Is there not a single soul amongst us whose life is untroubled by some soul destroying crap of one colour or another? It feels like everyone I talk to of late is desperately scrambling to keep their head above the various dire life changing piles of shit that appear to be raining down upon all of us in alarming quantities and with equally alarming regulatiry!
– Erick the Half a Bee and his wife have last week received papers from their daughter in law claiming they abused their son as a child. Literally a conversation about a tragic incident in which a pot of boiled potatoes accidentally spilled down their son’s back when he was about ten has been entered into an affidavit – a legal document – as court evidence of childhood abuse! Who the fuck is this psychotic chick my cousin married that she could say that awful accident was deliberate!!!
– Another old friend Rev. Pete Repeat who I caught up with a little while ago tells me he had herniated some discs in his spine last year and while recovering from orthopedic surgery suffered a heart attack (at 39!!!) resulting in triple bi-pass heart surgery after which he caught a chest cold that resulted in a punctured lung and 12 months of convalescence and a pacemaker later he now feels like he can finally breathe properly.
– And then there’s the wonderfully generous and unbelievably caring Karen who has been dealing with her husband being in and out of psychaiatric hospital all year for seemingly ineffective electroconvulsive shock therapy treatments for the debilitating chronic depression he’s been suffering for nearly a decade now…. how she hangs in there I don’t know.
– An old work colleague from some 15 years ago Mr Wolf called me out of the blue today and tells me that he and his lovely wife have separated and their three kids are stuck in the middle of what is shaping up to be a rather acrimonious custody/divorce case.
– Today I call one of my dearest friends and much loved travel companion Bluddy Mary, only to hear that she has just this week been informed that her brother has been diagnosed with advanced bowel and liver cancer and to say his prognosis is not good is an understatement of vast proportions. He’s only 49 years old.
But it goes on and on… someone else I know looks to be heading for divorce court because her quasi-philandering husband is positively delusional. Mr K is being sued by the tree lopping idiots who didn’t complete the work they promised. Another guy I know has recently had to move out of his own house because his partner wouldn’t back him up when dealing with her bludging adult children who’ve been sponging off them for ages. And BigSal spent most of the last few weeks thinking her 4 year old daughter, Fishy Bob who has a mysterious growth in her leg might have had an epitheliod sarcoma. And then there’s Equinom whose family are constantly struggling with a schizophrenic and occasionally homicidal brother/son whose alter personality says that an unplugged phone or TV talks to him…. and…. and…. and….
… and I’m just going about my normal pain filled, drug fucked days wondering why we fucking bother to keep going. So for pity’s sake if ANYONE has ANYTHING nice or positive going on in their life…. please leave me a comment or drop me an email or something, anything but no more tales of woe.
SAID HANRAHAN
by John O’Brien (1878 – 1952)
"We’ll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
In accents most forlorn,
Outside the church, ere Mass began,
One frosty Sunday morn.
The congregation stood about,
Coat-collars to the ears,
And talked of stock, and crops, and drought,
As it had done for years.
"It’s looking crook," said Daniel Croke;
"Bedad, it’s cruke, me lad,
For never since the banks went broke
Has seasons been so bad."
"It’s dry, all right," said young O’Neil,
With which astute remark
He squatted down upon his heel
And chewed a piece of bark.
And so around the chorus ran
"It’s keepin’ dry, no doubt."
"We’ll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"Before the year is out."
"The crops are done; ye’ll have your work
To save one bag of grain;
From here way out to Back-o’-Bourke
They’re singin’ out for rain.
"They’re singin’ out for rain," he said,
"And all the tanks are dry."
The congregation scratched its head,
And gazed around the sky.
"There won’t be grass, in any case,
Enough to feed an ass;
There’s not a blade on Casey’s place
As I came down to Mass."
"If rain don’t come this month," said Dan,
And cleared his throat to speak –
"We’ll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"If rain don’t come this week."
A heavy silence seemed to steal
On all at this remark;
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed a piece of bark.
"We want an inch of rain, we do,"
O’Neil observed at last;
But Croke "maintained" we wanted two
To put the danger past.
"If we don’t get three inches, man,
Or four to break this drought,
We’ll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"Before the year is out."
In God’s good time down came the rain;
And all the afternoon
On iron roof and window-pane
It drummed a homely tune.
And through the night it pattered still,
And lightsome, gladsome elves
On dripping spout and window-sill
Kept talking to themselves.
It pelted, pelted all day long,
A-singing at its work,
Till every heart took up the song
Way out to Back-o’-Bourke.
And every creek a banker ran,
And dams filled overtop;
"We’ll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"If this rain doesn’t stop."
And stop it did, in God’s good time;
And spring came in to fold
A mantle o’er the hills sublime
Of green and pink and gold.
And days went by on dancing feet,
With harvest-hopes immense,
And laughing eyes beheld the wheat
Nid-nodding o’er the fence.
And, oh, the smiles on every face,
As happy lad and lass
Through grass knee-deep on Casey’s place
Went riding down to Mass.
While round the church in clothes genteel
Discoursed the men of mark,
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed his piece of bark.
"There’ll be bush-fires for sure, me man,
There will, without a doubt;
We’ll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"Before the year is out."