Léargas

Long suffering readers of this column will know I am a dog lover. That’s the way it is.  For all my many faults that may well be one of my redeeming qualities.   I was thinking the other day that it may be possible to measure your life by the number of dogs you have known. In my case that would mean that I am starting to get old.   My first dog was called Darkie. He was a large black and tan canine that stayed with me and my Granny Adams when my Uncles Frank and Seán emigrated to Canada in the 1950s. He was a great dog. I always think of him being big but size is relative. I was only seven or eight at the time so big then mightn’t be so big now.  It’s like the schoolyard at St Finian’s. When I returned there as an adult it was tiny. But back in the day when Brother Christopher, Mr Nolan, Johnny Blake and Brother Aloysius did their best to educate us the yard was enormous to wee Falls Road primary school students.    So too with ...

I don’t mind the rain. I never have. Away back in the day when I was on the run it was easier to wander around West Belfast on a wet day when there weren’t a lot of people about and those who ventured out weren’t paying much heed to anything except the need to get back indoors again as soon as possible. In the rain you could become invisible. A cap, a parka jacket or a duffle coat hood kept out the drizzle and provided much needed cover from passing British army jeeps and other trespassers. So me and the rain are good friends. When I was a school boy it wasn’t so easy. Not when your shoes were letting in. My shoes used to let in a lot. It was entirely my own fault. There were no brakes on my bike. So in order to stop or slow down the trick was to wedge your foot in between the front fork of the bike and against the front tire. This had a debilitating effect on the sole of the brogues. My right shoe had a groove which eventually became porous. My Ma was going to kill me w...

There is not a single family across this island that has not been affected by the challenge of mental health issues. It is now accepted that one in seven adults will experience mental health issues in any given year. Allied to this is the issue of suicide. It is now believed that the real figures for suicide across the island of Ireland are as high as 1,000 people annually. Under-reporting of suicide has always been a problem. Often deaths resulting from road accidents and drowning are impossible to classify. The reality is that all sections and all generations of our society are affected, from the very young to the very old, and in rural and urban areas.  Self harming is also a huge issue in Irish society today. Thousands are admitted to hospitals every year as a result of self-harm which in many cases go unreported. The impact on families and communities is huge. Most are left wondering, Why? They are left asking what they could have done to prevent the death of a loved ...

A Plaque and Mural to Roger Casement were unveiled at Casement Park on Wednesday morning the centenary of his execution. Tuesday was the anniversary of Big Doc’s (Kieran Doherty) death on hunger strike. He died the day after Kevin Lynch. Five days earlier on July 29 th 1981 I had visited the H Block Hospital in Long Kesh with Owen Carron and Seamus Ruddy of the IRSP. By this point in the hunger strike Bobby, Francie, Raymond, Patsy, Martin and Joe had all died. As well as Big Doc and Kevin, Tom McElwee, Laurence McKeown, Matt Devlin, Pat McGeown, Paddy Quinn and Mickey Devine were in the prison hospital. I met all of them together except Kevin and Bid Doc. Kevin was too ill. When I entered Doc’s room he was propped up on one elbow listening. He was on his 69th day of hunger strike and could no longer see. But Doc was as determined as ever. He understood the gravity of the situation. His words were defiant: “ Too much suffered for too long, too many good men dead. Tha...