WINTER ' FOURTEEN
The countryside was serene, with the nearest public road several hundred yards away and the next
door neighbours were three fields over, unless you counted our sheep and cows which were the only signs
of life and they were mostly laying in the short grass, chewing the cud. Air drier than tinder. Cloudless
sky like bleached cloth. The vapour trails of jet planes looked like squeezed toothpaste.
The needle of hobnails boots echoed from the road where our next door neighbour, Danny’s John,
was walking, and Da said, “Look at that auld codger go.”
[CHARACTER DESCRIPTION] Danny’s John, 72-years-old, 5’7”, farmer. Walks alongside a 1930s pushbike
where is balanced a bale of hay on the crossbar. Daily mile-long pilgrimage to feed cattle.
I swapped tools with Da and punctured the ground with the pickaxe. He kept his eyes on my work
like a setter and when the scree had been loosed he pounced on it like a cat on a field mouse. He’d been
vigorous with his efforts all morning and I had said to him to slow it down but he’d hear none of it. I
didn’t want to tell him I’d blisters on my soft hands and that it was hard to get used to working with
something that didn’t have batteries in it. I punctured through the stones and rubble into a layer of think
black muck with a malodorous odour.
“Put the shaft of a shovel in my hand and I’m happy,” said Da. “It’s home to me, Cathal.”
The sweat was pouring down our faces from the force of the work. There’d be no five o’clock whistle
for what we were doing, this thankless work paid for with brow sweat. Not being one to back away from
a challenge, my old man being an expert at laying shores, I matched his speed of intensity and honesty
of effort and we continued toiling in this fashion in silence for a half hour until the shore stretched twofeet deep for fifteen yards. It would need to be five-feet deep before we could bed down the drainage pipes
and backfill the trench.
My mobile phone summoned me with the beep of a received message and I used it as an excuse to
climb out of the shore and take a break. The phone was on the window ledge of a whitewashed outhouse,
and our lunch was packed in a pail and rested i n the shade. Even though we were digging this shore
outside our home we wouldn’t eat lunch inside; we always ate where we worked, out in the fields.
“Off to a hooley tonight?” asked Da.
[VECTOR OF MESSAGE] Bearing a lascivious quality but in good banter. Gist of message: invitation to
party with old school mates. Interpretation: fortification of the body with the imbibing of various alcoholic concoctions
with the distinct and unenviable result of an embarrassing evacuation of stomach contents through the convulsing
of oesophageal muscles taking the vomitee by utter surprise sometime before midnight. Prognosis: hellish day digging
the shore tomorrow. Result: worth it.
“I’ll go out for a sociable pint or two,” I said.
I checked the mobile phone signal but it had dropped out and I was unable to send a reply. This
reunion with my old friends was something I had been looking forward to with great anticipation because
it would mark the end of an era: I was moving permanently to Dublin to pursue a teaching career, which
meant I would only make it back to the area for holidays and special occasions. Tonight’s party was to
be a grand send off, a wake for my old life.
The Linnet's Wings