I'm a Berk, Indeed I am and proud of it. We all hail from Galway and still have family there, many members, proud to stand up for our heritage. Yes, a true blue lineage which can be traced back to the Bishop of Metz. Bastardisation has mutated the name, but the old family tree still has branches everywhere, de Burgh, Burke, Bourkes the Gillicks ( ? ) strange lot, all coming from the Bishopric.
Check Burke's Peerage, we all have our entries, or just Google Ron Birks I'll come up straight away. .. Everyone claims to have a little Irish in them, but I even worked at Berkley House, in Berkley Square, Homestead of the Berkley Hunt clan where I was an art director on accounts including Guinness of course.
Aunt Sinehead who's 96 is still to be found practising the oldest profession back in Bushy Park, it's not exactly legal, but if they want a little Poteen, someone's got to make it. Her Daughters Haylee and Mary both sixty nine, still run the business, and they said if I ever came unstuck, there would always be an opening for me there, how sweet.
I remember playing with them both when we were younger, running down the hollow slipping and sliding, oh what fun we had. But they probably could do with a man about the house now, especially since Uncle Paeder slipped away, He was a sailor, but always in and out of trouble, always in an out of Port, 'in and out, in and out make yer feckin moind op' Aunty used to say.
He used to do a bit of Trawling, but then joined the lads in a big Frigate, I think he had an early discharge, for a bit off rough and tumble, so his mates claimed, but you can never believe what comes out of the mouths of Seamen, Aunty used to say.
When he was on dry land he was a bit of a tinker, 'tailor made trouble' she used to, but she would soldier on, careful not to spy on him when was beavering away at his hobbies lest he flew of the handle and threw a Paddy. Yes, an unstable and voilent man, in fact, people would often ask ' Was Uncle Paeder vile? you could say that, I suppose.
He slept alone, a tormented soul, could you could hear him at night tossing, turning tossing and turning, gasping... then all of sudden he would ejaculate loudly 'Sinehead' get me a feckin cloth, I've spilt a load of pot…..dutifully she would run up the stairs, ready to wipe him down…and mop his feavered brow.
The pub's still there, the 'Faucet Inn', called in last year. 'Hello Ronnie' landlady Mary said…How the Divil are ya… in for your usual?' flexing her fat fingers in anticipation. 'Yes please Mary' How d'ya want it Dahlin', as it comes Mary, she's started to pull, slowly at first, but gradually getting quicker drawing up the thick liquid, forcing it through the pipes, she was certainly able to give you the best head in the village. It's true what they say though Guinness just doesn't tavel. So I let the pint settle, sat in the comfy chair that old Paddy O'Boyle used to use and abuse, my eyes glazing over as I reminisce about the old days down in the hollow, slippin' and a sliddin with my two cousins Haylee and Mary, chasing each other around so hard that we were fit to burst, we'd sit down the three of us on the Old Oak tree, me with a big gash on my knee, all twisted and gnarled, moist from the morning dew, as the spunk seeped into our breeches, steam rising from our hot bodies…ah happy days, indeed. Ha ha I chuckled to myself the familiar souroundings you can see... Cockatoo… the picture on the calender dated '63, frozen in time, on the other wall a Toucan flat aginst the wall, pints of the black stuff perched on its grossly engorged bill, I breathe in, ah, I can smell the bogs from here, I thought to myself, dorty brown peat water seeping thorough our naked toes….
I looked around at the shell of a pub. Where has it all gone? the pub now an empty vessel, where are they all now?Old Mick McManus wrestling with his jacket at closing time, all gone John Thomas, always hanging out here, Paddy Brah, could never pull himself together, Séamus Awl, always in a brawl, Lance O'Boyle always popping in late…all gone. It's like they sucked the atmosphere out of the place when they left . I sigh, move up to the bar, just me and Mary looking at each other drawing in each others breath as I lean over bar brushing the jugs as I reach for the pickled egg jar. 'You'll be needing a stiff one then', she said, peircing my eyes with her stare, 'That's a fact Mary I replaid, give it to me now, make it a large one'. I throw a euro into the slot of the jukebox in the corner, it shudders into action playing my favourite song 'the boys are back', what is it with this feckless shell of a place, when years gone by it was anthing thing but… Feck Feck Feck was all you ever heard amidst the clattering and nattering…. All gone away….where the crack? what has happend to it? the grey sunken punt of the world…..
Would I go back to live there? would I feck
Lá Fhéile Pádraig