LOVE OF SPORT

As we get older we realise that the only certainty in life is death. Some people get paranoid about this, but it is simply a passing on to another stage in our existence.

I’m a war baby, born 7 May, 1942 while Ireland was free-wheeling along in blissful neutrality. Someone once said it was one of the rare times that the Irish went out of their way to avoid a fight.

Age is only a number. It is all in the mind. Although I’m now eighty, you make up your mind on what age you want to be. I agree what was once a blazing fire is now a flicker of light, yet, personally, there are not enough hours in the day to do all the things I want to do and I seem to be forever chasing my tail.

The most important fact to remember is that there is nobody in the whole wide world the same as you. You are unique. Never forget that. I keep telling young people this; be proud, hold your head up high, you are special, one of a kind.

Another aspect of growing old is that with every passing year nostalgia multiplies and the mind becomes flooded with minute unexplainable, mundane, and strangely selective memories. I vividly remember I was dying at two years of age and my father making a coffin in the back yard. For some reason I recovered. It wasn’t my time.

There is a touch of black humour about the fact that I nearly drowned in Youghal, I was also badly electrocuted. It should have killed me and later when I was seriously ill in hospital I heard a nurse in the hall saying, ‘the patient in there is dying.’ Then I suffered a heart-attack. This hurt because I went from someone who regularly walked up from Mallow to someone who could barely walk to the nearest shop, but that also passed.

My doctor, an old friend, reassures me that I’ll live to be a hundred. He wouldn’t give it to me in writing.

Why do I have no recollection of many important episodes in my life, yet I vividly remember my first day at school? I wore a red jumper as I walked the halfmile on my own to the school. I never missed a day in school, but I was forced to leave at thirteen. The schools, cinemas, swimming pools all closed because of a polio outbreak.

I was shipped off to Dublin to live. Again, I vividly remember when people on the train heard my Cork accent they stayed far away from me. I was a health risk!

I still have a great love for Dublin, the 1956 final in Croke Park, the Abbey Theatre, The Theatre Royal, Dalymount Park, John Giles’ magnificent goal against Sweden, Charlie Hurley - the best centre-half I ever saw, so sadly neglected in his native Cork.

All the different jobs I had, from a parcel-wrapper in a big store to a messenger boy for a grocery shop in North Main Street. It was no fun delivering a pound of sausages up the far-off hills of Montenotte for twelve shillings (60 cent) a week. Life was so different then compared to now. Money was scarce, no radio, no television, no cars, no traffic or traffic lights. We expected and accepted that there were no Easter eggs, no muggings, no drugs, no money, no nightclubs, no alcohol at dances, no house phones, no mobiles - people spoke to each other back then.

Everyone went to the theatre and the cinemas were sold out. There were no birthday cards or presents. I didn’t get a card or a present even for my 21st birthday. That was the way it was. I smile when I see four-year olds get €50 in their many cards now.

It was the same at Christmas. The only presents I ever remember getting were a flash-lamp with no batteries and a tiny cap gun which was useless after two minutes when the caps ran out.

My friends and I walked or cycled everywhere. We were fanatics at sport and I often played three games a day and would have gladly played three more. In my early teen years I cycled all alone to Killarney to a match and also to Limerick to see my hero, Christy Ring. Cork regularly won All-Irelands back then.

My nickname then was Ishmael. I don’t know if it was after that wild gypsy of a character in the Bible or Roy of the Rovers’ team-mate, Ishmael?

For some strange reason I loved to travel from an early age, over and back to London regularly on the Innisfallen to see football matches. I saw all the greats and there was no diving then. You could just turn up at the gate and walk in. I still have some old ticket stubs; two shillings (10 cent) to get in to Old Trafford, 14 pounds for a return flight to Cherbourg, 21 pounds for Paris, 64 pounds for two weeks all-in to Spain, 2 cent for a beer. How things have changed.

In just the last thirty years there have been huge changes in our acceptance to language, religion and sex. Bad language is rampant and accepted. The priest was once God. Religion is disappearing. Many don’t go to Mass, especially the young.

SO MANY MEMORIES

A kaleidoscope of memories still rush on. I adored my father, a five-foot seven giant with fists like shovels and shoulders like the Mountains of Mourne. When he died I cried for a month. Strangely, when my mother died a little after I never shed a tear. I just accepted it coldly. I went to visit her in hospital. It was heart-breaking to see this chatter-box of a woman lying there speechless after a stroke. I held her hand. I talked and talked about everything and nothing. For the first time I told her I loved her. What kind of a country have we with its backward traditions. What kind of a stupid son was I that I had to wait until my mother was on her death-bed to tell her I love her? I never forgave myself.

The years roll by and life goes on. I try to enjoy every moment. The great tailor from Gougane Barra sums it up when he said, ‘Take the world fine and aisy and the world will take you fine and aisy’.