marginalia of sorts, being located in the blank end pages. One of these notes refer to the quoted piece which seriously impacted when I read it.

Jigsaws were me growing up. They allowed escape from participation and conversation.

I would so love the time and permission to assemble the stones – to ensure that the headstone is read, even for just one more time.

‘The surface of this headstone is breaking up into large, thin flakes, peeling away and exposing the softer layer beneath. In the damp fissure between the two, black mould has found lodging. The texture of the spalling stone is so unusual that I can’t resist reaching out and touching it lightly with my fingertips, and to my horror the phrase Loving Memory falls off in one piece onto the grass.

Sandstone is particularly prone to this kind of weathering, where moisture seeps between the layers; either rising, wicked up, from the earth beneath like drink through a straw, or hurled at the face of the stone as rain, freighted with windborne salt or acid. Sometimes the entire surface is sloughed in a single sheet, the stone underneath still bearing the shape of the letters and images carved through from above. A bad case of spalling can erase the inscription, like an attack of total amnesia.’

Jean Sprackland – These Silent Mansions: A Life in Graveyards

‘There are three deaths. The first when the body ceases to function. The second when the body is consigned to the grave. The third is that moment, sometime in the future, when your name is spoken for the last time’

David Eagleman - Sum: Forty Tales From The Afterlives

I read this quote first on a tweet by Louvain Rees . The book has been purchased and well thumbed. The quote more than once used in cards of sympathy. It also made it into the Examiner for my mother’s anniversary message. The quote definitely hit a home here….

An Ríordáinigh & Me

22/9/2022

Earlier I was reading a blog post on The River-side about banned books and particularly, The Tailor and Ansty.

In it, the UCC Library included a photograph of what was Seán Ó Ríordáin’s copy of the book, which made me smile. Many years ago, I decided that my books were mine and it was ok to make notes and underline passages.

Not alone did Seán Ó Ríordáín do likewise – but we both made notes as to Ring- A-Dora.

Here Lies All That Could Die

29/6/2022

I cannot recall ever seeing a message like this carved on a headstone. It definitely resonated with this reader.

‘There are three deaths. The first is when the body ceases to function. The second is when the body is consigned to the grave. The third is that moment, some time in the future, when your name is spoken for the last time’
Metamorphosis

David Eagleman from Sum: Forty tales from the afterlife

‘As if my mother
stepped from the shuffling throng
On South Main Street
and stood before me:
“Dead? Who told you I was dead?’

Nothing Is Lost
Gerry Murphy
My Life as a Stalinist

A tweet from Louvain Rees first introduced me to David Eagleman and his story, Metamorphosis. The book was quickly published and regularly takes residence in my inside jacket pocket.

A few months back, I used that quote in the Memoriam message for my mother in the Irish Examiner. Proof, if needed, that the concept has well taken root in these quarters. Gerry Murphy’s poem conveys a similar message, only different. The two were calling out to be put together.

The recent Three Castles Burning podcast on the Stolpersteine installed at Danore Avenue in Dublin notes the message in The Talmud that a person is only forgotten when their name is forgotten

This morning, at early o’clock, in Abington Cemetery, near Murroe, I read that Winifred Frances Barrington experienced the first of the three deaths in May 1921.

Fundraising in a Time of War

13/3/2022

I write this at early o’clock, just after returning home from dropping our fifteen-year-old at a swimming pool. As part of a fund-raising drive, the club members are swimming the distance from Cork to Dublin and back – all within the confines of a 25m pool.

The group that entered the pool at 04:30 are scheduled to complete the return to Cork at 07:00 but if stuck at the toll plaza at Watergrasshill, it may go on a bit longer.

Printing off the sponsorship card earlier this week, and also in conversations with others, I did wonder as to whether, at this time, it is appropriate to be fundraising for anything but Ukraine ………………………….

Make Friends With Murphy

20/5/2020

I spotted this old advert this afternoon.

It is not my drink of choice, but I would dearly love an opportunity to make friends with Murphy.

Oh! For this lock-in to end………

Remembering A Private Census – Cobblers

1/4/2020

In Goreybridge in Wexford, between 1862 and 1867, the landlord’s agent kept detailed records of the occupants of the dwellings, names, ages, relationship to tenant, occupation – all of which are recorded on the modern census.

I learned of this from Dr. Rachel Murphy in January when I attended the Irish Modern Urban History Group Symposium in Limerick, when she spoke on ‘The Goreybridge Censuses, 1862-7’. A significant proportion of the houses were occupied by one trade, Cobblers (if I remember correctly). There were only a small number of houses – 13-15 from memory – but shoemaking/cobblers was the trade of quite a number of houses, making the percentage significant.

I was in Belfast a few weeks later and spotted this plaque on a modern building on North St. This is definitely my type of plaque – small history, local information. A visit to census information is calling out to me as to whether the Belfast shoe-makes on North St were shops or whether they lived there too. A 2m distant conversation with my father is also calling to discuss whether others who worked with his father in the Lee Boot Co lived near him growing up – whether there was, decades later, a tradition of living near you work/trade colleagues.

If I only took better notes on the Goreybridge talk, I might be better placed to join some dots ……

Behold - the Conjun Box

29/3/2020

I blogged some years back about the conjun-box which was a connection between my grandfather and each of his early crop of grandchildren – he being the guardian on our bank accounts and who would bring us to the Cork Savings Bank for our box to be opened and monies transferred into our account.

Last November, there was a box-lot at Woodwards auction. I was tempted but there were too many other things to drive the price up.

The remote for the car acted up over Christmas and I ended up at ADM Locksmiths on Tramore where a conjun-box is on display. The owner, Morgan, told me that the conjun-box was his and that his interest in locks and his career as locksmith started when trying to pick the conjun-box open – a feat successfully completed.

Oh! Where I might be now if I had preserved with my efforts.

Woodwards Auction - Lot 3 - Nov 2019

Legs Eleven

27/3/2020

A smile came upon my face driving through Ballyphehane a while back.

I really like the house number sign.

It brought me back many years to when it was a treat to be allowed go with my grandfather to the Bingo at The Barrs. Grandad was one of the callers, so I was given a few cards and allowed play. Keys of the Door and Two Fat Ladies were first imprinted on my mind in the hall of St Finbarr’s Hurling & Football Club on a Friday night before we got the special Bingo bus home.

The whistles that accompanied Legs Eleven made it even more impressive, more deserving of questions seeking explanation over milk and biscuits when safely back in St. Brigid’s St on a Friday night.

I don’t know how long the number sign has been on the house but it brought me back decades.

Time Out & Letter to Santa

28/11/2019

The Crawford Gallery was a place of refuge – a place where I could sit with my own thoughts, trying to put things back in some sort of order. Since we moved office, my visits have not been as regular but I need to correct that. The first floor gallery houses many of my favourites including Time Flies.

In 2015, I was delighted when the Gallery put on an exhibition called W. B. Yeats: Resonances where they matched a piece of Yeats poetry with a painting – a combination of different art forms. My visits were longer.

I was reminded of the poem/art combination on a visit to the City Library earlier this week and there was poetry from Gerry Murphy with art on the walls – perfect for a lunchtime recharge.

I have been a Gerry fan since I read of the statue at Stalin visible in the distance from Knock for the first time over thirty years ago. His work has been quoted hereabouts on more than one or two occasions. I even followed the example of Poe-A-Tree and pinned one of his poems to a tree on Grand Parade one day – radical or what….

I met Gerry at the swimming pool recently. He mentioned that he is retiring, again, around now – Happy Birthday.

I would dearly love if his poems and the work of other Cork poets could adorn the gables of buildings, just like Leiden in The Netherlands . I have a folder of photographs on my drive of walls suitable for the receipt of poems. I even have my choice of some of the poems. But I expect that Cork street poetry will remain a dream.

For a bit of fun and relaxation, I recommend the installation at the library – John & Gerry. My list of wishes for a Christmas present has doubled.

This latest blog post from Eoin MacLochlainn hit the Inbox this morning. I was well impressed with his work on fireplaces in disused houses when showing in Limerick a few years back – if only funds had permitted.

In this morning’s read, the artist has donated a piece of work of Glencar Waterfall, associated with a poem to the Phlebotomy Dept. at St James Hospital – the waiting rooms that I have graced have never had such an art combination.

Three connecting dots are enough reason for a blog post after a bit of an absence.

Published – Bródúil

25/9/2019

I was delighted to receive the post this morning.

After a 4-year degree, a 1-year Diploma and over 30 years work experience in my chosen field, a journal has considered my writing to be worthy of publication – and it has absolutely nothing to do with my work life.

If only someone had mentioned filling out the C.A.O. way back then to do something that you enjoy; or even, to select something that will allow you to change as your preferences change. If. If. If……..

This article grew out of course work on an evening diploma at U.C.C., prompted by Marie-Annick, and steered to fruition by Ciarán - sometimes one can be very lucky with those they meet on this journey.

Very happy today.

Now to read and spot my typos……

Without Blood

21/7/2019

I think I am becoming a convert to the short novel.

Chess was read in two sittings over Christmas and remains on the brain. It almost made it into my #7DayBookChallenge on Twitter

This morning, as the lobster fisherman went about his business in Brandon Bay, Without Blood, all 87 short pages were enjoyed.

I was not expecting to be thinking of Terence MacSwiney and enduring pain – but I was.

Without Blood

Utility Box, LIberty St., Cork

Resisting Everything Except Temptation

11/7/2019

My bookshelves are not absolutely full – but they are not far off.

At my current pace of reading, it is quite possible that I have more unread books than I will read in the remainder of my lifetime – without even considering library visits.

It looks like full capacity may be approaching.

Last weekend, we were in Ennis. This child’s sweetshop was actually Scéal Eile, Lahinch Bookshop and Bookstop Ennis. I was disappointed to see that Scéal Eile have removed a section of their older history books for online sales only. That was one of the joys of my irregular visits, and I am not yet a full convert to online book purchases. I cannot recall an impulsive unplanned online book purchase, preferring to touch and read which had led to many of those books as yet unread.

And the day he died it was a birthday - And I noticed it was mine

8/6/2019

My Bucket List is not very long – possibly reflective of the reality that has been encountered, having learnt the lesson of not getting ones hopes up.

A night on An Blascaod Mór, a trip to the Skellings, ascending Croagh Patrick and walking part of the Camino remain on the list – as do two places inspired by songs.

Peter Gabriel’s So was probably the most played record during my later school days. Afternoons laying on the floor with the big padded headphones plugged into the three-in-one are fondly remembered. From an earlier album, Solsbury Hill has been a song to which I regularly return and a place to which I would like to spend an evening.

“And the day he died it was a birthday
And I noticed it was mine”

Cathedral by Crosby Stills & Nash had me intrigued by the above line, and I was not alone in wondering as to the birthday and the name of the soldier who died in 1799. Hugh Foulkes of the Royal Cheshire Militia died on February 2nd and appears in many websites explaining Graham Nash’s bad-trip that led to the lyrics. A tweet, similar to this, some time ago, showing the main altar only confirmed Winchester Cathedral’s position on the Bucket List.

Today represents day 159 of 2019 and in an ongoing attempt to categorise my photographic collections. It is the day when I have tweeted the 159th Street Art installation, Post Box, Ghostsign, and Roadside Memorial.

Today’s Roadside Memorial was from the N61 from Boyle to Roscommon town, erected to Gavin Lee. I had a Graham Nash-like moment when I came across this memorial, noting it was my birthday.

"Fiche bliain ag fás.
Fiche bliain faoi bhláth.
Fiche bliain ag cromadh.
Fiche bliain gur cuma ann nó as"

As the twenty years when it doesn’t matter whether I am here on not approaches ever more rapidly, today’s Roadside Memorial is another reminder of the motivational line in Shawshank Redemption – Get Busy Living, or Get Busy Dying.

The Yank

4/4/2019

‘It wasn’t that I was ungrateful to America because America had been good to me, and still is, but even the very bird prefers the area where it was hatched’
Tomás Ó Cinnéide – The Wild Rover
(trans. Pádraig Tyers)

Last July, heading for a weekend on the Dingle peninsula, I detoured at Cordal and took time-out, a few minutes of me-time in Kilmurry Cemetery. There, for the first time, I met with John O’Donoghue who had died 35 years earlier, about the time that I was receiving my Leaving Certificate results.

I have seen many nicknames on headstones on my rambles through cemeteries. The term ‘The Yank’ struck. Maybe it was because I had not long finished the book by another returned Yank, Tomás Ó Cinnéide. Maybe it sparked a memory of the tales told of Kruger.

As possibly the only returned emigrant in the area, use of ‘John O’Donoghue’ was likely to cause confusion in the area, whereas there was, most likely, just one ‘Yank’.

This morning, I spotted a tweet about a recently released book by Sinéad Moynihan on the ‘Returned Yank’ that will probably be requested of my local library in the near future.

It brought back that minute on two standing with John O’Donoghue on a lovely quiet Kerry morning.

Ghosts and Schools

5/3/2019

This Friday sees the official launch of Enda O’Flaherty’s book – The Deserted School Houses of Ireland. On Friday at 6.00, I do hope to be at the Nano Nagle Centre.

When the reminder popped up on my computer, it prompted concentrating this week on school buildings on my daily update for Ghostsigns.

Since the first day of the year, in an effort to get my photographs of Roadside Death Memorials, Postboxes, Street Art and Ghostsigns organised, I have been tweeting one of each every day. Today is Day 64.

Last week’s tweets included the Cork Model School which has been repurposed as Circuit Courthouse.

Today’s tweet is a crest in a terrazzo floor. It greeted me most school mornings for six years of my life so it brought back some memories when I spotted through an open door a while back – neither good, nor bad, just memories.

The ghost most likely has much better, and much worse, memories, for others.

The building was originally the Vincentian School until the transfer in 1888 of seminarians to Farranferris. The Christian Brothers opened the school in 1888. I do not know the date of the terrazzo flooring which from recollection goes all the way up the stairs from MacCurtain Street to above Wellington Road entrance

Cork City
Was Christian Brothers College - Now Residential
Wellington Road
Photos Taken - 18/2/1

Patrick Street, 1872
‘….On the right of the photograph is Carmichael’s drapery store, which would later become Cash & Co. On the skyline in the centre of the photograph is the Scott residence in Sidney Place that would in 1885 become Government House, the residence of the general officer commanding the Cork Military district. To the left below it was the Vincentian Schools building in St Patrick’s Place, later the Christian Brothers College.’

CORK In Old Photographs – Tim Cadogan (2003 Gill & Macmillan Ltd)