Visions & Revisions: An anthology of new writing by Junior Cycle Teachers [selected extracts]

Martine O’Brien
boxes of memories I have. Some in the attic, in albums, on the
walls in frames. Wandering from scene to scene sometimes, I try
to remember and feel in me the look of joy on their faces. It’s
hard though, when faces blur into each other.
They really do try to keep me going, the children and the
grandchildren. And I appreciate all they do. Before Mary got
really sick I had an idea what was coming. I had a bad feeling.
She hadn’t been right for a while and the pain was incessant.
The medical people did the best they could, but it was too far
gone. She swelled up on the steroids and ate like a muck savage.
My beautiful wife became a bald, pale, bloated pumpkin with
slitty eyes. Makeup can hide a multitude but the eyes don’t lie.
They were glazed for days before she passed. A dead expression.
It scared me a little. I tried to be loving though, always kissed
her on the lips at the beginning and at the close of each visit.
After my daughter Una gave out to me, I never forgot. We went
through it as best we could and then one awful day she died. It
was all over. Suddenly the cliff had given away and I felt myself
being angry and sad and every emotion in between. Abandoned,
I didn’t know what to do with myself. The children were well
grown, doing their own thing. I was in despair. I was warned
about the drink, it was grabbing hold of me. Thanks be to God I
had discovered Sudoku!
At the funeral, the wake, before and after, sympathisers
came up to us and aspects of Mary’s life, before and after our
lives together, were recounted fondly. They told us about a Fun
Mary, and a Young Mary we’d never known. She had lived a
full and varied life and was well liked. Maybe if she hadn’t been
so private, those lovely women who consoled me at the church
would have come to her, supported her and made the journey
home a bit easier. It puzzled me the way she blanketed herself so
tightly, strictly keeping people out. I even wondered early on if
she had had enough of life and just wanted to leave and join her
parents. Maybe … I don’t know, and I probably will never know.
I’m not sure if you heard my recent news? Emily Lynch, a
friendly woman, maybe mid 70s, recently widowed, living down
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the road, sidled up to me after mass last week and offered to
make my lunch every day and to keep me company. Her husband
Tony passed away about a year ago. Her two children are living
in Canada. I’m not sure what to make of it. Fr. Richard says she’s
harmless but the children don’t think it’s a good idea. I might
give her a call in a few months…
Funny the way the human need is to try and encourage
engagement with life, even when the grip is tenuous. Mary
struggled to be convinced by words of hope from the doctors.
Maybe she just knew how strong a hold the cancer had and that
she didn’t stand a chance. A present of a Country Woman’s Diary
when she was ill, decorated with pretty flowers and vegetables
in season, remained blank. She wouldn’t write in it because she
had nothing positive to say, she explained to me. That was hard
to hear, I knew better than to point out that her constipation
had eased. Normally a problem solver, she didn’t seem to have
much appetite left for a fight in her. I wasn’t much help, but I
tried. I was with her every single day, even when we were bored
of each other and there was nothing left to say. Some routines we
kept, like prayers before sleep time, alone in our separate beds.
How do you comfort someone you love, when they’re suffering
in front of your eyes, life force slipping, stumbling, haltingly to
a place they fear? And you can’t fix it or take a share of the
burden? ‘This is my journey,’ she’d try to convince herself and
us. ‘And you can’t come with me!’ Turns out to be true. Can
I tell you a trick? Whilst you’re brushing your teeth, put your
hot water bottle on your pillow where your head is going to be.
Don’t leave it too long. When your ear lies down on the hot spot,
it feels like a hug. There’s a lot I’m getting used to, I miss the
comfort her strong body lying beside me.
Mary was all woman. Soft and curvy. Babies had fattened
her over the years. She was self-conscious of her size. ‘I’ve soft
skin,’ she once confided to me with a little smile that sagged
in the middle. ‘I’m not fat.’ She went to Unislim a few times, it
didn’t make much difference. She had a gorgeous head of hair.
Years ago, she got a blow dry in Portugal the day before we
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