Heart Beat: Before I resume my surgical trail, I wish to make yet another small diversion.
Minister Roche is about to make money available for skateboarding parks. Whatever way you look at this, it has to be wholly positive. It is commendable, as is any investment, to persuade us young and old to keep active and to participate in exercise.
I have one question for the Minister, but it is fundamental. How is he going to resolve the matter of insurance? He knows well that there are ongoing problems in schoolyards and playgrounds and that the stifling grey blanket of threatened legislation overlies even the most innocuous aspects of play and recreation.
I feel that this must be faced resolutely and that accidents must be realised and accepted as such. Accidents happen and, despite reasonable precautions and vigilance, they always will. We must collectively rid ourselves of the notion that there is always someone or something to blame.
We must realise that such inappropriate litigation costs us all money, be it in higher taxes or increased insurance. I wish the Minister's programme well and hopefully it will cause us all to again look at the wider issues.
I had described the first of many hospital parties with which I was associated. These were little oases of planning and organisation for our group, far removed from the realities of our everyday lives. I suppose it is a universal truth, however, that you enjoy everybody else's party better than your own.
Since I am writing about such matters and before I return to the doleful matter of work, I must allude to another social event of our calendar, indeed the social event of the year for us. This was the Hospital Dress Dance. It would now be known as the Hospital Ball with the same kind of metamorphosis that prompts our youngsters to refer to "debs" events. I am sure our grandparents would revolve in their republican graves at the adoption of these names and customs.
The dance was the prerogative of the hospital rugby club and, indeed, almost its sole source of funding. Apart from the president and senior treasurer (consultants), interns provided the officer corps of the club.
Success was imperative - otherwise the annual trip to Twickenham or Murrayfield or, more daringly, Paris, was in jeopardy. To allow such failure to occur on your watch would be to cast yourself in perpetuity in the halls of infamy.
A committee was formed including consultants' wives of whose opinions we took no notice. Tradition coupled with our northside location placed us in the Gresham hotel with bandleader Neil Kerins. Our southside colleagues from St Vincent's were located in the Shelbourne hotel with Earl Gill. Theirs, they felt, was a rather more social event than ours. They were St Vincent's, you appreciate. We always felt that, as they had much less work to do than us, they could afford to spend more time on their preparations. However, we knew our place, and we always made more money.
The first items at our initial committee meeting in the Gresham, with tea and cakes for the consultant wives, were the fixing of the menu and the ticket price. For years previously, the Mater dance had provided only sandwiches and coffee and cakes with no semblance of a formal meal. This cheapest menu, coupled with an inflationary tendency to increase the ticket price, ensured maximum profitability.
Imagine our consternation when, on this occasion, a senior consultant's wife announced that she had just been to the St Vincent's dance and that they had provided a formal meal. She, supported by the rest of the ladies, gave it as her opinion that we could do no less. There was dismay among the troops who saw our profit margin and hence our trip disappearing. Our intern honorary treasurer, later consultant obstetrician to the Coombe hospital, rose to the occasion and volunteered to speak to management on the issue. He returned angry and said that, on this occasion, the management would be unable to facilitate us as we had given too little notice. They, however, intimated that this could be considered in future years.
Afterwards, I asked Cathal what had transpired with the manager: "Jaysus, I never went near him, I went to the Gents. That crowd of old bats would ruin us!" he said.
Selling tickets was no problem and we squeezed 1,300 to 1,400 people into every nook and cranny. Consultants were cajoled, blackmailed and threatened into taking parties and/or buying tickets for their staff. Hospital suppliers, pubs, restaurants and parents were badgered for spot prizes. An MC was selected and a truly awful group of musicians among our crowd was given a slot for the band interval. Rosters and duties were arranged, dinner jackets, black ties, formal dresses, let the revelry commence. Funny thing, there was always somebody in top hat and tails.
Allocation of spot prizes was undertaken with an efficiency of which Tammany Hall could have been proud. Tradition decreed that some always went to our St Vincent's colleagues and erstwhile classmates or their partners. A drought among the blood brethren would have been intolerable. I don't remember much about the music and dancing, my skills in the latter being akin to those of the famed Clarence McFadden. I do remember an innocent, fun-filled evening with dear friends of long ago. By the way, we made money and our travels were secure.
• Maurice Neligan is a cardiac surgeon.