THIS MAN’S LIFE

L

LORD Geldof of Gobbington. Bob The Gob. Mouth Almighty. The Nabob of Gob. Geldof — for it was he — proved he is still top of the slag-heap last Sunday evening when he announced himself to me thus: “Ah, Egan, you’re back from Tulsa. I see you were fecking brown-nosing Bono,” The Boomtown Rats singer said in cruel reference to my review of U2 in Tulsa in last weekend’s Sunday Independent. “Good job, Egan.”

First things first. I love Bob. He is one of the funniest and most charming people on the planet. Any planet. Even Planet Bob.

That said — and this forms part of his charm — in the 30 years I have known Bob, he has never once referred to me by my first name. He always refers to me in a mockChristian Brothers way of “Egan this”, “Egan that”. This entertaining banter ensued last Sunday night in the ‘green room’ backstage at the Vinyl festival in The Royal Hospital, Kilmainham, after Bob’s equally engrossing interview onstage in front of a packed, and enraptured, audience. (Cillian Murphy would later do a similarly brilliant tetea-tete with Depeche Mode and PJ Harvey producer Flood). My wife and I had previously spoken to Bob’s lovely wife, Jeanne Marine. She was, like her husband, in possession of immense personal charm. My own wife, Aoife, didn’t know who she was, and I wasn’t about to tell her. Jeanne Marine talked glowingly about visiting Ireland with her husband “who is from Dun Laoghaire”.

I was more than intrigued to finally meet the administering angel with the Bardot looks who saved Bob, who helped him address his agony full-on, the enemy within, and made him whole again — the Gallic Messiah who rescued Bob not just from his darkening depression, but from the very true possibility of killing himself. So I was more than intrigued to finally meet the French beauty, who inspired Bob to sing Dazzled By You from his 2012 flawed-masterpiece How To Compose Popular Songs That Will Sell: “In abandoned empty rooms Lying naked in my ruin I was dazzled by you Dazzled by you I was whipped and I was raw When I looked up and I saw you Dazzled by you I’m dazzled by you See, I have barely survived Saw no point in being alive I was dazzled by you Dazzled by you.” Jeanne Marine’s famous soulmate looked dazzlingly good for his age (sorry, I am fecking brown-nosing, Bob) of 66. His dad, Bob senior, lived to be a whopping 96. So Bob has a good few years to throw his arms around the world in him yet.

I remember watching Bob speak at his dad’s funeral service in August 2010, in St Joseph’s Church in Glasthule. A few years later, I interviewed Bob in London, and he recalled his father telling him of being in Mass at the same church in the late 1970s.

“It was the Sunday after my first Late Late Show appearance. The priest said from the altar: ‘I don’t want to embarrass the father of that young gurrier Geldof...’” My father was mortified.

“Bono told me he and Gavin Friday watched that Late Late Show and it was a moment for their generation when they went: ‘Yes!’”

At risk of Sir Bob denouncing me once more for brown-nosing Bono, I had a similar reaction to seeing U2 two weeks ago at the opening night of their eXPERIENCE + iNNOCENCE tour in Tulsa. U2’s reputation — and very existence — hinges on their ability to move forward with relevance and credibility. I think they showed in Tulsa that they are still very much one of the best live bands on the planet. Any planet. Even Planet Bono.

While apocalyptic images straight out of Goya poured out of the giant TV screen above them, Bono and the boys no longer seemed to be straining for relevance. They were like a new group, angry at the world around them; four men with a rage inside, performing powerful songs about love and the searching for personal meaning in life.

******* TO go out and smell the flowers is a better philosophy to live your life by, than sitting in, reading books about philosophy. At 50 years of age, you would think I was old enough to have a reasonably clear understanding of life. But sometimes I feel, the older I get, the less clear my understanding of life becomes.

I was on the long plane journey home from Oklahoma last Thursday night; my jet-lagged brain was a tangle of emotions, feelings, thoughts and fears.

At 38,000ft somewhere over the Atlantic at 5am — with a glass of whiskey in my hand (fear of flying) and having given up on watching the Phantom Thread (Daniel Day-Lewis’s character is a misogynistic tool, deaf to his partner’s feelings) — I was thinking, unless cancer or a plane crash intervenes, I have 20 or so years left in my life.

I tend to have those kind of thoughts rush through my head in the middle of the night at 38,000ft somewhere over the Atlantic, especially when the big lump of steel I am in hits heavy turbulence and I suddenly think I am never going to see my two kids again, and will they even remember me. As much as I love hanging out with U2 and seeing them in concert, I love my kids more. I missed them and I couldn’t wait to see them.

Later that day we all went to the Irish National Stud in Tully, Kildare, to celebrate the unveiling of the Garden of Meditation by the Japanese Ambassador, Her Excellency Mari Miyoshi.

It was a glorious evening and the wonderful David Wardell, the Irish National Stud’s Tourism Development Manager, very kindly took us and the children to see the newborn foals at the sumptuous stables nearby.

You learn more about life from seeing the faces of a three-and-a-half-year-old child and a 12-week-old baby light up when they see foals beside their mummy horses than you will, I suspect, in the pages of Camus or Sartre or Beckett (“You’re on earth. There’s no cure for that.” Take a chill pill, Sam.)

Afterwards, we went for a walk in the spiritually awakening gardens and, indeed, did smell the flowers which were in full bloom on this most sunshine-y of May evenings. On nights like these with your kids so smiley, there is no more wonderful place in the entire world than Ireland.