I Should Have Been at Work. Des Lynam

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СКАЧАТЬ school I was progressing from cowboys and indians to football and cricket. I also sang in the school choir – our rendition of ‘Panis Angelicus’ won us first prize in the Sussex schools’ competition. My best pal was Micky Weller and I was in love with a pretty girl called Janice Prossor. I usually showed my passion for her by chasing her round the playground. It was unrequited love, but I did manage to kiss her once. Sheer bliss. It gave me a wonderful tingling feeling of which I have never tired.

      In class, I was doing well under the guidance of Miss Thornton and Mr Beech, but being a Catholic school we were consumed with religious instruction that took up around an hour of each day. I kept hearing about the Immaculate Conception many years before I knew what immaculate or conception meant, never mind the two of them together. It was a wonder we had time for the academic stuff.

      I got into a few fights in the playground, won a couple, lost a couple. Steeled myself not to cry when I lost, but the emotions usually got the better of me when I won. In summer evenings I would gather in the local park with a few other boys and we would play cricket till dark.

      Although we had little money, my parents loved to go to the local variety theatre, when the housekeeping budget allowed, to see some of the great comics of the day, and I went with them. They had heard Frankie Howerd, Jimmy Edwards, Max Bygraves and Max Miller on radio; and in those pre-television days, or at least before most people had TVs, this was the way to see your favourites. The Brighton Hippodrome was usually packed when a big name came to town, which happened regularly. The theatre was a ‘number one’; that is to say, the top-line acts would appear there. As well as those mentioned above, I remember seeing Tony Hancock, Vic Oliver, and even Laurel and Hardy live on stage. And of course we never missed a pantomime. To this day I can smell the red velour seats and remember the anticipation as the orchestra struck up their introduction to the evening or matinee.

      But each year, Mum and Dad and I would set out for ‘home’. This was a trip back to Ireland for two or three weeks. While my pals were enjoying Brighton beach, I would be spending my time with the family, either in Ennis or at my Dad’s village, Boris in Ossery, in the county of Laois in the midlands of Ireland. I would usually return to Brighton, pale as death in contrast to my sun-tanned pals, having suffered from the wet Hibernian climate.

      When in Ennis, I would go to my grandfather’s forge and spend hours pulling the bellows to heat up the fire for smelting the horseshoes. There, I would listen to stories and jokes as the men got about their work. I learned not to be afraid of horses, but never to stand behind them. The forge seemed to be the meeting place for many boys after school or on Saturdays, and I remember a great atmosphere of camaraderie. I was now occasionally ribbed for my English accent. What a turnaround.

      On Sundays it was off to Mass, then lunch and either a trip to the country or, more likely, down to Cusack Park to watch a hurling or Gaelic football match. My grandfather was known to everyone and his former sporting prowess earned him a good deal of respect. He proudly introduced me to people, and being ‘Packo’s’ grandson seemed to give me some reflected glory. I learned how to use a hurly stick and, a lifetime later, I was walking in Richmond Park one day when I came across two Irish boys smacking a ball between them with hurlies. ‘Can I have a go?’ I asked. They were amazed that I could pick up the ball with the stick, control it at speed, and fire it to them accurately.

      I loved being in Ennis, but would also spend a while at the home of my paternal grandparents, Joseph and Bridget Lynam. Joe was a signalman on the railway, a task he combined with running a small farm. Between them they produced no fewer than fifteen children, most of whom survived into old age, a couple of them into their late nineties.

      Once, when I was about fourteen, I cheekily suggested to my Dad that grandfather must have been a sex maniac. Dad, rather amused, reckoned that his father might only have had sex fifteen times. Can you imagine bringing up that many children in a small farmhouse, with no modern conveniences, on low pay and no benefits? Well they all ate well, all went to school, all ended up with responsible jobs, and the only case of lawbreaking in the family was when Uncle Gerald was had up for a bit of poaching. My grandparents set standards for their children that were adhered to throughout their lives.

      I was always frightened in the house at night. My parents, with my grandmother (who liked a Guinness) and other family members and friends, would go off to one of the many pubs in the village. I would be left in the house with my teetotal grandfather. I was always given a room that had a picture of Jesus Christ on the Cross wearing the crown of thorns; his eyes always seemed to be staring right at me. Whichever way I turned in the bed, the eyes never left me. I never slept a wink until daybreak. Then I could never get up.

      Bridget and Joe Lynam were as different as chalk and cheese, underlining the old adage that opposites attract. Joe was straightforward, hardworking, and very literate. He could quote Shakespeare readily, and enjoyed most of the plays. He particularly liked George Bernard Shaw, a man of his own vintage. Bridget was somewhat capricious, with a ready wit. She liked a drink and whenever a visitor with similar tastes arrived at the house, she would ensconce herself in the ‘parlour’ to pour the guest a glass of Guinness. Then she would liberally imbibe herself. The theory was that Joe knew nothing of this habit, but of course he wasn’t that stupid and left her to her own devices.

      To this day I remember some of Granny’s sayings. About someone always complaining about their aches and pains, she would say, ‘He’s never without an arse or an elbow’. If she saw an odd looking couple, she would remark that ‘Every old shoe meets an old sock’; or on seeing someone strange she might say, ‘It’s amazing what you see when you haven’t got a gun.’

      She told stories about the village cheapskate, a lady who, when it was her round, would describe the Guinness as having got ‘very bitter’ until it was someone else’s round. Her favourite one was when someone came up with something she had missed. ‘You’re an eejit but you’re right,’ she’d say. Bridget was quite a lady, a lady who had endured being pregnant over nineteen summers of her life.

      But it was back in England that I remember enjoying one of the best days of my life. I was ten years of age and it was Christmas morning. I had received a great array of presents, everything I could have wished for, when Dad called me from the kitchen. ‘There’s something here in a big parcel,’ he said. ‘What can this be?’

      I ran in, and there underneath the cardboard wrappings was a brand new Raleigh bicycle. I don’t think at any time in my life since have I exceeded the happiness of that moment.

      But that morning, a boy who lived across the road learned that his mother, who was probably only in her early thirties, had suddenly died – on Christmas Day. I could see his pale face looking through the window of his house, tears streaming down. I took my bike several streets away to ride it. I didn’t want to display my happiness in front of his abject misery.

      As I went through my years at junior school, it became clear that I had a good chance of passing the Eleven-Plus examination. In every test I usually came top or near the top of the class. When the examination came round, Dad promised me a cricket bat if I passed, which I did. I still have the bat, with the signature of the then famous England captain Len Hutton inscribed on it. Years later when I interviewed Len, who had long been retired, he asked me to sign an autograph for him, for his grandchild. How could I have imagined at eleven years of age such a turn of events? Dad told me later that the bat would have been mine even if I had not passed the exam. ‘You would have had it for trying your best,’ he said.

      Janice Prossor was also successful. My pal Micky Weller was not. He was distraught and deemed to be a failure at that tender age. Whenever I hear arguments in favour of that life-changing test, I think of Micky’s tears.

      And so, in September 1954, I was off to Varndean Grammar School for Boys along with Pat Dale, Ron Cavadeschi СКАЧАТЬ