Thank you, Bernard

I read a lot of poetry at university. I wrote some too. Recently I found some old poems I had written in my bedroom. Reading them again made me want to gouge my eyes out. Straight, white, upper-middle class 21 year old men should not be allowed to write poetry.

A lot of the poetry I enjoyed at university was from the Romantic era. Byron, Shelley, Wordsworth and the lads. Or beautiful rhyming poems like those by William Butler Yeats and The Ballad of Reading Gaol by Oscar Wilde – a banger. But my favourite was, and still is, Irish poetry. Poems about rural life and catholic Ireland. Seamus Heaney shit.

I read Heaney over and over at university, and I still read him. But I remember I wanted to branch out and buy a book of poems by another Irish poet – one I’d never heard of. So I went to my favourite shop in Dublin city, Books Upstairs (the old location on Dame Street), and went to the Irish poetry section. I quickly browsed the shelf until I saw a book of poems by Bernard O’Donoghue. I’d never heard the name before. Lovely, I thought, pulling the book down and only reading the name and nothing else. Straight in my basket.

On the DART home I read the book a few times, sometimes stopping to look out the window because a line had taken me by surprise. I loved the book so much I went back the next day and bought more by Bernard O’Donoghue. And loved those books too.

I wondered why I’d never heard of him, and why in school we had to study Robert fucking Frost and his metaphorical walls and roads, and not the likes of Bernard O’Donoghue, who described things I could see again or made me love home.

For some reason, I assumed O’Donoghue was dead. All the best poets are dead. But a quick Google search told me that Bernard O’Donoghue was alive and kicking. He was also the head of English at Oxford. So I wrote a letter to him. (I was going through a strange letter writing phase. The most embarrassing one I can remember writing was to Richard Dawkins after reading The God Delusion. Every time I remember that letter I wish to be hit by a bus to ease the cringe-filled pain.)

I wrote to Bernard O’Donoghue and told him I loved his poetry and that I was interested in studying poetry further – maybe even for a Masters once I was finished my BA in English. I told him I’d love to go to Oxford, but asked if he knew any other good spots to study poetry because I didn’t think I’d get into Oxford. I even sent him some poems and a short autobiographical story.

Bernard O’Donoghue wrote back to me a few weeks later. He said he liked my poems, particularly the one about my dog. But he said my story was better. He said he liked my writing style and said that I “showed a command for prose.” I was absolutely fucking chuffed with that. It meant the world to me.

At the end of his letter, Bernard O’Donoghue told me that I should look into studying Creative Writing rather than poetry. Ever since I was a kid I dreamed of writing a book. When I was three I wrote one called Fly Away With The Birds on pages of A4 computer paper and illustrated it with little drawings. I’ve no idea why it’s about flying away with birds. But I enjoyed writing it and illustrating the clouds and the birds which I drew as capital Ms. Then I taped the pages together with black electrical tape so it opened like a real book. My sister still has it.

In his letter, Bernard O’Donoghue told me to apply to the University of East Anglia in Norwich. He said he considered it the best college in the UK for studying a masters in Creative Writing. Hearing that from the head of English at Oxford, where they also offer a masters in Creative Writing, I knew that UEA had to be good.

A couple of months after receiving his letter, Bernard O’Donoghue gave a talk to first year English students at UCD. I got the time wrong and arrived an hour late – he was already gone. So I ran to the school of English office and asked if O’Donoghue was still on campus. He had gone for tea I was told, and had left his briefcase in the office, so he’d have to be back. I sat down next to his briefcase and waited.

Soon he arrived and I asked him to sign my books of his. He said he remembered my letter, and told me again that he had enjoyed the short study I had sent, and asked if I had given a Masters at UEA any thought. That blew me away. I doubt he remembers me know, but to have been remembered that day left me in awe of him.

It made me think I could try writing, or any form of storytelling as a career. So much so that I entered a competition in university called The Maeve Binchy Travel Award, where the winning proposal for a creative writing or storytelling project won funding from Maeve Binchy’s widower – the children’s author Gordon Snell – to travel and work on a story.

And I was chosen. The first undergraduate to win. It was some feeling. With the funding I went to West Africa for a few months and worked on a story that I hope to finish some day.

That prize was an amazing feeling, and only made me believe even more. So I went back to Bernard O’Donoghue’s letter and decided to look into a Masters at UEA. After doing some research, I applied and sent them a story. Then I got an interview and was offered a place to study Creative Non-Fiction and Biography writing. I was so fucking excited.

My year at UEA was one of the best years of my life. I met lovely, brilliant people who became friends and only made me want to make a living from writing even more. It’s not easy though. People aren’t really hiring writers in the same way they used to. The landscape has totally changed. But there’s always a way in and I believe that.

And all because of that random day in the book shop, and the letter. Mad buzz.

Thank you, Bernard.

Fr. Pat Noise

The next time you are in Dublin city, go to O’Connell Bridge. Go to the west side of the bridge, leading upriver towards Temple Bar and Heuston Station. On top of the wall of the bridge you’ll find a plaque. It reads:

“This plaque commemorates

Fr. Pat Noise

Advisor to Peadar Clancey

He died under suspicious circumstances when his carriage plunged into the Liffey on August 10th, 1919

Erected by the HSTI”

The plaque is an intriguing one. Not because of the “suspicious circumstances,” but because not a single word printed on the plaque is true.

There was no Fr. Pat Noise. He never existed.

Apparently two brothers had the plaque created in memory of their father. His name wasn’t Pat Noise, and he wasn’t a priest, but rumours suggest that the name Pat Noise is a play on the Latin ‘pater noster,’ meaning ‘our father.’

Historians and academics were questioned about the veracity of the plaque’s claims, but nobody could give an answer, because there was none to give.

Dublin City Council eventually had the plaque removed, but it was swiftly replaced by the pranksters with an identical. This was in 2007. As a result of the plaque’s initial removal and subsequent replacement, councilor Dermot Lacey proposed that Dublin City Council have a vote on whether or not the plaque be allowed to stay. Lacey was for the plaque remaining on the bridge, saying it was ‘a bit of madness, a bit of colour… It’s a monument to eccentricity and it adds a bit of colour to our lives.’

The council voted in favour of the plaque remaining and it’s still there today. Go have a look.

Personally, I love that buzz – that something harmless and far fetched was allowed to stay, purely because it was nothing more than a bit of clean craic, and apparently a nice homage for two sons to their father (who presumably loved a good yarn.)

World’s Most Expensive Spliff

I’ve only been to court once, when I was twenty one, for possession of cannabis.

The night I was arrested, I was sitting in the back seat of a friend’s car, parked up near a local football pitch; normal behavior. As always, we were on the lookout for white Garda cars or Ford Mondeos with two extra aerials.

We mustn’t have been looking too hard though, because soon enough a white Garda car pulled up and flashed its blue and red lights. Two potato-headed Gardaí rolled out and waddled towards us. I’ll call them Fergal 1 and Fergal 2.

‘How ye lads?’ wheezed Fergal 1, rhetorically, as he approached the car.

None of us said anything. I could hear the blood pulsing in my ears.

Both Fergals were breathing heavily. Their breath fogged the cold dark air like big cumulus clouds. Their faces were red and full; the midnight 3-in-1s from Dragon City catching up with them.

Fergal 1 leaned in towards the driver window and gave us all a long look. Fergal 2 stood back, rearranging his belt and smoothing out the boxers that had bunched up around his arse inside the thick navy uniformed trousers he had on.

‘Is that weed I’m smelling in there now lads?’ asked Fergal 1 in a Garda accent.

We were made to get out of the car. There were three of us. I had the bag of weed in my pocket. We’d smoked most of it, but there was enough left for one joint.

Fergal 1 took our names while Fergal 2 searched the car.

‘Right lads, I’ll ask ye now, and now only,’ said Fergal 1. ‘Have ye anything on ye that ye shouldn’t have?’

I took out the little plastic baggy and gave it to Fergal 1. There was barely anything in it. He shook the little baggy, holding it up to inspect it under the orange glow of a nearby street light.

‘Nothing else, no?’ he asked.

We shook our heads.

Fergal 1 told us he wasn’t going to do anything. He kept the small bag of weed and made us sign his notebook to confirm we had been cautioned. That was the last of it, he said. Fergal 2 told us to go home and stay out of trouble. Then both Fergals got back into the Fergalmobile and left, presumably in the direction of Airside Swords where there’s a 24/7 McDonald’s.

And so, that brilliant use of taxpayers’ money came to an end. We got back into the car and left the car park.

About two or three months later, in early December, I was at home. There was a knock on the door. I answered it.

It was Fergal 1 and Fergal 2, looking smug – big round soft heads on them like brioche burger buns.

They mustn’t have met their arrest quota for the year, because despite having promised us that nothing would ever come of the caution they’d given us a few months prior, they served me with a court summons and waddled away with all the grace of two walruses headed for a comfy rock after a big feed.

My court date was a month or so away. I needed a solicitor, and got one based just down the road from Swords district court, where my “trial” would be held (if you could even call it that.)

My solicitor was a very short man in his 50s with salt and pepper hair and a Marty Whelan moustache. His office was on the main street above a spray tan salon. It was small and smelled like your granddad’s coat.

I sat opposite my solicitor, who was behind his desk. There was a picture of his daughter in graduation robes on the wall, and a framed degree. He started asking me questions about myself, trying to come up with a plea he could use.

‘Aha! That’s it. We’ll say you’re a college student and you want to apply for a Masters in America and that a conviction would put an end to that. The judge should let you off with that and strike out the case.’

It sounded like a plan, so I agreed. Before I left, he told me to wear a suit on the day, and to bring three hundred Euro with me for his fee – preferably in cash.

On the day of my case, I met my solicitor in his office before going to the courthouse. We ran over his plan. He told me not to talk under any circumstance, and that if the judge asked any questions, he would reply on my behalf.

‘What if the judge asks if I still smoke weed?’ I said.

‘He won’t. And anyway, like I said, don’t talk at all. I’ll do all the talking.’

He asked me for his fee. I handed him an envelope with three hundred Euro inside. He counted the notes then put the envelope in a drawer.

We walked to the courthouse.

I randomly met one of the lads outside the courthouse. He was up for a driving offense. Neither of us had known we were both due in court that day, so we laughed and went inside. We sat beside each other on a bench in the courtroom.

The courtroom was full of young men. Most looked like they’d be straight back to the bookies once their case was heard, or into the pub. A few were handcuffed and standing to the side, next to some bored looking Gardaí.

The judge eventually arrived, looking pissed off that this was how he had to spend his morning before tee-off at 11am in Old Portmarknock. We all had to stand up for him like children in a classroom.

The judge heard a few cases. Some for drink driving, some for theft, some for public indecency. Many people were convicted, receiving fines, and in some cases short prison sentences.

Before each case, an arresting officer would read out the accused’s criminal record. Some people’s convictions count was in the double digits.

I noticed the judge was in a bad mood. He often barked at Gardaí who supplied him with inadequate information about the accused’s arrest, or else he barked at the accused themselves for not giving one iota of a fuck that this was their twenty-sixth conviction.

My name was called. I walked up to the bar, stood facing the judge, and listened to Fergal 1, my arresting officer, read out my charge.

Fergal 1, looking sweaty and warm, told the judge that I was arrested for possession of marijuana, with an estimated street value of forty Euro. Forty fucking Euro. He caught me with one joints worth of grass and said it was worth forty Euro. Whoever he was buying from was ripping him off. Despite being annoyed at this, I said nothing, following my solicitor’s orders.

Next, my solicitor pleaded my case. He told the judge that I was in college, and that I was only experimenting with marijuana, and I knew I had made a mistake, and I was deeply remorseful, and that I planned on applying for a postgraduate program in America so a conviction would ruin that.

‘And do you still smoke?’ The judge asked, looking straight at me.

I looked at my solicitor. He hesitated, then turned to the judge.

‘Judge, as I’ve said, my client…’ he began to say, until he was cut off.

‘I’m not asking you,’ the judge snapped at my solicitor. ‘I’m asking him. Do you still smoke?’

I looked at my solicitor. He looked away from me, towards the ground then up to the ceiling, his master plan now fucked. I looked at the judge. Then I looked around me, then back to the judge. The judge tilted his head, staring at me impatiently. I stared at my solicitor again. He didn’t look back.

The whole courtroom was silent. I could hear the handcuffed accused sniggering at the side of the room. I looked around me again, to where my friend was sitting on the bench. With his eyes, he seemed to be telling me, ‘Man, fucking say something. Quick.’

I looked back at the judge, who’s face was now red, tense, and stiff with anger.

‘Answer me!’ he roared. ‘Do you still smoke?’

I looked at my solicitor again. Still, he wouldn’t look at me.

You little hamster-sized prick, I thought. Great plan, mate. Stellar fucking stuff. Really earning your fee today, aren’t you?

The judge roared at me again.

‘If I made you do a drug test today, would you pass or would you fail!? Answer!’

‘I’d fail,’ I quickly replied.

More sniggering from the wings of the courtroom. I may have heard someone call me a fucking eejit. The judge silenced the room.

Following my response, my solicitor pursed his lips and looked at the judge apologetically, like a parent whose child had just said the most embarrassing thing in the world.

‘Good answer,’ the judge replied, relaxed now. ‘An honest answer. I don’t get many of those in here. I’m letting you off.’

A wave of relief washed over me.

‘But you’re to pay a three hundred and fifty Euro fine to a charity of my choosing. I hope you’ve learned from this. I better not see you in here again, you mightn’t be so lucky the next time. The case will be struck out. Next.’

I went back and sat by my friend on the bench. My solicitor shuffled sheepishly to the side of the courtroom, knowing that for all the money I had just paid him, his game plan of me not talking had proved to be as useful as Anne Frank’s drum kit.

Fergal 1 stayed where he was, because he had also arrested the next person whose name the judge had just called.

A tall, fat, baby-faced teenager rose from a bench, flanked by his worried parents. They were told to stay put by the judge. The young lad was wearing a suit – a very baggy one – and the poor chap shook with nerves. He couldn’t have been a month over eighteen. He was definitely still in school.

The judge asked Fergal 1 what the young man had been arrested for.

‘Well, judge, myself and my colleague arrested him and found a marijuana grinding apparatus on his person,’ said Fergal 1, clearly referring to another past adventure of the Fergals.

‘But did you find any actual marijuana on his person?’ asked the judge, annoyed, rubbing his eyelids.

‘No,’ Fergal 1 replied, ‘but we did notice marijuana residue inside the apparatus, with an estimated street value of five Euro.’

The courtroom burst into laughter, led by the handcuffed men standing by the wall. Even some of the Gardaí struggled to contain themselves.

Again the judge silenced the room. Then he looked at the terrified young man. The judge seemed fed up, eager to get to the golf course ASAP. He exhaled long and hard.

‘Look. I just made him pay a three hundred and fifty Euro fine for a similar enough offense,’ the judge told the boy, pointing at me. ‘It’ll have to be the same for you. The case will be struck out. Next.’

Soon, I was back outside the courtroom with my solicitor. He shook my hand and said goodbye.

‘That went well,’ he said, seemingly oblivious to how useless he had been. Then off he went. I watched him go, thinking about how I’d just spent nearly seven hundred Euro on one joint.

Hopefully I’ll tell this story to kids in the future, and they’ll have a hard time believing me. The same way I can’t believe it when my parents tell me condoms and divorce used to be illegal.

Deco from Cabra

The Adrian Kennedy PhoneShow on Irish radio must be one of the easiest platforms to pull the wool over everyone’s eyes. I reckon half the callers and texts read out are fake. I know how easy it is to swindle listeners, the producers, and Adrian himself, because I did it myself for close to two hours, live on air.

The topic was men fighting on nights out. Too easy.

The first thing you need to do when you’re trying to get on The PhoneShow is send a text in. Don’t make it too far fetched though. Give it enough believability that the producers will bite. But get ready for what comes next, because if your initial text is what the producers want, you’ll get a call from them.

It was a late winter evening and I was sitting with my friends, parked up, in a local car park beside a football pitch. There was a row of cars full of us, each parked close together so conversations could be heard and joints easily passed back and forth. A typical Tuesday night for young lads in college. I was nineteen.

The lads knew I had texted in to The PhoneShow. But I don’t think anyone expected what was going to happen next.

Again, the topic was men fighting on nights out. I texted something like:

“Tell ur 1 ta shut da fuck up I always be in a scrap down me local its natural I luv it gets me mad respect in d local fuckin dopes talkin shite Deco in Cabra”

Two minutes later I got the call; private number.

‘Hello is this Deco?’ a posh south side woman’s accent asked me.

‘It is… eh, I mean…’ (Now doing my best inner city Dublin accent). ‘Yeh it is yeh.’

‘Hi Deco, this is Una calling from The Adrian Kennedy PhoneShow. You just texted in didn’t you?’

‘Yeh.’

“Great. I’d like to put you through to the show so you can join the live conversation on air, is that something you would be interested in doing?”

‘Eh, yeh. Wha’ever.’

‘Great, Deco. Just hold the line.’

The lads were all staring at me, excited and wide-eyed. I told them to hush. Everyone leaned in towards my phone.

I was put through to the show.

‘Adrian tell him to shut his fuckin mouth the stupid cunt. Eejit, so he is.,

‘Sarah, Sarah, please. I’ll have to ask you to not use that sort of language.’

‘But he is a fuckin eejit, Adrian, listen to him…’

‘…You shut your fuckin mouth!’

‘…John, please…’

‘…You see Adrian? He’s worse, fuckin eejit.’

‘OK, well let’s hear from Deco. Hello Deco are you there?’

‘Yeh.’

‘Deco, you said, and I’m reading your text here now, that fighting on a night out gets you “mad respect” in the pub. What do you mean by that?’

‘Just dat fightin is normal like. All lads do it. Your ones a dope der talkin shite.’

‘He can’t be serious, Adrian.’

‘Of course I’m bein serious. I’ve scars down me face and all and everyone knows not to touch me cos I can handle meself. All young lads should be able to handle demselves. Ye haven’t a clue what yer on about ye fuckin dope.’

‘And you do? Fighting makes you hard does it?’

‘Yeh, and the mots love it. I get loads of gee after I’ve floored some cunt.’

‘Deco, please, that sort of language isn’t acceptable.’

The conversation continued like that for close to two hours.

After the first few minutes, I had to leave the car I was sitting in and go stand in the cold, because the lads couldn’t stop laughing in the background and I didn’t want to blow my cover. Also, the lads obviously wanted to listen to the conversation, and there’s a twenty second delay between the actual conversation and what goes out live. So I couldn’t sit in the car with the radio blaring the delayed conversation.

Callers came and went, but Adrian kept me on the line throughout. I was stirring so much shit that people were getting really angry. It was too easy to wind some people up.

One man called in to say he’d like to see me put a pair of gloves on and get into an octagon. He said I’d crumble in an MMA fight. I called him a poxy little fairy who loves getting half naked and oiled up to hug his mates, and that he should skip all that and just go straight to riding fellas.

Another lad told me I was a coward, and that one day I’d get what was coming to me. I said the only thing coming to me was respect and his auld one.

During ad breaks, Adrain would talk to me personally.

‘Deco, how are you doing?’

‘Good yeh.’

‘Listen, this is great. I’m going to keep you going OK?’

‘Yeh grand yeh. Fuckin dopes the lot.’

‘Brilliant.’

It did get tiring at times though. I was standing out in the wind and cold so long my hands went pink and numb. My teeth were chattering and I needed a drink to cure my cotton mouth.

Every thirty minutes one of the lads would come over to me, silently, with a big smile and giving me the thumbs up. They’d hand me a half smoked spliff, because I’d chipped in on a bag with the rest of them, and then leave me with it. I’d make the hand signal for a drink and someone would grab me a water or Coke from one of the cars.

The distant laughter from the lads in the cars fed me. When I knew I’d said something good, I’d turn towards our row of parked cars and wait for their delayed response. Plumes of smoke billowed from the car windows. So did fits of laughter and choking coughs. It spurred me on.

Sometimes my accent slipped. Maybe the producers and Adrian noticed, but I doubt they cared. I was controversial, unrepentant, and winding the other callers up to the point of hysteria. Deco from Cabra, The PhoneShow’s wet dream.

I told Adrian I’d been glassed and bottled plenty of times, and had the scars to prove it. I said I wore my scars with pride, like war medals. I said any woman who says my behavior is disgusting is only lying to herself, because one sight of me knocking people out in a smoking area and their knickers would be drenched.

Adrain was loving it. He knew how angry everyone was getting with me. I reckon the phone lines in the studio were lighting up like the control centre on board the Millennium Falcon.

One caller – let’s call him Terry – said he was from Cabra as well, and he’d like to see me outside one of the locals for a straightener tomorrow night. I told Adrian I recognised Terry’s voice, and that Terry was a well known sham. I said Terry was always throwing shapes and running his mouth, but couldn’t back up the chat with his fists. I told Terry I’d seen him “go down more times than a bleedin whore with bills to pay, know what I mean Adrian?”

That really boiled Terry’s piss. He eventually had to be cut off the line because of anger and profanity.

I stayed on the line until the midway point in the show, where Adrian winds up the conversation and takes an extended ad break before changing the topic and getting new callers.

Then I joined the lads back in the cars.

I’d like to bump into Adrian Kennedy in a pub, or one of his producers, and ask how many callers he reckons are faking it. I reckon every night of the week there’s a group of stoned young lads parked up somewhere, giving it a go.