by David Louden
“Douglas, Douglas…son calm down. It’s ok boy, calm yourself.”
“I am calm.”
“No you’re not. Just calm, breathe before you kill one of those little bastards and ruin your life.” he said matter of fact.
“Ok.” I said with a deep exhale.
“Good. Now let’s get out of here before someone has to explain what happened.”
Dad took me to his place across the Albert Bridge. I couldn’t tell you where it was, I was unfamiliar with that part of the city at that age. I hadn’t ventured out of the areas the North Belfast ghetto mentality would deem safe but it was small. The living room sat to the rear of the house, with the front room kept “for good”. It made his world dark as the only window in the concrete den had its access to the sun obscured by the high wall and the house across the communal yard. The couch didn’t match the armchairs and the paintwork was chipping. A thin blue carpet sat on the floor, the carpet at home felt deep and comfortable but this barely covered the cold coming off the slab floor. Dad made me a cup of tea, my hands had begun to shake uncontrollably as the last of the adrenaline dripped from my body. He poured himself a glass of vodka and cracked open a can of beer. He took a seat, looking across the room at me with an odd admiration in his eye.
“You handle yourself quite well.”
“Why were those guys attacking you?”
“Old debt. Nothing to worry about really.” he slurped his beer.
I nodded, not entirely sure it wasn’t something to worry about.
“How is your banjo coming along?”
“What?”
“You still have your banjo correct?” he all but stated.
“Yeah.”
“So how is it coming along? What can you play?”
“Nothing,” I said, matter of fact “I haven’t really touched it.”
“That’s a shame.”
“I guess.”
“So you don’t want to learn a little something then?” he asked, getting up and removing his banjo from the nook under the stairs next to the door to the kitchen.
He tuned up quickly before calling me out of my armchair and on to the couch beside him. He played something familiar, something catchy real quick before turning towards me and explaining each chord to me from right to left.
“This is your E,” he said plucking the first chord “then A,” second, “D,” he played the third “and G” the fourth. “First finger, second fret on E gives you F sharp” he played it to demonstrate. “Second finger, third fret on A gives you C. You’re going to want to have your index cover the first two frets, your middle finger the next two and your third on the fifth.”
“What about after the fifth?” I asked; he chuckled.
“Let’s deal with the first five for now, ok son?” I liked how he called me son.
“Ok Dad.”
“So we’ll play F sharp, open A, then C, then A again. Can you do that?”
He handed me his banjo. It was weighted in the base, a lot heavier than mine and the wood was darker. It barely even shone. If anything it looked like it absorbed the light. I played what he told me, slowly at first, hands shaking with nerves and desire to please. He nodded in approval.
“Good. Now don’t stop, play it over and over ‘til you get it.”
I played it twice, then twice more, then twice more with a little speed. Dad finished his beer, drained his vodka and poured himself another.
“Like this?” I asked, trying not to notice the vodka.
“Good. You practice and I’ll write down the rest, you practice that too and if you want we can work on some more together.”
“Cool.”
Dad went to the kitchen and returned with a pen and a sheet of paper. He was left handed like me, and like me he played a right handed banjo. He drew out the neck of the banjo, marking up the chords on the frets with their letters before writing the letters along the bottom that I’d need to play. I wished my songbook had looked this easy. He folded it over and put it into my shirt pocket as I practiced over and over again. A smile crept across his face lighting up his bruised mouth. I handed him back his banjo and he played what he had taught me at speed, with some embellishments.
“What’s that one called?” I asked enthusiastically.
“That’s the Kerry Polka, Douglas. It’s good isn’t it?!”
“Yeah.”
“And not too hard, right?”
“Not hard at all.”
“Well, wait ‘til you learn the rest of it before you say that. So why don’t you practice that and we can come together again and go over it…maybe learn a few other tunes to get you started.”
“That sounds great.”
“Good, just don’t go stealing my busking spot you hear?” he said, his once massive fist playfully wagging in my face.
He stood up, setting his instrument in the armchair and gave me my cue to stand up too. He opened the living room door and walked me to the front. Throwing on his coat we stepped out of his house and he’d walk me back into the centre of town. En route everyone seemed to know him; they all referred to him as “Jackie” he’d acknowledge them with a wink and to those who asked he’d introduce me as “my boy Doug”. We walked in an awkward silence and when we talked about anything it was slightly laboured but it was good, it felt natural having a relationship with this man. He asked after Mum but never in a way that seemed like he was fishing to know where we lived. He seemed calm, though his flask never left his hand. He walked me as far as May Street on the edge of town and my familiarity. He gave me a hug and told me he’d see me soon before turning and disappearing up the street he had just come from. I watched for a while before running to the bus. I was starving; when I got home I horsed my dinner before fleeing to my room and working on the Kerry Polka for the rest of the evening.
The following morning there was a knock on the door that woke me from my heavy sleep. I had spent most of the night reading some writers I had discovered and picturing what Dani’s rump looked like without that skirt getting in the way. Suddenly downstairs was filled with roars of laughter and voices I could almost recall. I dragged my prematurely weary bones down the flight of stairs I had been neglecting to vacuum for weeks. Mum’s health wasn’t what it once was and though she was still a tough old bird she had had to give up the cigarettes to hold the asthma at bay. She was stubborn, I got that trait from her, there was no nicotine patches or gum or twenty-four hour telephone support line or hypnosis she just lit her last cigarette and said “leave me in peace to enjoy this because it’s going to be my last one” and then it was.
“You’re joking me!” she screamed “I can’t believe…awk what a beautiful surprise, why didn’t you let me know you were coming? I would have got this one to help me tidy up.”
“Put the bags in the living room,” Aunt Ruby said to her wave of children “John found himself in a spot of trouble and we figured…”
“I was coming over to crash with you Ruth,” added John in a thick Midlands accent “and the rest of these fuckers tagged along.”
They even brought a dog which Bosco wasn’t a fan of and demonstrated his disliking by spending the entire time in my room turning the air inhabitable with his geriatric canine gas releases.
Mum made tea for the entire Bruce army as children from twenty-nine down to twelve camped out on chairs and the cold floor in the kitchen supping down on Tetley and chewing over a mini mountain of tuna fish sandwiches cut into triangles. Tara would come home and immediately see the chance to volunteer to stay at her boyfriend’s in order to create more space for our cousins to bunk down.
“Really Tara? How awfully generous of you!” Tara’s face lit up
“Thanks Mum.”
“I mean to volunteer to abandon your family over Christmas, the one time of year when it should mean so much…”
“I wouldn’t pack a bag just yet love.” Ruby added, draining off a cup, still in her coat.
“I think of the amount of time
I have and your Aunt Ruby have sacrificed ourselves for you children and this is the wonderful way you want to repay us. Sit your hole down we’re reminiscing.”
Tara tucked her bony ass down on the edge of the radiator and chewed her tongue trying not to look too disgusted at how badly she had just been word beaten by the matriarch.
“Don’t worry Tara,” offered Brenda “they’re old birds, they can’t go on all night.”
“No it’ll just fucking feel like it.” offered another who was out of sight.
“You’re not too old for a smacked arse.” Mum informed them.
Eventually John pointed out that the following day was Christmas and unless we started making plans the turkey wouldn’t last a once around the table let alone evening sandwiches and he was right. He was also quick to volunteer going out to get another bird for the table to which I immediately stood up and took as an invite to go help.
The Oldpark Road was a stretch of urban decay and getting worse. By this point there was as many people not working as there were and half of them saw it as a badge of honour to leech back off the British state what they couldn’t take by force. John was an Irish boy alright but he had served in the British army and somehow had managed to hold on to his service revolver after leaving. He had packed it in Wolverhampton and crossed on the ferry from Liverpool to Belfast with it jiggling around inside a ball of undies fully loaded and now it sat down the front of his trousers as we walked towards the Cavehill; towards nature and a turkey farmer he remembered when he was last over visiting us.
“You were just a wee shitter at the time, you wouldn’t remember it.”
“Was it in Rosapena?” I asked.
“Before that.”
I didn’t know there was a house before that but bowed to his knowledge.
As we got closer and closer to the bottom of the Cavehill the houses became bigger and more spaced out. Eventually we were standing in front of a three storey detached house with a front and rear garden that sat in the shadow of the hill. Climbing over the garden fence John started looking around as though he was about to whisper a turkey. I wouldn’t have been convinced we were related if it wasn’t for the fact that he looked like Jeff. He was light haired and it was thin, he was already starting to reflect at certain spots at the back of his dome. I watched mesmerized as he looked left and then right and then started making cooing noises, as a light came on in the kitchen he fired two shots into the air and ran to the side of the house. The owner raced out looking all round him before spotting and charging towards me.
“Hey you, kid! What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
I froze; barely understanding what the hell was taking place as John ran into the bull’s kitchen opened his refrigerator and jammed the largest turkey I had ever seen inside his coat before zipping it up and running out of the house, down the side and clearing the front fence in one leap.
As the enraged man got close I turned and high-tailed it as quickly as possible leaving him confused and minus one poultry. I’d catch up with John as he stood at a crossroads smoking a roll-up cigarette and laughing manically.
“Suppose you think that was funny!” I spat.
“That was excellent.”
“So what was all this shit about a turkey farmer?”
“Would you have come with me if you knew?”
I was starting to see the kind of trouble Ruby meant and wondered if I stood a chance of escaping the same. On the way home he bought a bottle of cider with the money he was given for the turkey and we drank it as we strolled home fresh from victory.
The next day thirteen of us ate like Kings, John would throw me the occasional knowing glance and I’d smile with every bite of white meat that had come from urban turkey rustling. In the evening I’d practice the Kerry Polka and Aidan, the cousin I looked most like, would watch before asking “Who taught you how to play that?”
“My dad.” I’d say.
“You reckon you could show it to me?”
“I reckon so.” I said, handing him over my banjo.
13
WE’D MEET on Saturday afternoons after my monstrous weekend job had ended for that day and the bulk of the workload was done by someone not even sixteen while thirty-year-olds slept it off in the staff room. We were still rehearsing in secret, I hadn’t the heart or the bravery in me to tell Mum and maybe hurt her feelings. Three weekends in and my banjo ability was fast approaching a halfway decent amateur as not only did I seem to have a natural affinity towards the instrument but I had an eagerness to please that could rival any virgin’s boner. I’d gotten used to the course from the Victoria Centre to the Albert Bridge and the ins-and-outs of the side streets that led to my old man’s place. So used to it that, I’d call up for him on one occasion springing him from his slumber and into the business-end of a machete attack of a hangover. I tentatively remembered the mornings when waking him was like waking a wild beast but those days were gone. His skin had wrinkled, his hair colour had exhausted and his demeanour had softened.
The house showed signs of a woman’s touch, too many cushions, a banister free of dust and at least one pair of frilly knickers hanging from the washing line that I now know to be crotchless. I never met the woman in Jack’s life, he kept his schedule strict and his two worlds separate. Bar the presence of a tea cup not spiked with half a bottle of Jameson I doubt she’d ever know I was there.
We took our seats in the living room, Dad would arrange the armchairs so we could play face to face; he’d slow his hands down to a speed I could comprehend and I’d do my best to pick it up as quickly as possible. He never mentioned it and I never commented but he had spruced the place up a bit since the first time I had been there, or maybe it was her. I knew his trade used to be plasterer/labourer/painter/decorator before he found himself on the 9-5 booze trail; whoever’s idea it was a good job had been done.
“So’d you get the knack of Shoe the Donkey then?” he asked, tuning up.
“Yeah, that and the Polka.”
“I thought you would. It suits you because you’re left handed you see. A little bit more fretty than some of the others.” Jack explained.
I nodded in faux agreement.
“Ok, so play me in.”
I played Shoe the Donkey for the old man; he came in and accompanied pushing the pace up ever so slightly on the second time around.
“You have been practicing.” his face beaming with pride.
“Morning, noon and night.”
“How’s your mother taking to the sound of the banjo being in her house again?”
“She’s ok with it. Think maybe she thinks I’ll get bored with it and move on to something else.”
“Why would she think that?”
“She bought me a typewriter a while back and I got myself a laptop too. I never use them now though.”
“You fancy yourself a writer, huh?”
My mouth cracked from dryness, I didn’t have to think to remember his mantra.
“Who knows, I read a lot of books I liked. I figured maybe you know…”
“You any good?”
“I don’t bother with that anymore.”
“There is an ugliness in being paid for work one does not like. You ever hear that before Douglas?”
“No.”
“Gave up writing then. Probably for the best,” he stabbed at me “It’s not something that you can just fall in and out of. It takes practice, you get bored often?”
“Often enough. Not on this though.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because you play the banjo too.”
“Right,” Jack stated changing pace “what would you like to learn now? I can teach you either the John Ryan Polka or Tripping up the Stairs.”
“Which one’s more fretty?” I asked.
“They’re both pretty fretty, Tripping’s a little more up and down.” he slid his left hand up and down the neck of the banjo.
“Ok well let’s try that then.”
He laughed “You’re game as a badger, I will certainly give you that much. Ok so this is Tripping up the Stairs at speed.”
He played the song at a breakneck speed, dropping in little pieces of style and filler to pad out the sound. It was nothing short of amazing. As he came to the end of the tune he’d slow it right down in order to walk me through it.
“F, A, A then down to G, B, B,” he pointed out while playing “make sure you use all three fingers on this one it’ll make it easier for you…and F, A, D min…good.”
As I practiced Dad grabbed his notepad and jotted down the rest of the chords for me to work up the whole song over the week; my “homework” as he’d call it. I slowly but surely found my fingering, he watched me strumming on his antique instrument before breaking into a little Dueling Banjos, he realized that I had seen that movie and knew what he was referring to.
We threw our coats on and braced the sharp tongue of Belfast winter. We ended up in the Park Inn Hotel. It never really changed much over the decades. I had soup and a sandwich and a cheeky half pint that Jack paid for; he started in on the doubles and pointed out to everyone who’d pay attention that I was his boy. An hour later and he was slumped in his seat, the bartender had an arrangement with him which he’d provide Dad table service in exchange for him not trying to walk to the bar and bothering any of the hotel’s residence. I knew it was my time to leave when the conversation fell silent. Jack’s mood changed like the tides; the caring father part of the day had receded. I gave him a partial hug as I got to my feet.
“So I’ll work on that one this week Dad, maybe we could go looking at straps or something for mine next week.”
“You plan of playing standing up?”
“No.”
“Not much use for a strap then boy.” strangeness had arrived in his voice.
“I guess. Thanks for teaching me Dad.”
“See you next week Douglas.” he said, draining his pint.
