IN MEMORIAM

Last Saturday, my Dad passed away, sometime around nine o’clock in the morning in Cork University Hospital. He had been unwell for a long time, having survived several heart attacks, two major strokes, forty-plus years of diabetes, and a cancer diagnosis. It was his heart that finally gave in.



Last Sunday, Valentine’s Day, he came home to be with us in the house he had shared with my mother for the last forty years.



He stayed with us overnight. The next day he was taken to the funeral home, and on Tuesday we had the funeral mass and burial. He was laid to rest in Shanballymore cemetery beside my brother, his son who was buried there thirteen years ago.


I’m still not sure I believe it happened. He was supposed to be coming home to us, maybe this week or next week, or maybe even in a month if rehab had been required. But he came home last Sunday for the last time.



I owe my Dad a lot.



He was a religious man, but he respected science. He was an Irishman of the old school, raised on nationalism and republicanism, but he fed me no bigotry. He loved the Irish language and was a fluent speaker, but was also fluent in Latin and Greek and he gave me a love for the correct and elegant use of any language.



He gave me books. He introduced me to Robert Louis Stevenson and Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, to P.G.Wodehouse and Flann O'Brien, and to Alistair Maclean and Frank Richards’ Billy Bunter. He bought me the Look and Learn books when I was about six years old and sparked my interest in science and dinosaurs and nuclear energy and castles and sharks. He was my constant source for the Beano, the Dandy, the Topper, Sparky, Whizzer and Chips, the Victor, and Roy of the Rovers. Because of him, I met Superman and Batman and Spiderman and Daredevil and the Incredible Hulk. He sat with me through Star Trek and the Man from U.N.C.L.E. and Gunsmoke.



My Dad was a Kerryman. He moved from the Kingdom county to live in the People’s Republic of Cork, but he was a Kerryman to the core. On Munster Final or All-Ireland day, if a Kerry team was playing (and they usually were), the afternoon was punctuated with roars of “show them the hammer of it!” or “h-anam an diabhail!” right up to the final minute. Normally a quiet man, gaelic football or hurling brought out a rabid fanatic side of him.



He was a teacher. His classes were in Irish, Latin, History and Geography, but his involvement was always far more than official hours required. He helped establish a student’s council in his school, organised debating and drama teams, was a founder member in Mallow of a pilgrimage group that raised funds to send disabled or sick kids to Lourdes every Summer, was a regular participant in or organiser of anything that involved the Irish language or Irish music, and was instrumental in founding Mallow’s first Gaelscoil – a primary school where Irish is the first language for all purposes. I met a past pupil of his at the funeral on Tuesday who told me that the only words he could use to describe my Dad were “an t-Uasal” – an Irish honorific which simply means “gentleman” or “noble” when used with it’s original intent.



He told really awful jokes – usually Kerryman jokes.



My parents have shared fifty one years of friendship and love, and I was privileged to be there for most of those years. If you can tell anything about a man from the people who love him, then my mother set the gold standard for my father. Together, they gave us everything they could in terms of love, support, and opportunity.



It’s only at funerals that you get to meet people you should have made the effort to meet and hear the stories you should have heard years before. I’ve spent the last week meeting my Dad’s extended family and friends and discovering just how wide and deep his legacy runs.



I spoke for my father at the funeral, and I hope I managed to say something that was worthy of the man. I know I wanted to acknowledge how much his family meant to him and how much they had done for him – all of the Browns and the Barrys and the O’Farrells and the Langfords and the Kissanes and Cashmans and the Hanafins and Nelsons and Tavolieris and others who had been such an important part of his life. I wanted to thank all of his friends. I wanted to say how proud I was that such people had called him their friend.



My Dad was not an artist, but he gave me a love of art. He was not a writer, but he gave me a love of books. He was not a scientist, but he gave me a love of science. He was no comedian, but he gave me my sense of humour. He was a quiet and unassuming man, but he thought me the value of love of people. The only thing he didn’t give me was a love of money. I think, on balance, I am all the richer for that.



He is at rest now in Shanballymore cemetery, along with my brother Ciarán, my uncles Kevin, Des, Bill, and Cormac, and my Grandmother. A sod of Kerry earth is in his grave with him.



Slán abhaile, a Dhaid. Táim cinnte i m-anam agus i mo chroí go bhfuil tú slán sabhailte agus sásta anois.



Go raibh maith agat.