My mother was very upset when I told her that I could not fix Mrs Flint’s television, as she believed that if I was able to make her a set, then surely I could fix anything. I tried to explain but it did no good. Then she said, “John, you’ll do something for her for sure, wont you? You must, and I know you will. Sure she’s worse off than ourselves, God help us”.
I did do something for her. First thing I did was to dump the bloody set. I told Larry I needed to build yet another television set, and as usual he didn’t give a hang what I did, even though I was using his parts, his time, and I was his workman. It was as if he knew I needed to do this and actually offered to help me if needed. It took me a full week, but I made yet another TV set. It had a small ‘Sobell’ body and mostly ‘Sobell’ parts inside it, but it was again a hybrid as usual, made from many different makes and models and bits and pieces. I figured that if the ‘Sobell’ transformer went on fire, it was already sitting in her fireplace, and at worst it would give her heat while it burned, as she sure had no possessions to worry about.
Looking back on it now, in today’s days of mass production and high technology, it was a great achievement, but came easy to me then, as according to the mother, “Sure he’s gifted”. But I attributed it to my methods of ‘doctoring’ developed in her attic some years earlier.
On a bleak Saturday night I arrived back at Mrs. Flint’s door. She welcomed me in, seemingly very happy to see me. Then I placed my new box of magic on her 'stone' table and turned it on. As it warmed up, I plugged in her dodgy looking aerial. The picture came on but it looked terrible. It was barely visible, flickering and rolling, but she got so excited saying, “Great, great, oh tis great and so bright too”. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, as the picture was almost lost in the snow on the screen and no one could possibly watch it. Her aerial was useless, so I got some cable from the car and made my own version of a ‘cats ears aerial’. Then she really did have a good picture. Mrs Flint became speechless - literally. It was as if she had never seen a real picture before in her life, and probably she hadn’t with that useless aerial. She seemed over the moon with happiness, shaking and rocking back and forth in her old chair saying, “Oh my, oh my, it’s so clear, so clear, thank you, thank you, thank you so much”. She said these words without taking her eyes off the screen, the poor woman was actually hypnotized.
Then almost in a trance she became glued to the screen, gazing at the picture in silence as I tried to show her how to work it. It was like looking at a child receiving the ultimate gift from Santa. She was hearing me speak, but she only saw the pictures. I never saw anyone become so transfixed by a television picture before or since. It was amazing to see sheer and utter happiness and appreciation being displayed at something so ordinary. Suddenly, as if remembering her manners, she jumped up and offered me tea. As I was going out later that night with the lads and I hadn’t much time, I politely said that I didn’t want any this time, and before I got a chance to say why, she added quickly, “I have sugar tonight”.
In spite of her poverty, in spite of her lack of money, somehow she had got me sugar. Who knows what she had to do, what she had to sacrifice just to buy that sugar, and she did it for me. It was her only way to say thanks. Obviously I hadn’t fooled her one bit with my feigned hatred for the ‘deadly’ sugar. Still I had to go, as I was already late. She said again that she had no way to pay for this new television set, and that I was so good to do this for her. I brushed it off saying my mother was taking care of it all and that I hoped she liked it. Then as I was leaving for the door, a very strange thing happened. She stopped me and put her two hands gently on my shoulders, and standing there looking deep into my eyes she said, “God bless you, and may you always be blessed,” still not saying my name. As I looked back in embarrassment into her dark pools called eyes, I am sure I saw tears forming there, but I quickly looked away saying, “Thanks very much Mrs Flint, and now I must go”.
She had given me all that she could give me in this world: a blessing truly meant from her heart and Soul, and though I was very anti-religious at the time, I am convinced that I felt some higher goodness come from her blessing that night. I left her saying, “Be sure and tell my mother if anything ever goes wrong with it, as it’s under guarantee”.
I never heard from her or saw her again. I drove away from her house cursing a system that allows such things to happen to good people, and swearing as usual that I’d be rich one day. My mother was really delighted when I told her about the 'new' television. She said, “Son be proud of what you did, tell no one, and God will reward you”. I left Buttevant that night with the lads, hell bent on adventure and feeling invincible.
In my years with Larry, I always wanted to rise above the mere fixing of television sets. Kyrle by then had moved into the broadcast side of things in Dublin, and I longed for that side of our business too. I felt that the real kings were those who made the television or radio signals, and sent them out to us viewers and listeners, and that’s where I wanted to be. Larry never cared for that side of things, but he was ten years older than me with a family to support, so he could not afford the luxury of ‘idle dreams’ as he called them. Yet those dreams were to become a reality for me in the not too distant future, but before that day dawned I would have many more adventures with Larry, and later still his brother George, who joined us from England.
I could write another book on my escapades with George Anderson, Larry’s brother. We got into numerous scrapes together, and every day with him was actually funnier than most days with Larry. ‘Georgie’, as we called him, had no clue at all about science and lived every day just for the moment and the sheer fun of being alive. He was a very big man, well over six foot tall, extremely good looking and reminded me always of Roger Moore. In spite of his size, I only ever saw him get really mad once. It so happened that we were to change an aerial for a farmer who lived out in the wilds of Mallow. The farmer lived alone, and no sooner had we arrived into his yard than he asked us, “Where are yer white coats lads”. Georgie looked at me as if to say ‘What’s his game’ and I had no idea either, so I said, “Why do we need them?” Our farmer replies, “Yerra no need at all, sure ye’ll be alright I suppose”, and in he goes to his dingy kitchen leaving us to get up on his roof. The house was a three storey affair with an old slate roof and I knew that getting onto that roof and chimney would stretch our ladders to the limit. I personally didn’t want to do this job at all, and neither did Georgie, so we tossed a coin and he lost. Our extension ladder was out to the max and Georgie made off up it, pulling the roof ladder behind him with me helping. Georgie reluctantly got onto the roof ladder and made his way up to the chimney, where his usual method of removing the old aerial was to literally break it off, as he was as strong as ten horses. I was by then standing on the ladder at the guttering, ready to go up after him and help, but I got a feeling to stay where I was. I saw Georgie standing on the chimney with his legs spread across either side of the chimneypot, trying to break off the old aerial. All of a sudden I also saw the first line of bees come out of the pot behind his back. I shouted, “Bees, bees Georgie,” and began my fast descent down the long ladder. As I’m heading down I hear a roar from on high and a thump, and I believed that I was going to see Georgie pass me out as he fell to his death. Thankfully, by the time I got to the bottom of the ladder his feet were crushing my fingers. As the bees had attacked him he had somehow got onto the roof ladder and scaled down so fast that he almost passed me out, and I was really moving, being terrified of bees myself. He leapt past me and we both ran into the house, slamming the door on the black cloud following us in. We beat at the bees with cloths and our hands, and the shouting and roaring soon brought the farmer out from inside his lair. He says, “What’s wrong with ye lads, what’s all the fuss about, surely yer not afraid of a few tame bees”. I think this became too much for Georgie and the fright and the stings got to him. He exploded in rage. He made a drive for the farmer, had him by the
throat and was pushing him up against the wall with one hand while he still beat at the bees with the other. He began calling him every name under the sun, and all of them were real bad. I tried to pull him off the farmer, all the time getting stung on my neck as I did so, and by then I’m also shouting out a string of curses as well. It was pure bedlam for a while. By then the farmer was also in a panic thinking that Georgie might really clatter him, and he croaks out, “Ye should have had the coats, they don’t go near white coats. I told ye so”. I thought I was hearing things. After a little while we killed the last of the bloody bees and tried to calm ourselves down. The old farmer had scuttled off again first chance he got, and Georgie and I stared out the window at the bees still flying in all directions outside. We agreed to make a dash for the car and escape, and this we did. Then I said to him, “What about the ladders”. Georgie’s answer was, “Fuck the ladders, I’m outa here, let Larry do it, and we wont tell him about the fucken bees either”. Of course when we got back we had to tell him, and in the end he had to do that aerial job by himself as both of us flatly refused to go back. When he returned later that evening he told us that the farmer had called us ‘townies’ and ‘cowards’ and Larry laid it on thick, trying to make us feel like he was a hero and we were useless. Years later when I was doing calls to the same house, I discovered that Larry had put the new aerial into the farmer’s attic where there were no bees, and I saw Georgie’s old aerial still hanging half way down the chimney. Larry was no hero either, but he pretended he was to us.
We played practical jokes on each other all the time in those days. It was a kind of tit for tat fun. Georgie had been tricking me into doing extra calls for a long time and I was planning some kind of revenge, but no opportunity seemed to present itself until one day we had to deliver a television to the badlands of County Limerick. This was a big sale for Larry. A farmer who apparently knew Larry’s dad had decided to enter the television age, and no expense was to be spared. He was after buying our largest Pye television set, and we were to install a new aerial in his attic as well. The only problem was that we had no idea where he lived, and only knew that it was somewhere in the east Limerick direction. The deal had been done in a pub with Larry’s dad, and Georgie and I were to set off into the unknown, loaded down with the gear and the television.
Larry’s dad told us that the customer was ‘well known’, and that all we had to do was find any pub in the Kilmallock direction and ask for directions to his farm, so we set off. Georgie was driving as he insisted on using his car newly imported from England. There was no way he would let me drive it, and so I began to feel that this might be the day of my revenge. He also had a very bad hangover, having been drinking all the previous night while attending the ‘Rose of Tralee Festival’. Still he insisted on driving and was as sober as a judge too.
We drove for hours, getting more and more directed up into the hills of east Limerick, and eventually we arrived in the yard. To say that this place was a farm was a gross exaggeration. The entire place felt like it had never come out of the dark ages. I was surprised they even had electricity because it was so remote and rundown. The farmhouse was a thatched two storey building that had seen whitewash paint about a hundred years previously. An old tractor acted as a prop for one of the walls, and hay was piled against another one. I thought we were in the wrong place and told Georgie so, but as he was about to turn to leave, a swarm of small children came running out to greet us. They were all smiles, laughing and as happy as can be, but they looked like they had never seen a bath or even water in their lives. Snotty noses and scabby elbows as well as wild hair were all the go on both the boys and girls. Yet it struck me as odd that they seemed incredibly happy children, and I filed that thought away in my mind for some reason.
The front door was open and the farmer’s wife, a quite portly but friendly woman, greeted us warmly and invited us in. There was no sign of the farmer. The inside of her home resembled the outside of the farm. It reminded me of Nannie’s home in Gortnabearna, but at least there it was clean and tidy, unlike this place. The front door opened into a huge kitchen area, where I believe they did all their living. It had a large table in the middle and half of the table was literally covered in unwashed dishes, books and cloths. I figured that they never used that half of the table at all. I did spot another table on the way in though, which had two or three oily looking fish spread out on an old newspaper. These may well have been there for a day, or a week, I did not know, but my plan for revenge began with their observation, and I was hoping that Georgie had also seen the same fish.
I said to him that we should do the aerial part first, and that he should do the attic bit while I did the wiring downstairs for the television. He fell for it, but before he did he says to me real quietly, “Did you see them fish, the heads are still on em. I almost got sick passing em in, did you see em”. I said, “Yeah I did and I wonder who she’s going to feed them to”. Quick as a flash Georgie says, “The dogs of course boy, sure there’s no way she’d give them to the kids,” and he headed up the stairs with the aerial.
The kids have now become so excited that the noise level rises to fever pitch, but I noticed that some of them just stared at me as if I was from another planet, while some others run round and round the kitchen table playing some strange kind of game. The woman of the house says to me, “Ye’ll be staying for the dinner lads won’t ye, sure tis late as it is, and I’ll be cooking a few fish. Do you like fish yourself?” Immediately the revenge plan crystallizes in my mind and I say, “God no maam, to be perfectly honest I’m actually allergic to all kinds of seafood, but I do love home baked bread. Do you have any?” I figured I couldn’t get food poisoning from flour, no matter how old it was. She says, “And be God so you’ll have plenty of it me boy, and what about himself upstairs?” Before I can answer she says, “He’s a fine big man isn’t he, God Bless him”. I see my opportunity now and say, “I tell you what missus, he is a fine man alright, but he’s a real shy one as well. What’s more, he is always hungry and loves fish, but he will be too shy to ask for one. He will be saying no thanks all the time, but that’s just an act. He loves fish”. At that news she was ecstatic, “Be God he will have them fish so, and you’ll have my best curney cake, is that all right”. I tell her that’s just perfect and go back to my wiring.
After about half an hour I can hear the fish frying away and see her moving her black skillet back and forth on an old stove. I go up to Georgie and set the trap. I say, “Georgie, she’s insisting we stay for the dinner and that we will be paid by her husband after he finishes the dinner with us. It will be ready soon”. He says, “Well I’m eating notten here, and I hope the husband or the dogs is getting them fish”. I’m smirking away as he says it. I say, “Me too”, and head off down again. The farmer arrives in smelling of drink, and he is like a king to the children, causing the laughter and merriment to double in volume. It’s like a Christmas morning as he hugs and kisses his adoring children. I see the wife calling him aside and pointing to the skillet and nodding in the direction of Georgie upstairs. He is all happy in himself and says out real loud, “Yerra don’t worry your head woman, sure I ate in the pub”. With that bit of knowledge, I know Georgie is definitely getting all the fish.
“Come on down here now will you, the dinner’s ready and I won’t take no for an answer,” she bellows up at Georgie. By then she has prepared the half of the table that’s usable, and two white plates are placed in front of us as we sit down. Georgie immediately says, “Maam I’m not a big eater and I’ll just have a mug of tea and a bit of your curney cake”. Wise to his tricks she says, “You’ll have no such thing, a fine big man like you. You’ll have these two fine fish,” and at that she turns around from the stove and brings the skillet to Georgie’s plate. Then she scooped a fish right up and landed it on his plate. The fish still had its head on, and its eyes were staring back at Georgie. He lost it at that stage, jumping up from the table and running for the door clutc
hing his face. I quickly apologised and ran out after him, followed by a line of the children and the farmer. There he was, up against the wall, puking his guts out. He was pale and in shock and could not speak, but glared at me as he vomited. I figured he knew I had set him up, but I could not hold in the laughter. I almost collapsed laughing and I simply could not stop. Then the kids all started laughing as well, and then the farmer began laughing. We were all in stitches except Georgie. The farmer says to me, “Jezus he got the gawks real fast didn’t he. Was he on the piss or what?” I told him that the previous night he had been out celebrating at the Rose of Tralee festival, and with that important bit of news the farmer gave me a knowing look and disappeared. The rest is vague as I think he came back and gave Georgie a bottle of brandy to swig on to settle his stomach. We did finish the job but it was done in silence, and we did get paid as well, without Georgie speaking a single word to me for the rest of the work.
We left the farmer’s home, and as we drove away I again exploded laughing. In rage, Georgie goosed the car, hitting a huge pothole and blowing out his tyre as he did so. Of course he had no spare wheel as he had got another puncture the previous night coming home from Tralee. I began to feel that this might be a very long and uncomfortable night indeed.
We were close to the village of Hospital and a pub that in another lifetime may well have been the one Nannie had worked in. After a phone call to Larry, where we told him about the wheel, he informed us that we should sleep in the car for the night. Georgie broke his silence in the pub and says to me, “I suppose its Lucozade you want, you ould bollix,” and I think he ordered more brandy. We sat down and I stared across at him. Then he exploded laughing too, calling me the greatest bastard that ever lived on this earth and swearing revenge the first chance he got. More phone calls and hours later, Larry arrived with another wheel, which wouldn’t fit, and after even more hours of boring the wheel holes with a brace, we managed to get the replacement wheel on the car, but it was on inside out and we could only get three nuts onto it. It was at that point that the two brothers got into an argument as to which of them had the fastest car. They decided to race home to settle it. We took off at high speed and then, literally travelling at one hundred miles an hour, I realized that I was in the wrong car. Out of sympathy for Georgie for my tricking I had opted to travel with him for the race, and if any wheel was to fly off it would be his one, killing us both for sure.
Two Walls and a Roof Page 25
