CC 107: Foolish History

‘It always amazes me how these old buildings stay standing.’

‘Well, they were built strong.  They were fortified for war and such.  Not all buildings these days are built for military purposes,’ Emer said.

Looking up at the tower, I tried to put myself back to a time when it found itself under attack.  Troops surrounding the hill, and charging up in bursts to be mowed down by the archers on the battlements.   There was a young man there.  He looked like me.  It was his first day on the job.  He was hiding in the bushes when a squawking pheasant gave away his position and his commander saw him, grabbed him and angrily flung him onto the frontline and it wasn’t long before the coward had an arrow sticking out of his head.  Sad.  The ground was all soggy with the blood and spoiled with torn limbs and fallen youths while shields clashed and guns were firing, and everything was cloaked in thick black smoke – it was just an old war film in my head, not the real thing.  I was glad it wasn’t the real thing. 

‘How do you think that old house on the Castletown Road would get on in a war?’

‘I think it saw its fair share of action with us living there,’ she said, chortling to herself.

‘I had a feeling you were going to say that.  It’s an old house though.  How old do you think?’

‘Barry Myers said those houses were seventy years old at the time, as far as I remember.  It’s an old street, for sure.’

‘I wonder who will move into it next.  After I’m gone.’

‘Who knows?  Who cares?’

‘I care.’

I suddenly became embarrassed about how sentimental I’d grown in the time since Emer and I had split.  Always had a bathetic side to me, but it seemed to have deepened in the last year, whereas she had only become remarkably tougher in the face of all things.  Bound to happen, I suppose.  I’d seen no progression in those months since she left.  Head in the clouds.   No bloody wonder.  Even so, I did think about who the future residents of our old house might be, as I thought too about those who lived there in the past.  Mad to think of all the different folks we shared walls with throughout our lives, the near-forgotten stories lying buried behind each layer of wallpaper.  As I sat there, thinking soulfully about wallpaper, I could see that Emer was looking at me as if to say ‘still a big girl’s blouse, I see.’  Fuck it.  Maybe I should have become a teacher like Emer.  I could have taught history.  My passion for antiquity would have rightly inspired hundreds of students who would recall a lesson I gave once a day for the rest of their lives, and implement my teaching in their daily business of living.

I couldn’t ever see this castle, Cuchullain’s Castle, not existing, old and disintegrated as it was.  It wouldn’t be knocked down to build a new shopping centre any time soon.  That would surely have a new generation of mobs up and running, and developers and politicians everywhere in hiding.  It was a building that was worth more than anything an estate agent could offer you, though you’d be taken aback if one of them did try to make you an offer.  It wasn’t really viable as a home anymore. 

‘You’d have some job fixing that up if you wanted to live there,’ I said to Emer.

‘It’s not habitable, but you could probably do something with it,’ she replied.  ‘You’d have to be loaded and a bit mad in the head though.  Maybe Terry Kennedy could do it.’

Terry Kennedy was a Dundalk man who won the lottery a few years back. Three million was the amount he made off with.  Three million or not, you’d still see him walking around town wearing the same old tweed cap he always wore as if nothing had changed with him.  He still lived in the same house in Pearse Park and everyone in town would speculate on what he did with the money whenever they saw him walking past.  He obviously had it all locked away in the bank like the smart man he was, but he had the whole town batty with suspicion, and you could see a roguish grin on his face as he took to the parish each day like he was relishing it all. 

‘Yes, a modern Pirate Byrne would have to come along and whip it into shape,’ I said.

‘Well, there are modern pirates out there, but they’re all too boring to attempt something as beautifully foolish as that.’