Family life

A recent RTE book club drive was pushing Séamas O'Reilly's memoir Did Ye Hear Mammy Died? to the front again - it was first published in 2021. NPR reviews. I was surprised to find that the ratio of copies : reserves was favorable (214 : 42) on the Irish Library system and so ordered up a dead tree copy for myself. The book was favorably reviewed by the Guardian when it came out - as it should: O'Reilly is a regular columnist for The Sunday Guardian Observer. I hope sales get a boost, but with so many copies in libraries across the country that may not happen. 

As young Séamas was not quite 6 y.o. when the event of the title unfolded, he recognises that his trauma was less legs-from-under-him than for his older siblings, let alone his widowed father. So it's okay to play it for larfs against the back-ground of grief. Then again, whatever the hierarchy of grief, there were several months as a pre-teen that he was reduced to a barely functioning wreck by anxiety and insomnia. That was (miraculously) driven into a corner by an impromptu session of lively lovely Mammy related anecdotes visited upon the tween child by three of her friends who heard he was in the same hospital as they were.

Siblings? Well, yes, there were eleven (11) all told: the youngest barely out of nappies, the oldest almost old enough to vote, when Mrs O'Reilly died from metastatic breast cancer in 1992. They behaved a herd but each had their own stand-out individuality. "This could also have been a contributor to the frequent, horrible bouts of car-sickness which beset several of us, most especially Fionnuala and Dearbhaile, both so inclined to vomiting on road-trips that travelling with them was as precarious as cycling through a mine-field carrying a large, open vat of parmesan soup in your lap". My original post title was Normal Family Life but this paragraph only includes 2/3 (Mammy died; N = 11) of the data dissing 'Normal'. The other abnormal aspect of O'Reilly life in the 80s and 90s is that a small length of The Border [between RoI and NI] was their garden fence a few miles South of Derry.

They lived a short distance down a bohereen from the 'main' road from Derry to Lifford and Ballybofey. One fine day the customs post next door was blown up and chunks of the debris rained down in their back garden. Normalizing The Troubles is only really addressed in the penultimate chapter of the book. This is how it goes: Chapter 12 Notable Explosions, 1988 - 2005. After Daddy had his leg cut off . . . 

That's an example of dark Nordie humour. A few pages later it is revealed that Daddy was a late-diagnosed diabetic who peripheral circulation was fritzed by the disease. Daddy's leg was amputated to get ahead of the gangrene rather than, as implied, to tidy things up after his foot had been blown off in a terrorist outrage. Much hilarity was generated for the O'Reilly children when well-meaning visitors put their foot in it with an unfortunate turn of phrase. This memoir is littered with authentic voice turns of phrase which may be clichés in Derry but had me laughing out loud. You may do likewise. If you can't get the book, then I guess that authentic voice can be found in his journalism.

A brief cw: Mammy and Daddy O'Reilly were committed Catholics, not only regular Mass-goers but also fulfilling several key roles in the Catholic community. Mr O'Reilly collects priests like my friend Viv collects lesbians. He knows more priests, in Derry, Ireland and Wolrdwide, than I know, like, scientists. Several of these men have walk on parts in this memoir always doing good; although one is outed as an O'Reilly house-breaker [in a predictably play-it-for-larfs way]. But of the scandals and cover-ups which shook the church to its foundations over the last 25 years - not a word. That's fine; plenty pages on that elsewhere. 

Like, fr'inst, A Guest at the Feast by Colm Tóibín review which I returned to Borrowbox a fortnight ago. This is a collection of his published essays including his splendiferous LRB exposé of Rome Among the Flutterers: A few years later, on Easter Sunday, as I wandered around the inside of St Peter’s in Rome after Mass, I noticed vast numbers of bishops and cardinals, all in their regalia. Since the sun was shining, some of them had the most beautiful seminarians or young priests standing behind them holding yellow umbrellas over their heads. It was a sight for sore eyes.