A Singular Country

by J. P. Donleavy

  Now as we universally know, it’s the rich what gets the pleasure, it’s the poor what gets the pain. And in Ireland it’s long been the case that outside fox hunting circles, it’s the natives get the celibacy and the visitor who more often gets the hanky panky. However, recently in this relatively new nation it has been increasingly your affluent professional business folk who are getting their fair share of licentious shenanigans. And who do in their present lifestyles have champagne delivered to the door of a morning with the milk. And who can, out of the blue, get laid at your company picnics. Especially when a vicar’s daughter straight from England shows up and is conversationally everywhere boasting of her multiple orgasms as if she were the only one on the face of the earth so singularly blessed. In any event she wasn’t shy in letting it be known that she, given the appropriate Irishman, was ready and willing for a gallop. A nice enough and friendly and generous girl she was. Who’d give you a wondrous smile with the great set of teeth she had gleaming in her head. And arriving in a tight red outfit at the business picnic, didn’t she with her plunging neckline soon disappear in what was the early twilight of the afternoon and go off with your genuine homegrown exhilarated Irishman to a nearby glade. Now let me tell you there’s little or nothing incognito, confidential or unrevealed in this land and the pair of them would be watched going by more eyes than you could imagine could be in the thirty seven or so heads present. And all but one relishing what was about to unfold.

  And so, begob, the scene was set. Accumulating in the nearby bushes and shrubberies was a small crowd waiting in peaceful silence as the pair of intending lovers had already unlawfully presented themselves to each other without clothes and were exposing mammary, urinary and excretary organs contrary to standards of public decency. And it wasn’t long before the observing little gathering were waiting clucking their mouths at the gymnastic sexual shenanigans taking place before their very eyes and imported free of custom duty by a member of the British, leisured, upper middle class. Of course in spite of the wrenched, twisted and trampled foliage, not everything going on between the carnal collaborators could be seen through the leafy undergrowth. But enough to know that their legs were entwined around each other’s necks and their heads attending to each other’s bifurcations. There was even to be witnessed a little bit of your imported English bondage. Didn’t your seductress ask your man to tether her wrists and ankles with your man’s company tie and then give her a few lashes across her bottom with her belt. And who should now at that very moment of the strap landing, suddenly choose to join this little group of voyeurs but your man’s furiously enraged Irish wife.

  Now, amazingly, because of the revered Saint Bridget goddess of fertility, the Irish believe it can bring a curse upon you for interrupting sexual intercourse. So there is no ranting and raving and screaming, ‘stop doing that to my husband’. And in silence the wife furiously fumed there, as the seductress, stung into action by her chastisement, was loose once more from her restraint and had got up on her supine husband to gyrate like a spinning top teetering in the last of its revolutions. However, it was known at the picnic that this lady seducer so presently busily nakedly entwined, came in her own low slung motor vehicle that she managed to recently purchase brand new with money she got out of her last divorced husband. And wasn’t it on its four innocent extra wide wheels, parked not that far away. So didn’t some of the ladies of the voyeuristic gang in the bushes steal away while the rest continued watching with patient interest as your lithe seductress assumed a lady dog position and wagging her arse had now your man up on her from behind pumping away like a steam locomotive piston. And busy as both of them were, neither gave any notice to events happening less than fifty yards away. For let me tell you it’s one thing in Ireland to quietly and in the customary manner copulate but quite another when you get up to masochistic bondage, gymnastic gyrations and canine machinations. All of which add fuel to the fury of these Irish women of the group now volunteering to avenge the outrage perpetrated upon this temporarily, as it were, deserted wife. Now you’d feel sorry for the poor spouse whose husband is having a jolly dickens of an old time enjoying himself with this self proclaimed multi orgasmic vicar’s daughter. Don’t worry, come uppance is coming. And there they all are now, already ganged up on the fancy fucking seductress’s motor car. And a shiny brilliant red it is too.

  If your sensibilities are tender towards your beautiful mechanical equipage, don’t watch or listen to what is happening next. Splat. That was a massive cake of gravelly mud flung two handedly on the gleaming bonnet. Crash. That was a large stone just thrown through the windscreen. Smash. That latter reverberation was a big red brown brick you just heard go through the aerodynamically sloped rear window. Boom, boom, boom. Those are boulders heaved pockmarking your deep and sundry dents all over the car roof and body. And the hiss you hear is the air coming out of every last one of the tyres and not sparing the spare one. Plus the gang of lady avengers have just twisted off the outside rear view mirrors specially provided on the front fenders. And through the smashed side windows, they are now able to open up the vehicle’s previously locked doors. Having gained access to the perfumed interior, honey from the picnic baskets is now being poured over the cowhide upholstery. And generous fistfuls of butter are being rubbed over any of the honey free spots remaining. All those coloured wires you see pulled out were once connected to the ignition and wrapped colourfully around the gear shift, only god knows what they are connected to now. But one of your men is presently crying out that there’s no sugar left for tea. And he’s right. Every last bit of it has been poured down into the vicar’s daughter’s petrol tank, which rumour has it, is guaranteed not to improve the efficiency of the reputed three hundred horse power or thereabouts of this racy vehicle one little bit and they might as well have dropped a two ton boulder or two from a far height on top of the engine. Now as the guilty, recently copulating couple, dressed now, innocently wander back to the picnic site licking their chops, you’d wonder why these clannish Irish women instead of systematically destroying the seductress’s motor car, couldn’t have been a little more sophisticatedly urbane and simply have made a few of your more pointed remarks reeking of innuendo which would have allowed your seductress to get on her way to other conquests instead of being comforted by your man as she stands there at the side of her Ferrari, head in her hands, sobbing uncontrollably. But I’ll tell you why.

  Let us go back a little bit to the days of yore. Such Irish women, as do the sons, come from mothers who as they say, slaved their fingers to the bone to give their children always that little better than they had. And let me tell you it’s true. And it’s become a litany repeated in the kitchens of Irish mothers all over the globe. These resolute, battle hardened females who have formed the character of the Irish woman and her dedication to her home and children which is nearly without parallel in this part of the presently known solar system. And such singleness of purpose is there to this day to prove it. Herself then would recognise this threat to the peace and sanctity of the Irish home from this interloping vicar’s daughter gifted with the facility and artistry of fancy fucking. And her slightly more frigid than frivolous sisters in arms would take up to make sure this nimble expert in sexual gymnastics would never dare dream to approach near the aggrieved lady’s husband, or that of any other Irishwoman’s, again. Nor himself begob step out of line with any more of your liberally lewd foreign ladies. For himself, like all genuine Irishmen, is ever ready to get amorously excited, and as the old saying goes, one Irishman in the bed is like a thunderstorm in a desert that would only come once in a blue moon but by god when he did he would wash away all the sand dunes. And of course it is this nature of the beast that took herself once up the aisle in her lacy veils and had the priest pronounce them man and wife, and he was let loose at her over the honeymoon. Well she soon had enough of that I’m telling you and the law was laid down and the nagging started. And to be fair minded, is it any wonder that himself bega
n escaping out to the pub the nights running without end. And if there was a wage packet its contents would be sadly diminished and swept one way over the mahogany bar as the drink came flowing back in the other direction. So as you might imagine the Mrs. wouldn’t soon be getting a gift of a glittering diamond tiara or anything remotely in the way of jewellery, or a new ring slipped on her finger as she lay sleeping. But by god what she might get however, and it wouldn’t come gift wrapped, is a fist delivered in the gob, and any of the sparkling she would see would be delusionary stars. For as a few more belts and cuffs landed she’d hear the roar of your man’s voice shaking the kitchen window panes with his proclamation,

  “Now will you shut up your gob.”

  And remember, your man prior to the wedding bells was as free as a leaf in the breeze and blown hither and thither constantly. And here he is, hardly over the honeymoon and in the thick of the marriage hearing unforgettable carping and nearly unending pestering quibble. Nagging, why wasn’t he this? Nagging, why didn’t he do that? And, stop making that chewing noise when you chew. Now of course she’d only be trying to do her best to improve your man and break him of his worst indoor vulgar habits. But it is in the nature of the beast that no Irishman who has ever been put by an Irish mother on this earth, takes eternal guff from anybody. Or for the matter of that, one regrets to have to say it, needs to be changed for the better. For remember he had an Irish father too. And he’d have from this latter a sense of humour, a sense of fair play, and a ruddy good damn idea how to laugh, drink, sing and enjoy himself. And human enough too, for what awful harm would it be for him to occasionally fall prey to fancy fucking when it came in a tight red skirt and Ferrari his way. And so by god when he went home of an evening, if praise, worship and adoration be not his lot nor a gentle reassuring caress favoured by Danish women to give their men under the balls, then the least he wanted was peace and quiet and if your woman was not content to give him that by god why wouldn’t he raise a ruction and let fly blows in the direction of your woman to shut her nagging speaking hole. That he’d prefer was put to use for something licentious.

  And sad to say all this has led to a strange kind of phenomenon in Ireland. Friday being the nights on which it all occurs, filled as it is with this distressing form of mayhem. With the lady of the house home waiting of this Friday payday evening for himself to return the worse for drink. And she knows by god he’s going to make an attempt to jump on her. And that from such might come further childer in profusion. And she would be thinking it would be nearly better to get a fist instead. And that it would be up to her to get enough food, have shelter and provide clothing by scraping, saving and scrimping and sacrificing to keep the childer as neat and clean and well fed as any household or childer could be kept. And she would. But by god there would still come that ould Friday night. As back from the pub reels himself growling and roaring after an evening’s jolly male camaraderie with the usual slaps on the back and the encouragement into the future as the great dream boats are launched sailing on those wondrous seas of alcohol. And there are words long coined into a phrase to describe what happens next.

  “To bate sick the poor wife stupid.”

  And as himself approaches up the front path, fear spreads throughout the household. In the poor woman’s panic bolts are thrown as the front ingress is securely locked. But nothing is safe from this returned cursing reveller who is already kicking and finally with a bull rush of the shoulder smashes the door open, sending it swinging askew on its now twisted hinges. Children huddle in the bedrooms as a cry goes through the house,

  “Come here till I get holt of you, you bitch.”

  And many a lady it is who would have already escaped out the back kitchen door or had she been trapped up in a bedroom, down the drainpipe and into the back garden. Here to be crouched in fear and trembling. And woe if she had no back garden or attic to be retreating to. And found herself instead cowering and shivering in terror of her life in a closet or under the bed, her lot at that exact moment at least made easier due to the special strength Irishwomen derive from prayer. And although it is no picnic past midnight or in the wee hours outdoors in the wintry wind and rain she’d have the company of other similar stranded ladies in their pyjamas and kimonos waving sheepishly back. And what the hell, all of them had at least escaped a thumping and could steal back inside to a sofa when himself was comatose asleep.

  But these recent days come to pass there is no need to feel fatally sorry for such women and their lot. For as a result of such long borne heinousness there is a new Irishwoman afoot in this land. Of two varieties. And both by god are wearing the trousers with a vengeance. And they are of the very latest phenomenon in female evolution. And just to put a quick handy name on them you’d have to call them Man Fighters. They are respectively Man Fighter Mark I and Man Fighter Mark II. Such as these let me tell you would make your most ardent military feminists all over the rest of the globe seem like a bunch of polite male worshipping angels. And by god, let me tell you if you meet one, be assured there are plenty more where she came from. But let us first take your variety, of your Man Fighter Mark I. She’d be of a prankish type and ready for a guffaw as your man knocking down the front door fell straight into his spaghetti dinner waiting for him just inside on the floor with his face rearing up out of the red sauce your woman would be up on top of the staircase, slapping her knees as she roared hysterically laughing her head off.

  Now then your man might kick and dance around a bit and be back as usual next night in the pub. But your woman Mark I would still have yet another little subtle trick up her apron as your man again delayed indefinitely out in the pub. This time she’d get the dinner nice and ready and hot out of the oven. The spaghetti heaped up so. The baked potato, two of them steaming cracked open at the side of the plate. The red sauce cascaded generously over the top of the lot. And then she’d nice as you please, saunter straight down to the pub, where your man is holding forth with his enthralled admiring cronies and suddenly there in front of him is placed his dinner, with a tiny little heap of your baby mushrooms right under his very nose and your Mark I Man Fighter woman without so much as a word has just disappeared out the door. Now you’d find that not too many of your men would like a repeat of this in a hurry.

  But your Man Fighter Mark II is a rather different kettle of fish altogether. And is usually in a single, divorced or separated condition and entrepreneurially emerging in the rag trade, motor, publishing, journalism, stockbroking or bloodstock industries. Who could, if they continue to proliferate, turn Ireland into a male masochist’s paradise. Two fisted, these ladies with sleeves rolled up have been known in the sex act to swiftly without warning imprison their lovers in scissor wrestling grips, squeezing their male opponents till they scream for mercy, or agree to become male doormats upon which they can wipe their feet indefinitely. Ah but your Mark II Man Fighter is encountering stubborn resistance from your Irishman who has no intention of being ordered around for the rest of his life, and he does more than occasionally fight back instead of letting out a plaintive sob for merciful discontinuance. But these are the new women of a recently new nation who would ensure that if himself dared to present his dirty socks he would promptly get them back across the face. And many of your men without clean hosiery to wear went barefoot in their shoes so as not to smell up the office where they work. And even as the television was switched on of a supposedly peaceful evening, it was what she wanted to watch, and by gob when she was finished it was both of them to bed. Where likely as not your man innocently sleeping would dream the offending socks were now draped across his nose. And he’d get an elbow in the ribs for snoring. These are the women who at their dinner parties arrange for the ladies to be served and for the men to have to get up and help themselves and who make the temporary men they encounter make their tea and coffee of a morning and demand they deliver it up to them with their own private newspaper to read as they lie in bed easy as you please. And suddenly horny your Mar
k II Man Fighter is then demanding of your man to get a bugle on him that would whip a donkey out of a sandpit. Now it doesn’t take much psychology to appreciate that your poor chap standing there is shame faced and flaccid in his flute and wouldn’t be able to raise enough stiffness to lift a feather. Even if he had a railroad derrick helping and a bit of dynamite blowing his prick towards the sky.

  Now for the sake of peace and a beautiful place to live with plenty to eat and drink, your occasional man will go along with taking this kind of awful guff. But soon finds himself finally exasperated by this routine and previously used to his ould mother’s ways and fed up now to the teeth, he at last in the true Irish tradition raises a fist to give this Man Fighting woman an old fashioned and deserving one in the gob. A big and fatal mistake. For sure hasn’t herself this long time past taken up and become proficient in your martial arts of judo, jujitsu and karate. And here she is standing already nakedly up out of the bed, well balanced on her strong thighed legs and already winding up to launch her own sizzling left hook of a karate chop to contuse your poor old hombre one hell of an explosive blow on his own surprised gob. Plus, often as not, following it up with her knee cap plunging into his ruddy unprotected goolies which collapses your man and leaves him to lie writhing on the sheepskin rug covering the floor. The rest of his nightmare life now to be filled with visions of these Amazonian ladies who so long denied their rights have now understandably become the hostile eyed, karate chop emasculators you see now loose in the cities of Ireland building their big businesses, making male subordinates cower as they issue their biddings, and enticing other unsuspecting males to jump up on them and get their pricks caught in a mangle, the squeezing of which would make a shark’s jaws feel like a caress in paradise. Now you might say the status quo of Ireland is wrecked forever beyond all recognition as these brave new breed of ladies lay waste around them, making their presence known with multicoloured publicity and at dawn kicking the men who have survived the night out of their warm beds to find hotels or to go home to their wives while their own private maids bring them their own private breakfasts. And by god on top of it all, some of these two fisted Mark II Man Fighters also have men lawyers at the ready speeding the shafts of writs deep into the heart of the male chauvinist enemy and suing and threatening to sue the living bigoted bejesus out of them. And you’d sometimes be glad there’s only a random Mark II Man Fighter you’d see encroaching out into the more rural landscape and sitting up on tractors and digging drainage ditches.