Christy Moore is on the CD player. He is away from the island on his Honda 50. The rain is pelting down outside. The wind is whooooshing through the trees out the back. I have sliced the last of Teds ham and made a stew of sorts in a big pot with spuds, garlic, onions, tomatoes, organo, parsnips and carrots. And Teds ham. With meat balls. In the kitchen. And a splash of red wine.
Luisne is beside me, in deep conversation with Peppa Pig, courtesy of the internet. Christy doesn’t seem to mind. Neither do I. We are cosy here. Thanks be to God. I used to have a Honda 50 but that’s another story.
Christmas was nice. This blog was well looked after. So was the rest of the clann. We are very lucky. I am glad to get the rest. I haven’t seen your man for a wee while. Since before Christmas. Since he left me in Dublin.
The next day I went to Drogheda. I wandered along West Street. There is a man who sells organic vegetables from a stall there on Fridays. West Street has a street market on Fridays. I be there every third Friday. Or at least I was there every third Friday in 2011. Or every third Friday since the General Election. The other Fridays I was in Dundalk or East Meath. Doing constituency work.
So on Fridays I also shop for vegetables. Not always at the street market in Drogheda. Sometimes I got to a lovely wee Green Grocers in Dundalk. They sell very nice Florance Cakes there. As well as vegetables. When I was a wee lad my granny used to send me to McErleans Home Bakery on the Andytown Road just below Saint Agnes Chapel to get her a Florence Cake – spelt with an e instead of the a of Dundalk. So I like Florence Cakes whatever way they are spelt.
Other times when I know I’m going be in Dublin on the Saturday I go to Moore Street. I like Moore Street.
But I especially like the organic vegetables that I get in West Street. Especially the fresh dates. And the figs. The Friday before Christmas I noticed that the man selling the organic vegetables had mistletoe on his stall. He was talking to me at the time about what was going on in Iran. I only figured out afterwards that he was so up to date with all the sceal from those parts because that’s where his dates come from.
That’s when I noticed that the mistletoe wasn’t hanging up. I mentioned this to your man when we spoke on the phone.
‘I suppose he is just being careful’ he said.
‘What do you mean?’ I wondered.
‘I mean if he had his mistletoe hanging up some people might think that was an invitation’.
‘An invitation?’
‘To kiss!’ he exclaimed.
‘I know that’ I said, still not getting his point.
‘Well’ he explained slowly ‘ If his dates come from Iran he wouldn’t want to be jeopardising that by kissing anyone else!’
‘Ho Ho Ho’ I retorted. ‘ see you in 2012!’
‘2012!’ he exclaimed. ‘2012 here we come!’
2 comments:
Hello Gerry and a happy New Year, come what may.
Very insightful to view the great Pot of stew and the Trade of goods of man selling the organic vegetables. The clear deep percetion of Irish needs. I enjoy your insight, maybe more of less suggestive of the greater world about us. Maybe it not all about economy or British economy, but about Irish life. Irish people are better off with the good economic sense they have and have used in the past. On the street level of life, the big pot, the bit of this and that. Exports play an important role in Ireland's economic growth, and the past and now in this market. We say that Ireland's main economic resource is its large fertile pastures, but it has always been its people.
Dear Mr. Adams,
I love your blog. It is refreshing to read this kind of genuine and sincere narrative coming from a 2012 Teachta Dala. Though my comments here pertain to your more personal Christmas 2011 post, overall your writing throws into high relief the general lack of sincerity and even patriotism in the standard "flip flop" Irish TD fare. At least as we are subjected to it via mainstream Irish media channels.
Thank you for taking the time to set and keep the record in general straight here. I hope some day to be in a position to join your party if I ever manage to find a living wage back home and to leave this godforsaken USA, much as I am indebted to it in many ways too.
I attempt to educate myself on all things Irish via P.S. O'Hegarty's incredible library collections here at the University of Kansas.
You might be interested to hear that just a week or so ago I found an old autograph book from the early 1900s, full of signatures of well know Fenians and early Sinn Feiners which must have been given to O'Hegarty for safe-keeping.
It brought me to tears to read their sentiments and to feel the strength of their convictions in their personal notes and doodles. I wish my own generation was as determined to ensure the Ireland we want to live in is the Ireland we work and if need be, fight to create.
I imagine if O'Hegarty was to rise from the dead, he and his fellow Fenians would be horrified to see the state of the country now...
Here's to our evolution if not some peaceful revolutions. Thank you for all that you do.
Sorcha Ní Aoláin, Lawrence, KS
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