Chantal

My gorgeous friend Chantal and me, on the cliffs near Garinish

 

 Magic day

 

Looking back out the Hag’s Glen

Fugitive cows

My father used to spend a lot of time in the mountains, but hadn’t done any serious climbing since he had his second hip replaced this time last year. On the top of Carrauntoohil and Cumín na Péiste, I got wistful text messages from him asking me what it was like and to pelt rocks at tourists for him.

 

There is nothing wrong with Dad’s fitness and he is particularly steady with a walking stick, so I worked on him to try something a bit more challenging. He seemed reluctant; at least, he came up with any number of reasons to put it off. Really: he says a few prayers every now and then - it’s not as if he’s tied to a desk.

 

I was thrilled when Dad said he’d like to walk up to Curraghmore Lake, just underneath Carrauntoohil, and suggested the following Monday.

 

The drive the Bridha Valley is stunning: a single-track road winds its way up a gorge and tops out at Bealach Béama with sheer rocks on either side. Unfortunately, halfway up we got stuck behind a Bentley, which in turn got stuck behind a herd of cows. After a while, it became evident that the cows were fugitives; there was nobody driving them.

 

Half an hour later, I was fed up with the Bentley jamming on the brakes every time a cow chewed cud aggressively. He was obviously nervous about having his gleaming car licked by a cow, or lashed with a tail. When we came to a narrow(er) stretch of track, I applied the handbrake and dashed up to the Bentley. I knocked on the window.

 

“Hi, ah- oh, how are you? Nice weather we’re having. Where you off to today? Just here for a holiday, eh? Oh, Glenbeigh is lovely, yes. Listen, I was wondering, would you mind pulling in when you have a chance and letting me go ahead? My husband’s an expert on passing cows.”

 

“Oh, no problem,” said the driver. “I wanted to do that myself, but missus wouldn’t let me.”

 

The Bentley pulled over and I nudged through the cows, instructed by Andrew: “Ok, zoom up behind them really fast and then swerve to the left.”

 

We eventually reached the head of the Bridha Valley and got ready to go. Dad did a couple of creaky squat-thrusts.

 

I was terribly nervous for Dad, but he set off strongly. Every few hundred metres I checked to see if he was ok, but it seemed superfluous when I had to catch him up to pose the question. The man leaped from rock to rock and forded streams in single bounds. I was tremendously proud.

 

“This is my dad. He has two false hips,” I said to everyone we met.

 

“Er Niamhie, maybe your father doesn’t want you telling everyone,” said Andrew.

 

It took us shortly over an hour to reach the lake. As we ate our lunch it started to drizzle, but we had waterproofs and a flask of coffee, and Dad wouldn’t have considered it a Walk if he hadn’t battled headwinds.

 

We were back at the car, when a man pulled up and wandered over. He was waiting for three people who had set off from the other side of the saddle two hours before. Andrew managed to pick out the group as they passed the bottom of a rock face.

 

“Why don’t you go and meet them?” I asked the man. “There’s a clear track.”

 

“Oh no, I don’t do that kinda stuff,” he said. “Ah have a false hip.”

 

“Well, I have TWO false hips,” said my father, and maybe only I could hear the ‘na na nana na’ hanging unspoken in the air.

 

I considered The American’s size more an impediment than the false hip, but inspired by my father’s restraint, I resisted saying so

In the mountains

Although Husband looks deep in thought, he’s actually working up to laugh at one of my father’s jokes This is my favourite photo of Andrew of all time

 

This isn’t

 

Andrew on Cumeen na Péiste

 

Still there

 

Yep

 

Kerry sheep

 

Top of Ireland

Tic infestation

Husband flew into Dublin in the early hours of a morning and I met him off the train in Rathmore. I got a bit teary; I hadn’t seen him for six weeks.

 

Now, holidays with Andrew can be a bit fraught; he’s barely out of the airport before he’s muttering about how bored he is. Maybe it’s how he relaxes, but he drives me bonkers.

 

This time, I had A Plan.

 

After dropping his stuff at The Rectory, I took him a way out the road where, according to the trusty Ordnance Survey map, there was a lake about 2 kilometres off a track.

 

Now, Andrew’s version of the story might go something like: Once upon a time, I was totally jet-lagged, and my wife dragged me out on a walk and for a while it was quite nice but then Niamhie insisted on going around a forest when there was a path that went straight on, and I tried to tell her; I said: “Niamhie, this path probably goes right up to the lake,” but she wouldn’t listen and forced me to walk through a whole pile of crap and it took HOURS and it wasn’t nice at all.

 

My version is totally different and paints me in a much better light. Hmm, actually it isn’t much and doesn’t really - BUT - there’s always a ‘but’ - Andrew’s story is lacking context. Because around about the time he said: “Niamhie, this path probably goes right up to the lake,” he also said: “Hey - you hear that? A wild goose! And where there’s geese, there’s water. Came from over there <pointing 90° in the wrong direction>. That must be where the lake is, let’s go.”

 

And when I said, “That’s not geese, it’s a raven,” he said: “Nonsense! I’m an expert on wild geese.”

 

And when I said: “Ok, but the map, it says the lake is this way, not over there,” he said: “Well, it’s wrong. It’s an Irish map, what d’you expect?”

 

You know I once orienteered for Ireland? In other words, I’m reasonably good at navigating. So whereas I’ve always sincerely admired Andrew’s ability to talk absolute crap with complete assurance - to the extent that I frequently go along with him and even feel disappointed if it doesn’t work out - I have more faith in the OS than the mating calls of ravens. (Please note how I avoided variations on jokes about wild goose chases. You’ve got to give me credit for that; it took HUGE reserves of willpower.)

 

Anyway, there was nothing wrong with my estimate of the lake position to the nearest millimetre. Unfortunately, the route I chose (around the forest) was somewhat rugged. We waded through waist-high heather, fought through thickets of gorse, plunged down bog holes and sloshed through boulder-strewn drains. But we got to the lake, where Andrew had a three-second swim after half an hour of coaxing.

 

Over the next few days, we worked out a system whereby I had veto power on directional decisions. Whenever Andrew struck off briskly up some cliff face - “Screw the map! It’s this way, I can feel it in my waters. Let’s go,” - I would respectfully say: “Andrew, I respectfully exercise my veto power. Step this way, please. Now.”

 

After a few days, I was sporting various midge, horsefly and family inflicted bites. Seems I still retain my fatal attraction for biting, stinging insects, along with flesh-eating goats and used chewing gum. DID YOU KNOW that scratching could be better than sex?

 

Oho yes.

 

One morning, I woke up covered in tics. After Andrew assisted me in banishing the buggers, I asked him if he’d like me to perform a similar service. A look of distilled horror accompanied the realisation that he was probably hosting tics himself. When I found one on his shoulder, he executed a little foxtrot on the spot and squealed:

 

“Get it off, get it off!”

 

He clenched his teeth in mental anguish as I picked it out. I don’t know what he was carrying on about; a couple of days later, a friend of Anne’s told us with morbid relish about some bloke who had an infestation of tics on his perineum. If you don’t know where the perineum is, you really should look it up. An INFESTATION. Apparently, he rubbed tea-tree oil on the area and the tics dropped off

The Deans

Me, Dan and Philip after climbing Brandon. If you look closely, you can make out the cartoon cloud on the left

 

Dan from above

 

Froggie

 

A drop of sun on Cumeen na Peiste

Lethal liver eating disease

I had resolved to get out in the mountains again, but the last time I walked the Kerry hills was thirteen years ago. On one of my father’s Wednesday Walks last month, my walking boots circa 1988 disintegrated after a one-sided tussle with a puddle.

 

At the start of October, Dan arrived in Ireland with his father for a climbing holiday and I was appointed official walking guide. I treated myself to a new pair of boots when I was summoned to tackle Mt Brandon.

 

As I drove towards the west-most tip of the Dingle Peninsula, I could see the peak was clear. However, we had barely set off before we were in cloud. Visibility was poor and we were lashed with rain as we approached the summit. A German took our photo beside the shrine at the top, and you can just about make out the three of us in the mist, standing at an angle against the wind, hair plastered to our skulls.

 

Four hours later, we dropped below the cloud 100 metres from the car. Gorgeous day: blue skies, 360° views for miles around, not a whisper of wind. You could hear sheep bleating from the next county. I’m not sure which of us attracted the Cartoon Cloud - probably Dan.

 

The following day, I could only negotiate the stairs by pulling myself up the banisters, legs dangling uselessly behind me. Never mind coming back down: pure agony.

 

The day after that, Danny and Philip were keen to do the Coumloughra Horseshoe, 14 kilometres covering the three highest mountains in Ireland. When they arrived to collect me, I found the journey to the car arduous. I could just about walk without whimpering, but my knees weren’t working and my quads were present only in a vocal capacity.

 

Completing the walk had less to do with physical ability than willpower and the promise of Irish Coffee. After that day, I had no further problems with the pins.

 

I persuaded Danny to stay on longer than planned, since Husband was threatening arrival at the end of the week. We were sitting in the kitchen one day, when Eoin sloped in.

 

“Dan, good to see you again,” he said. “By the way, nice shorts.”

 

Dan was wearing jeans.

 

“Errr,” he said. “Er- ah-”

 

“Very comfortable,” said Eoin. “The gusset has a lot of give. And I like the colour.”

 

At that point, we realised: EOIN WAS WEARING DAN’S SHORTS. Ann told me later that Eoin came around to her house one day and robbed them.

 

“Er- I wondered where those had got to,” said Dan.

 

“Would you like them back?”

 

“Ah- no, no you hold on to them.”

 

Husband and I spend a lot of time with Danny in Dubai, but he and Andrew like to talk about things like spliced cabling systems and the optimal size of wrenches, while I prefer to pull out my eyelashes one at a time. So although Dan has been part of my life for ten years, I can’t claim to really know him. So it was great spending time with him tramping around the mountains. The ordnance survey maps mark plenty of stone circles, ring forts and grottos. One day we noticed a small red dot on the map, labelled ‘rock art’.

 

“We’ve got to find it,” said Dan. “It’s probably some ancient, mystical man-art. Let me get my GPS.”

 

Fifteen minutes later, I said: “What’s taking so long?”

 

“Em, it’s having problem getting a third location point. Wait - here we go. Oh. Apparently we’re in North Virginia.”

 

“Hmm, that doesn’t sound right. Ok look, according to the map, it should be on this side of the spur halfway between those two rivers-”

 

“If you wait a minute I’ll tell you exactly where it is-”

 

“Western Tennessee?”

 

“Very funny,” said Dan.

 

“Look, it’s at 600 metres; same level as that saddle there. Around . . . about . . . here. Got it.”

 

“What?”

 

“The rock art. This boulder - see the fish shape? That’s it.”

 

“You are pulling my leg.”

 

“What were you expecting: the Venus de Milo?”

 

A few days later, we woke up early to phenomenal weather: fresh and clear blue with glinting sunshine. We were on our way to Killarney to do a low level walk, but it seemed wasteful. We spontaneously decided to go up Cumín na Péiste, the ‘Ridge of the Worms’. We were thoroughly over-excited:

 

“Oh my god, I can’t believe you just tried to high-five me!”

 

“I can’t believe you high-fived me back!”

 

“Saddo!”

 

“Saddo squared!”

 

We stopped halfway up the Devil’s Ladder to talk to a couple of gnarly Cork men. The previous day, they were halfway up Carrauntoohil when a member of their party - one of the men’s brothers in law - collapsed on the ground, frothing at the mouth. Ok, I made up the frothing; but he was unconscious for HOURS. Well, at least a few minutes. His companions thought he was having a heart attack and called the Mountain Rescue. A helicopter came out and fired orange flares all over the Hag’s Glen and it was all terribly intrepid.

 

“Jesus,” I said. “Is he all right?”

 

“Ara, he’s grand. They took him to Tralee General Hospital.”

 

“What was the matter with him?”

 

“He had a Urinary Tract Infection.”

 

“A what?” said Dan. “Sorry, I thought you said a - heh heh - a ‘Urinary Tract Infection’.”

 

“Aye, I did.”

 

“Not some lethal liver eating disease?” I enquired after a pause.

 

“Urinary Tract Infections can be quite nasty,” said the Cork Man defensively.

 

“Evidently,” said Dan.

 

On another day Danny and I met an old friend of mine. The Bridha is a secluded valley just under the Reeks - it was the last place in Ireland to get electricity in the fifties. We used to spend a lot of time there when I was younger, and got to know the Joy family: three brothers who didn’t know which end of a woman was up, and their sister who proved she was well aware which end of a man was up when she produced a daughter out of wedlock.

 

When I was sixteen I had a mad pash on Jimmy Joy. Tragically, there were a couple of obstacles standing in our path to true love. One was the fact that I was mildly disturbed by his monobrow. The other was that I couldn’t understand a word the man said. Literally not a word, not even the occasional verb. He once said my name, and I thought he was suffering from indigestion.

 

Dan and I were picking our way back to the car and didn’t want to bump into Cranky Nora, so we went around her place and came to a farmyard barred by a gate. Two dogs tore over barking and snarling.

 

“Oh feck,” I said to Danny. “Nice doggie, goooood doggie,” I said to the dog that was trying to gnaw through the bars of the gate.

 

The only way out of it was to throw Dan to the dogs. I was working out the logistics of picking Dan up in order to feck him at them, when a man came striding across the yard.

 

He said something that sounded like the Spanish dialect of Cantonese, but I presumed he was well-intentioned when he grabbed one of the dogs by the scruff. Looking at him and his bristling monobrow, I realised-

 

“Are you- are you one of the Joy Boys?” I asked.

 

“Ara aram issa tomaunday.”

 

“Jimmy Joy?”

 

“Ara an ooda awalla aroo?”

 

“It’s Niamh! Niamh Shaw! You remember, I used to spend time here-”

 

“Oo ar ablanna nowoo errayta!”

 

Then we had a discussion wherein I employed a repertoire of five standard responses which, used at random, address every conversational contingency:

 

“The grandest, but I reckon there’s a nip of rain in the air.”

“Can’t go wrong with sheep.”

“Better than a kick in the eye.”

“It’s a curse, a curse I tell you.”

“That feckin hoor.” 

 

 

 

“How the hell did you understand him?” said Dan later.

 

“You’ve got to have the ear.”

Baa Baa Black Sheep to the tune of ‘Fernando’

Daire picks up carpentry jobs around Kenmare so my niece, Ceara, spends a lot of time at the Rectory. When Ceara was not occupied ordering her devoted granny around, I was Chief Executive Babysitter (the perks of the job made up for the salary). She has just turned four and a gorgeous little kid - although she seems to have inherited my cheek and distinctive passive-aggressive leadership qualities. She never walks when she can run and is always singing, making up the words as she goes along.

 

Whoever puts her to sleep has to sing her a bedtime song, so I introduced her to a medley of seventies classics. One night after putting her to bed, I joined Daire on the doorstep outside.

 

“What the frig was THAT?” asked Daire. “It sounded like . . . was it Abba?”

 

“Well spotted. Fifty quid if you can name the song title, year and position in the Irish top 40.”

 

“The tune was ‘Fernando’-”

 

“Correct.”

 

“But the lyrics-”

 

“Baa Baa Black Sheep. Yeah, I don’t know any words after ‘Can you hear the drums, Fernando?’

 

Eoin is a full-time card-carrying member of the hippy community in Sneem, about 10 miles out of Kenmare. He lives in a log cabin on top of a hill, hangs his food from the ceiling so that rats won’t get it, craps al-fresco, and says he has never been happier.

 

 

 

I’m taking his word for it; after all, Andrew and I aspire to his lifestyle, although without the rats and with more insulation and a bathroom equipped with walls and, preferably, a shower

The priest’s children and the miller’s cow never do well

Back in Kenmare, we have been hit with an unseasonable spell of warm weather. The Irish rioted because the Minister of Education wouldn’t extend school holidays to take advantage of it; the entire country phoned in to radio stations bitterly lamenting why ‘that hairy bollox’ couldn’t show a little bit of human decency and/or compassion and let the little wans enjoy their last bit of freedom before they had to grow up and get mortgages and pension schemes.

 

The Irish really are completely, fabulously nutso. I listen to the radio whenever I can:

 

“So, you went to stay in a rather unusual place-”

 

“Oh right, yea I did, yea. It was an Orc community, like- you know Lord of the Rings? That sort of stuff, residents running around Dungeons and Dragons like with pointy ears-”

 

“Their own?”

 

“No, no, stick on ones-”

 

“So, before we wind up now- oh, actually we should have been off the air three minutes ago. Just quickly then, what do you think of Elvis?”

 

“Who?”

 

“Elvis, you know, The King. ‘Thnkyouvermuch’.”

 

“Elvis? Mad overrated. Awful feckin’ gobshite, especially-”

 

“Sorry, I don’t think you can say that on air.”

 

“Ah well now, I just did.”

 

I have settled into the place with ridiculous ease. Andrew was supposed to come over in early October, but the NZ Embassy was into its fourth month renewing his passport.

 

Mum and Dad are in great form. I was surprised to realise that Dad has been an auxiliary minister for nearly ten years - he and Mum moved to Kenmare shortly before I went to Dubai. He has just been made a Canon. It’s not the same as canonisation, which is sainthood, but he’s heading in the right direction. I think he gets fast-tracked into heaven - at least, there don’t appear to be any other perks, apart from the numerous opportunities for corny jokes (he’s easier to fire etc).

 

 

 

It’s awful pressure being a priest’s daughter though. People always think you’re wild and reprobate, partying and shagging until all hours.

 

“The priest’s children and the miller’s cow never do well,” according to Edel. It’s a German proverb, apparently; and the first time I’ve ever been compared to a miller’s cow. Possibly not the last.

 

When Mum isn’t playing golf, she’s usually in the kitchen entertaining visitors, dodging Dad (who wanders around presumably blessing stuff), airing language entirely unsuited to a Rector’s wife, answering the phone, baking scones, bread and quiche, and preventing Ceara slinging food; and all at the same time

Extra rations of crucifixes

En-route to Ireland, I met up with My Agent in London. He is a dear fellow who would most fittingly have been attired in a deerstalker and inflammable cape, but maybe he didn’t want to overwhelm me.

 

He took me to lunch in Piccadilly. I was nervous and talked too much.

 

“You’d better make me MONEY,” he muttered darkly.

 

“Well, that is the general idea,” I said. “And if you sell Smart/Casual for a seven figure sum and optional movie rights, I probably will. What are you sitting around for?”

 

But first, there was the matter of the overhaul. When he offered to represent me, My Agent wrote a specifically vague email about the first third of Smart/Casual: how it was choppy and erratic with too much Bridget Jones-style teetering around in high heels and under-developed characters engaged in a flailing plot with not enough darkness.

 

“And the first CHAPTER, darling,” he said. “It’s too FARCICAL. And not INTERESTING enough. I mean, your heroine falls OVER in a SHOP. Now, my DAUGHTER - she’s just done a charity ABSEIL. You know, darling- down the side of a BUILDING. Now, I was THINKING- maybe- maybe your heroine could do something like that- you know, a charity ABSEIL- and she could maybe- she falls on top of a MAN- and he- he- topples over! And you know, he- he- gets a bit ANGRY and he- he waves his arms around and maybe HITS her! With a stuffed fish! How about tuna?”

 

“Interesting idea,” I said, shredding my napkin all over the table. “Really not farcical in the slightest at all. Funny I hadn’t considered that already.”

 

“What people don’t understand about we WRITERS,” said My Agent, finishing off my glass of wine, “is that writers must - we simply MUST - create. We are COMPELLED to write. Darling.”

 

As far as I’m concerned the only thing I MUST create is noxious quantities of carbon dioxide - and it’s less a compulsion than a regrettable side-effect.

 

I repaired to Ireland with a signed contract and lethal build-up of carbon dioxide. After pausing to greet The Wrinklies and kiss my mother, I barricaded myself in The Resource Room with my laptop, notepad and a blanket, which is where I spent the month of August refining my skill for profound swearing and gusty spells of weeping.

 

By the time I finished, I could no longer recognise arrangements of letters. In fact, I didn’t technically finish; one day I stared at the word ‘and’ for five minutes trying to ascertain how to apply it to any given sentence, and realised I could no longer write.

 

I gave the manuscript to my mother to read through for seplling mistakes and dodgy grammar: “Mum, I don’t want to <expletive deleted> know my <expletive deleted> hero’s a <expletive deleted> pansy-arse with a weak character arc! It’s a bit <expletive deleted> late to be telling me that now, all right? Hold it- sorry to interrupt- wait- wait- I feel some emoting coming on. Waaaaaah!”)

 

Evidently, I was a joyful addition to the household. My father fortified himself with extra rations of crucifixes and exorcised me a couple of times, to no measurable effect. Mum provided a steady supply of coffee and monitored my hunger levels.

 

At the end of August I sent the amended manuscript to My Agent, complete without charity abseil; I just couldn’t get it off the ground. I told him I would be travelling for a month with sporadic access to email, so regrettably any further editing would have to wait until October.

 

I tried to prepare myself for My Agent’s demanding multiple rewrites before declaring he preferred the original version. Thankfully, about a week later, he responded saying he would start submitting Smart/Casual to publishers. He also mentioned that one of his contractors, an independent bookseller, reviewed the manuscript and thought it would do well. But really, it’s all just words and not worth the paper it’s not written on until a publisher tries to screw you out of royalties you haven’t even earned yet