Christy had an ability to support and listen

IN last week’s column I wrote about ‘Normal People’, both the book and its dramatisation, which is currently being screened on RTE and BBC. At the time I had not finished the book and as the drama series is still running, I did not know how it would all end. I’ve finished the book. I’m not going to ruin it on readers by revealing what happens.

Usually the written word wins out and while I’m enjoying the drama version of the book it would be impossible to show or depict on screen Sally Rooney’s genius in describing situations. She has an uncanny ability in putting down in words incidences, moods, feelings, the fraught moments experienced by people. She writes about the banal, the run-of-the-mill.

The book is centred on the relationship between the two main protagonists, Marianne and Connell. Rooney says she could not imagine writing a novel about an individual person in isolation. She has never come across a novel about a character in isolation and she argues that such a novel would be an experimental work.

I had less than 80 of the 266 pages to read when I learned of the death of a fellow Dominican. Christy O’Flaherty died in Galway on Sunday, May 17. He was six years older than I.

Thinking about Christy since his death, I was reminded of ‘Normal People’. It’s important to catch the moment. To make the best of times, to be kind. I’m wondering did we all tell Christy to his face how we appreciated him.

Christy was an extraordinarily talented man. He could do anything. He started framing pictures in St Mary’s Priory in Tallaght probably in the late 1970s. People came from far and wide for him to do framing for them.

Later he effortlessly turned his hand to cooking and gardening. He could turn a patch of unloved ground into a place of beauty.

Some weeks ago when a woman realised I was a Dominican and asked me if I knew Christy her face lit up when I told her I did. She went on to tell me the friendship she and her family had with him.

He had an extraordinary ability to support and listen to people. He never judged and always put himself at the back of the queue.

He disliked headlines and fanfares.

And he had a smile that told a thousand stories.

I remember having a discussion with him over Irish politics. It must have been in the mid-1970s. We had different political views. On that particular evening we were strongly disagreeing with each other. I have no idea what the issue was but I can still vividly remember his parting smile.

When I visited him earlier this year in Dublin’s Beaumont Hospital as soon as he heard my voice I saw that very same smile again.

Christy’s funeral Mass was last Thursday in Galway. Because of Covid-19 I was unable to attend. I am back thinking of Sally Rooney and how she can describe the tiniest of details, the incidental moments. Aren’t they the magical moments in our lives? I’m hoping that Christy knew that he was cherished.

The important events in our lives are wrapped around our relationships with other people. And often the tiniest of things are what count.

‘Normal People’ is a love story between two young people but it’s also a great piece of writing about the ordinary, the run-of-the-mill, as Rooney puts it. There’s a lesson in it for all of us.