DISPLACED IN MULLINGAR:JUST BEFORE I got married in 1993, I lived in east Galway, in a small bungalow surrounded by flat fields near the village of Skehana. I would sometimes cycle to a mausoleum in Monivea, and gaze in a cracked window at two coffins that lay side by side, festooned with ancient sashes and covered in dust.
Locals said that the mausoleum was built for Robert Ffrench, a diplomat who married a Russian princess in the 19th century. I spent many afternoons loitering around that mausoleum, meditating on the splendours of marriage, the shortness of life, and the fact that we all end up in separate boxes.
And I spent other afternoons sitting by the Stanley range in my bungalow, gazing out the kitchen window at the empty road as I waited anxiously for my beloved to arrive from Dublin on Burke's bus. I would bake sweet rice in the oven, for no other reason except that sweet rice was a source of comfort to me in childhood. My mother used to leave a pot of milky rice coated with sugar in the oven until a brown skin on top indicated that it was well baked. I looked forward to it on winter days, after walking from school, my shoulders hurting from the straps of the schoolbag, and my face hurting from the sting of the wind and the humiliations of the day.
Last week, I ordered rice pudding in Ballina. I had spent three days in Enniscrone, sitting on a balcony overlooking the beach, drinking glasses of brandy and gazing into the roaring Atlantic. There was a lot of drizzle, and rough winds, and I staggered around the beach in a haze of ozone, like the hero of Death in Venice.
Finally, on Wednesday, I headed for Ballina, and bought a few fresh buns, which cheered me up. I planned to consume them that evening, on the balcony, sipping café royale, and wrapped in blankets.
For lunch, I had fish and chips in a restaurant near the river, as sheets of rain carried paper bags around the streets, and the staff kept the door closed in case the wind might ruffle the hairs of little old ladies sipping tea.
One waitress told me that she had intended going to Lidl that morning to buy a tent. She set her alarm for 7am, knowing that only the early birds in Lidl get any bargains.
"But goodness me," she said, "I slept until a quarter past 11, and I had to be at work by 12." I remarked that it was now only 20 minutes past 12.
"I know," she said. "Sure didn't I go upstairs a few minutes ago and I could still see the track of the sheets across me face."
I glanced at her, and sure enough a little red line crossed her forehead and cheek, and brought the two of us into an endearing intimacy that I would have enjoyed extending for the rest of the day had she not been so busy.
The rice pudding in Ballina was delicious. The waitress returned before I was finished and said that she had an ice-cream on the shelf that no one wanted and, if I wished, I could have it.
She carried it to me on a tray; a mountain of red syrup dripping down the white slopes, and I felt that people were staring at me as I sunk my spoon into it.
I returned to Enniscrone in the late afternoon and went straight to the beach. White waves clapped down at my feet, each with the sound of distant thunder, and a salty hurricane lashed my face.
I passed children in wet suits, with surfboards under their oxters, staring at the waves like a line of ducks, and a young couple pushing a buggy at high speed. I passed a father, kicking ball with his son, and three teenaged girls in swimwear squealing in the waves.
Close to the water's edge, two old ladies were holding their hats, and a bull of a man, in swimming togs, was jogging. I passed two men with a giant kite who were unravelling its strings with the gravity of engineers handling electricity cables.
A rope across the sand marked the limit of the lifeguards' territory, and beyond that I was alone. I leaned into the wind, and I walked on for a long time.
