Chapter 3

DraftCh3/5.30.99

 

 

 

August 5,6,1969

 

Brian was surprised at how quickly he took to driving “on the wrong side of the road.” But, as Caitlin explained later “It’s not the wrong side so much as it’s that the Irish roads are built differently.” The Dineens had picked up the car, a relatively new European Ford, at Shannon Airport and had driven through Ennis before stopping, many hours later, for a late lunch of soup and sandwiches in Galway City. The view from the car, since they left the airport, was different from what they had seen from the air, Brian observed to Caitlin. “It’s a kaleidoscope of nothing but green, with no two greens matching, and each one more beautiful than the one before.”

“I think Ireland brings out the poet in each of us, Brian,” Caitlin countered, “but with any luck, you’ll get over it soon enough.” Brian realized Caitlin was home now, and the Yankee talk he had become so accustomed to in Caitlin had given way to a more primitive, more humor filled language.

The hills, they hadn’t seen what could be called mountains yet, seemed gentle and undulating as though a tableau of hills had been placed behind a tableau of hills to form a visual impression of grace and peacefulness, here light, there fleeting. The hills seemed the texture of velvet, especially where the sun shown down through the clouds to brighten now this spot, then that, with stands of trees and hedges and walls of stone separating the animals that grazed on the hillets. As they drove along roads that were neither straight nor flat, point of view afforded several impressions of the same scene, each one as breathtaking as it could be from that locus. Any of these spectacular vistas was rewarding, but as vista upon vista registered in the mind, Brian found it difficult not to become less sensitive to the beauty. He was excited to be seeing this with Caitlin. It’s good to have someone to share these impressions with, Brian thought. But, yet, there is an intimacy that exists between viewer and viewed that is too private, too ineffible to share, at least just yet; something that cannot be readily put into words at this moment, but in time will find expression.

Brian thought to drive north to Clairmorris and then on into Ballina, the most direct route, arriving in the town late in the evening. Caitlin suggested they take the extra time now, at the start of their trip, to drive west from Galway City to Clifden and then through Connemarra, the bog covered expanse of Western Ireland where Gaelic is still the spoken language. That way, she said, there would be no chance of missing this unusual area at the end of the trip because they had run out of time.

West from Galway City, they passed through several picturesque villages-Barna, Spiddal and Inveran. Though it was late in the day, there was enough daylight for sightseeing. West of Costelloe, traffic came to a stop and after an unexplained ten minutes of waiting, Brian turned the car around and, after looking at the Tourist Board map, decided to drive twenty miles through desolate bog country to Oughterard. The narrow, barely paved road wandered through the bog-covered terrain scarcely wide enough, in places, for a single car to pass. As the day finally began to yield to darkness, a sense of aloneness, now magnified by the sudden absence of utility poles along the road, set in. Moving isolation is how Caitlin described the feeling as they progressed along the wandering road sharing the desolation with an occasional group of sheep grazing along the bogland. The utility poles came back into view and Brian continued to drive for some distance before the next settlement could be seen. At Oughterard, a town that reminded Brian of the smaller villages in Westchester, New York, the Dineens decided to call it a day and found a room at an inn that had not yet turned out its electric sign

“Do you have any idea where we are, Brian,” Caitlin asked as the two were unpacking their luggage

“I suppose we’re still in the bog country,” Brian replied. “Am I right?”.

“Not exactly,” Caitlin said “we’re on the west shore of Lough Carrib, and if you look north across the lake, you’ll see the town of Cong, the place where they filmed The Quiet Man in the 1950s”

“I thought that was Innisfree?”

“They called it Innisfree in the film but it was done in Cong. My family went there when I was in school and after Cong, we explored Connemarra. And that’s when I first took a serious interest in history.”

The next morning, after an Irish Breakfast of fried eggs, Irish bacon that looked like ham, sausages Caitlin called bangers, small portions of other meats she called black pudding and white pudding, soda bread, brown bread, orange marmalade and tea, they repacked their luggage and drove on to Maan Cross and then Lenane. They then turned north toward the Partry Mountains and the wild but beautiful extreme of County Galway that conjoins County Mayo. Brian and Caitlin stopped in the town of Westport for lunch of Clew Bay oysters and roasted lamb chops, surprising themselves that they still had room for food after their first breakfast. When lunch was finished, they drove east to Crossmollina, and then, further east into Ballina.

When they were planning the trip, Caitlin suggested to Brian that they check in at a bed and breakfast in Ballina before calling any of the relatives so as not to hurt anybody’s feelings. “Everyone we talk to will want us to stay at his or her house and if we accept an invitation from one, it might be taken as an insult by all the others. So by calling from the bed and breakfast,” she added, “we avoid a touchy issue.”

“Come on, Caitlin,” Brian said, “I can’t believe you’re serious.”

“I am,” she answered, “and you won’t be in Ireland long before you agree I’m right.”

“Well, I’m not that sensitive and you’re not that sensitive, and we come from the same stock as our relatives.” Brian said. “Why would it be different for them, Caitlin?”

“You’re a Yank in Ireland, Brian, whether you like it or not and by the time we’ll meet them, I’ll be seen as the wife of a Yank. And that’s the way we’ll be received by your family and mine. It’s the way the Irish in Ireland are, Brian. You’ll get used to it.”

Brian recalled that conversation as they checked into the Whitecreek Bed and Breakfast in Ballina.

Peter Dineen, though he knew by their letter that Brian and his new bride were coming to spend a few days in Mayo, sounded overjoyed to hear from his nephew and told Brian to stay at the Whitecreek and he would be down to meet them in fifteen minutes. Almost an hour later, and after seven or eight other men had come through the sitting room, Brian met saw father’s older brother for the first time. He didn’t need an introduction when the man in the dark blue sweater over a rumpled faded blue, open collar dress shirt and black, unpressed trousers walked into the sitting room of the Whitecreek. Brian was overwhelmed. He was staring into the face of his father, a somewhat older, more wrinkled face perhaps, but there could be no doubt that the two men were brothers, almost twins. In person, Peter looked entirely different from the old photographs Brian could remember from the family photograph album. Peter stopped inside the room, and when he spotted his nephew, tears welled up in his eyes.

“Brian og, Brian og,” Peter said as he rushed toward the younger man. “I’d know you anywhere. You’re Martin’s son allright, and I’m so happy to see you.”

As Brian embraced the older man he could smell the only thing left of a recent warm beer on the man’s breath.

“And I’m sure this is your new bride, Caitlin,” Peter smiled as he extended a strong, calloused hand to the young woman. Caitlin responded by hugging the man firmly and kissing him on his less than well shaved face.

“I’m so glad to meet you Uncle Peter. The only other relatives of Brian’s I’ve ever met, with the exception of his father, Lord rest his soul, are on his mother’s side.”

In the parking lot, Peter told Brian to lock his car and ride with him. “It will be easier for me to drive since you don’t know the roads and there are so many of us wanting to meet you and Caitlin, that this will save time. I understand that you’ll only be spending two days in Mayo. Is that right?”

“That’s about all the time we have, Uncle Peter, and we want to meet my mother’s relatives in Bohola and some of Caitlin’s family in Catrracastle, before we head on to Dublin.”

“Well then Brian, we’re going to have to make the most of the time we have.”

Peter drove north toward Kilcummin, a small town on the west shore of Kilalla Bay. “Kilcummin is where all of us Dineens have come from since way back before the days of Oliver Cromwell,” Peter said. “And there aren’t many of us left. I’d be gone myself, but for the farm.” Peter pointed out a crumbling castle up ahead. “Ye’ll get tired looking at those things before you go home.”

“Since I was the oldest, the farm became mine when your grandfather died, about six years after your father left. The rest of them left as soon as they could. Margaret went to Canada and we never heard from her again. Paddy and Seamus went to England and after a while they found their own lives to live and we don’t hear from them too often. And of course your father went off to America.”

Peter pointed out an old abbey near the bay. “All of us used to poach salmon on the bay side of the abbey when we were little and then we’d run all the way home hiding the fish so no one else would see it.”

“Why would you do that Uncle Peter?” Brian asked. “Were the salmon that rare?”

“Oh no, Brian,” Peter answered smiling. “In those days the British thought they owned the salmon as well as the deer, the rabbits, and the foxes and every thing else that was wild and if we were caught poaching we could be hanged as an example to the others. Luckily we never got caught.”

“Did my father poach with you, Uncle Peter?”

“Martin was a few years younger than me, you know, and by the time he’d be old enough to go after the salmon, I was up there at the place working the fields.” Peter turned off to the right after the town of Killala. “Its another seven miles now to Kilcummin.”

“I never heard my father talk about it, Uncle Peter,” Brian said changing the subject again, “but my mother said my father left Kilcummin after the civil war with a price on his head. My father never said anything about the Troubles as far as I can remember and I always assumed that his war-time experiences were too painful for him to talk about. But my mother’s Aunt Kitty told me several times that the British had a 2500 punt bounty on him. Do you know how he was involved in the war? Caitlin and I thought we’d like to find out about what he did back then while we’re here.”

“Brian og, that was a long time ago and my memory of those days is dim,” Peter said with a sigh. “And I’m sure most of the people you’ll meet around here won’t remember too much either. And with those who remember a thing or too about those days, you’ll find there are strong feelings on both sides.

“I do remember we were all divided fiercely on what was best for the country, independence or partition. I remember your father joined a brigade or troop and that was the last we ever saw of him. It’s been a long time since I heard talk of those days and if I was you I ‘d forget about it.”

 

The architecture of the Dineen homestead was simple. A two story building with three windows across the second floor and two windows and a front door on the main level. The main structure could have been stone or block covered with a pastry colored stucco. Galvanized metal roofs, painted barn red, covered the main building and the three outbuildings. The farmhouse had two chimneys, one at either end, and although it was August, an acrid smoke billowed from the turf fire at the end of the structure that Brian believed must have housed the kitchen. Inside, the three entered by a side door near the rear, Brian and Caitlin met Bridget, Peter’s wife who Grace Dineen always referred to as Bridie. James Dineen, Peter and Bridie’s son and Brian’s first cousin, wasn’t home whenb they arrtived, but Bridie assured the younger Dineens that James would return from a cattle buying trip before they left. Within an hour, the simple farm house was filled with first and second cousins and other relatives, some of whom Brian knew of only from having listened to stories about them at the Friday night get-togethers in his home as he was growing up. Brian managed to speak to every person who came and after a while found it easier to put names and faces and relationships together. Many of the people knew Brian’s mother’s family the Dwyers of Bohola and some knew the McLaughlins, Caitlin’s father’sfamily in Carracastle. The talk was light and friendly except when Brian asked questions about his father. Most of the people Brian spoke to did not remember his father or dismissed the question saying that was so long ago. Those who did remember Martin, however vaguely, contributed little to Brian’s quest. Every now and then conversation would stop as one guest or another contributed a song for everyone’s enjoyment. At the end of a very late evening, Peter drove the almost exhausted newlyweds back to the Whitecreek bed and breakfast. Brian thanked Peter for an enjoyable evening.

“I’m glad you enjoyed yourself Brian, it isn’t too often we get to meet members of the family from overseas and when we do, it’s cause for celebration. And, you know, we were delighted to meet Caitlin and yourself. We’ll get together again tomorrow when you are free. Just give me a phone call at the farm or come on out yourself, now that you know the way.

“Brian, I hope you don’t think I’m speaking out of turn when I say the past is the past and often it is better left forgotten. There were strong feelings in Kilcummin on all sides during the Troubles and you don’t want to be opening up old sores around here, now, do you?”

 

“It seems impossible to find out anything about my father, even from his own relatives,” Brian said to Caitlin, later before they went to bed, “and I wonder if it is worth wasting our time pursuing it any more.”

“I guess you’re right.” Caitlin answered. “Why don’t we sleep on it?”