WHEN FLOWERS FALL.

LET ME SAY THIS FIRST..EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENS IN LIFE IS PREDETERMINED WE ARE BUT ACTORS UPON THE SCENE AS SHAKESPEARE SAID...

PART ONE AND LATER.(This is a very rough draft).

BOTH ONLY 17 WHEN MARRIED WITH A CHILD AND Living with a spouse with genetic bi-polar psychosis ,schizoid condition, and family stories.



                                           
                                                                                                                                 


                                                                                                 
A Novel.
by;

FELIX BRENNAN .



A strange journey, many stories out of time and some different people 's experiences included. 



PREFACE.
OF COURSE THERE IS KARMA BUT THIS IS ABOUT THE RESULTS OF KARMA...
LIFE IS ABOUT CRYING AND MOVING FORWARD CRYING...UNTIL ONE REALISES...




                  

                                             
Credits- Recognitions/Dedications, Quotes and References.




It is a skeleton draft which eventually will upgraded to a book, and published on Lulu and Amazon.com, where I have previous works, paperback and ebooks. So it will change constantly deleting, adding in and so on.It will also be turned into a movie script for human interest story. Or perhaps a British type TV soap ...
THIS IS THE TRUTH AS I KNOW IT AND MY REPUTATION IS TO BE BLUNT AND TRUTHFUL AS I SEE NO POINT IN LIES.The children were too young to appreciate or fully comprehend all the events and may have even thought things were ok as they had no point of reference to what was normal. There are not versions of truth...
The story of a somewhat miserable hero or anti-hero, which meant I failed and had no idea of what was going on most of the time.


Dedicated to Truth and grandchildren we love dearly. 


Chronology;

1959---Married.( This was one of those 'have to get married' events as we had broken up some time earlier,a month or so, and I was surprised when she arrived at my door or my mothers door....)

1960-1962..London.

1962-1970++--Australia. ( 1962-1984)...THEN 1986 .....BRISBANE.

1968-...Separated .ROSETTA refused to move after I had moved, ahead, to Montreal and instigated separation, saying I could stay there).(Apparently she already had a boyfriend Ross an Italo-Australian farmer from Bonnyrigg area.My friend Mike who came to Houston told me about it. Ross apparently was around right up to the time she died.)

 Marriage retry only last less than one year, for the kids sake--always bad..but staggers on and off for a few months more, into 1971....(Also occurring this year the Death of Celia, possibly avoidable).




1971....Separate again finally and move into own apartment in 1.Bondi, Edward Street, with THEMISTOCLES Skiathitis/Uncle Greg. Really a non legalised divorce.

 Then 2.Cammeray with Pascal Phelan.

 Then 3.Oxford Koala Apt...( used to visit the kids on Sundays, and the girls visited me at the Koala, used the pool etc).


1973....August ,Re-Marry..

1975..Toronto.Trip..Gold Coast.

1977, onwards...Vancouver..Sydney and Brisbane...Vancouver.1984....Australia...

   





Chapters:

1. Home. Early Days.

2. Altar Boy and School Clergy Abuse.

3.Teen Years. Rosetta and I have to get married;Abandoned.

4.Rosetta and I move to London, Mary Jones' murder.

5.Voyage to Australia SS Orion.

6.Sydney and Early Days,Chlorpromazine, Largactil (PLUS OTHER SRUGS), and Rosetta's FRIENDS; Gelignite explosion.

7.Early Days Canada and USA, arrested for a handgun.Nearly get killed in Fla. 8.UK. Missing property and suspect wills.

9.Return , Sydney.

10.Brisbane move and Canada.

11.Appendix.Family Problems.

12.Appendix Two.Fiji and later Ireland, India.

13.Appendix Three. Buckley's Pub.

14. Appendix Four. Strike.

15. Appendix Five Aphorisms Karma Free Will.





                                                 


COPYRIGHT... 2011.. , . rights reserved. Except under the Copyright Act of participating countries,no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in any database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any quotations must be referenced and accredited any URL given.

All Characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental; And this has been done to protect the innocent.


Most don't like the truth but if it it isn't told then destructive events can go down the generations, in fact two deaths can be attributed to the symptoms, plus family damage. I think I was bewildered at one level and insecure and confused at another.It is difficult living with somebody who had mental illness, especially as her family had not not informed me, other than to say...'She is not well you know and you will find out' and that was the full information given to a seventeen year old. No doubt I won't win any popularity polls for revealing it; Especially amongst those that are embarrassed or have limited understanding, or awareness; However I had to live it!! Some may say I am denigrating memories but there is nothing more ultimately denigrating than death. Also people who are dead or don't know,don't care anyway. If this diary can prevent family damage and deaths for others then it has done its work. The main characters that could take it all personally are either dead or suffering from dementia...and this is why I waited so long, a lifetime already. Anybody else would just be worried about their personal egos...I make  absolutely no apologies about writing this at all, and there are no versions of truth.This is not about post-partem depression but proven and obvious genetic inheritence. 


The results were the oldest children had only a child's understanding of the actual situation..and became resentful later as their lives were more organised....I had a psychiatrist explain this in detail in Vancouver when she was treating the child with the mental illness...

What she said was ' Yes they were taken out of shit but it was their shit and they were in charge of it and resented losing that power"....



Quotes:

'Alcoholism and substance abuse is a search for spirituality at a very low level'-----Carl Jung.

Mental illness is usually karmic and genetics.

"We don't want to be free from fear. All that we want to do is to play games with it and talk about freeing ourselves from fear." U.G. Krishnamurthi.

If you tell the truth you don't have to remember anything....Mark Twain.

People who hide nothing, are people who have nothing to hide............Dr Phil.

Even if you are a minority of one..the Truth is still the Truth........Gandhiji...


Whole families could be affected on one way or another....


'AUTISM-SCHIZOPHRENIA-BI-POLAR CONDITION'--- ALL COME FROM THE SAME GENETIC PART OF BRAIN, AND NO DOUBT OTHER ASSOCIATED CONDITIONS..(..AND WE HAVE SCHIZOPHRENIA, AND AUTISM IN THE FAMILY PLUS OTHER CONDITIONS NO DOUBT RELATED BACK TO THE SAME GENE THAT, ROSETTA HAD.)...


https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/autism-shares-brain-signature-with-schizophrenia-and-bipolar-disorder/


http://www.understand-schizophrenia.com/borderline-schizophrenia.html

http://www.medhelp.org/posts/Bipolar-Disorder/BP--Sexual-Promiscuity/show/706657

http://www.webmd.com/bipolar-disorder/guide/bipolar-disorder-symptoms-types

http://www.webmd.com/bipolar-disorder/guide/bipolar-disorder-symptoms-types

http://www.depression-guide.com/anxiety-neuroses.htm
Aattachment Disorder.















 Chapter One. "The Queen's  Hotel".




My first home was in an Ulverston hotel, where I lived; 1942,with my Mother, Marie, my Aunt Esha and my Grandparents. The family was of Devout, Irish Catholic, Persuasion and some Superstition; My mother’s side from Drumintee, South Armagh. (Many of my cousins lived in Co Louth, and my sister ended up moving back there.Also did my mother and she is buried there.)

 My grandfather, Daniel, was  Campbell and half Donegal Irish, and came from Kilmarnock. He was a tall wavy-haired man with a serious but friendly face. At one time he had lived in Clydebank and had played for that football team. He also played for Motherwell and Celtic. My grandmother or Nanny, Mary, was shorter, redder faced and plumper. She used expressions like, not caring a Tinker’s Damn, and Americanisms, like ass instead of arse, as her father was an Irish-American.  She was much given to going on about the Black and Tans, B-Specials, Wolfe Tone, Terence McSweeney, Kevin Barry, ‘Just a lad of eighteen summers etc’, lovely Michael Collins, De Valera, Roger Casement, people being burned out and Orangemen. I knew about Black and Brown people but for the life of me I couldn’t imagine what these Orange people must look like.  She used to also complain about the Hanrattys, who took the McNally’s money, after they died, which seemed to be generational tradition. Which was doubly bad for they were Catholics, and this kind of behaviour shouldn’t be expected from people who could qualify for heaven. It was my Nannie’s opinion only Catholics could go to heaven, for they were of the one true religion. All the rest were doomed to other realms.

 


 The McNally brothers having sacrificed in Montana, facing, snow, ice and disease, to raise horses for the U.S. Cavalry, and now it was terrible that the rightful, heirs were dispossessed.They had also worked in the ANACONDA MINE near Butte and raised horses near Sheridan. It cost Mick his life with lung disease at age 47. They even had the family stopped on the docks at Liverpool, for the twin boys, Peter and Patrick had cystic Fibrosis, didn’t they? Peter was never used in the family again as in some Irish traditions it was not regarded as lucky to name somebody after a person who died early, or in bad circumstances....I suppose they thought that the bad luck would be passed on to the new child.Not being superstitious I never bought into this idea, but a name could bring up bad memories that is all. Brigid came back  and opened ‘Ascham Tavern’ and it is still there. Michael continued to work in the USA and travel backwards and forwards....and was a US Citizen.He used to sit at the back of the bar room in disguise and watch his wife working before revealing himself as returned again. In fact the last trip the record is in 1899 on  fast blue ribbon liner, The Luciana, and apparently was never heard of again. There is no record of his burial in UK or Ireland and there are records of his job at Anaconda and the boarding house he stayed in..There is a record of him returning on one occasion to Ireland in 1891, on one of his returns but after 1899 there are no records of a return.

 


 

The grandfather prayed three times a day, with The Rosary in the evening, and the Angelus prayer at noon.  Which was a veritable boring pain and hard on the knees, and to  me seemed somewhat ridiculous and may be one decade would have been more than enough. My father, who came from Dublin, he lived in Ashton in Maccesfield, Lancashire, but was registered in UK and Dublin by my grandmother,

had volunteered, before he was called up, and was away in The Indian Army and my uncle Mick volunteered, also, for The Irish Guards. He was in the first wave on to the beaches of Normandy on D-Day. Even though my family, were very Irish-British, they thought Hitler must be defeated. Or perhaps they thought it was all going to be a great adventure of some kind.

 

     One of my earliest memories is the sound of air-raid sirens and the drone of warplanes. In fact one particular day, I remember my grandfather picked me up and led the family down the narrow staircase to the beer-cellar. We, that is; myself, my grandmother/Nanny, my mother, my aunt and, one other person. We waited down there by the beer barrels, with only candlelight for illumination.

     The Hotel was quite old, three storeys high, about two or three hundred years or so old, and was built of solid stone. We were quite safe, unless there was a direct hit. The cellar had a low ceiling with large wooden beams, which gave it a somewhat gloomy and foreboding appearance. The floor was of large flagstones, now unlevel, and there was a sunken window with a grill at street level. This allowed the sounds of the street to echo through the cellar. The drone of the planes was therefore magnified and vibrated through us. Everyone was very quite, just waiting to hear the all-clear sound. I could feel the anxiety in the cellar but it soon changed to relief when the sirens wailed and we returned upstairs. However, not before there was heated discussion between my mother, aunt and my grandfather, about the nature of the siren. My mother was saying that was the ‘all-clear’, and Grandad was saying, ‘no there’s another yet to come.’ I didn't know whether this had been an air raid or not but there had been many in nearby Barrow-in-Furness, where there was a Vickers Armstrong shipyard, building warships and submarines. So this event had been repeated many times, during the war. In fact for many years, the sound of an overflying plane would scare me.

     Anyway we survived the war intact except Uncle Mick and Esha’s Fiancée, Basil were casualties; Mick was wounded at Cleves, and Basil was killed in Burma. (He received a Victoria Cross for his sacrifice, Britain's highest award for bravery.) My father escaped all injury except for a roughing up in the Indian North West Frontier area, by Pathan/Pushtun tribesmen.

     I suppose, because we lived in dangerous times it enhanced the Spirituality in the home, perhaps. I could barely remember my father of course, for he was in India. However I do somewhat remember Basil, who was my Aunt Esha's Fiance. He was a friendly loving person who spent time with me. I was lucky in one way, for I had two mothers almost, Esha and my mother Marie. So I had a lot of love, and affection, if only, in my early years. I also developed an extremely good memory, going back to a babe in arms. I can even remember the military parades as soldiers left for war, although I was very small. In fact I was startled, by the large guns of the tanks, appearing around the corner, as they led the parade. This must have been the Americans leaving, for many frequented my Grandmother's Hotel. As already mentioned ,her father was an American Pioneer Rancher, in Montana, and had a horse ranch with his brothers.  They provided horses to the U.S. Cavalry, so she had much in common with the G.I.s. One even gave my sister Henrietta, a half of a dollar bill, the other half to be retrieved when she was ‘twenty one’, in America. I heard later that most were killed in the War but they were never forgotten at the Queen's Hotel. (They were killed in the Normandy Landings. One was a Native Indian called Chief, I later found out that all Indians were called Chief.)

     Eventually the war ended, my father was home from India and there was talk of moving, much to my acute displeasure. Note *3. His Dublin, family were part of the Irish Contingent on Merseyside, which made up half the population, according to some. I really did not want to leave my happy home for the bonding during the war was pretty intense. My grandfather was particularly close to me, and as I visited later he told me many stories and many prophecies. Especially stories about Cuchulain, Colmcille and St.Malachy, both Irish saints and seers. He also had tales of seeing the Buffalo Bill Cody Wild West Show, when he was a child and other fantastic things.

My grandfather also had knowledge of herbs and as it seems some precognitive ability. For when I was young he said that I would sail the seven seas and I have traveled a lot and lived in different countries.  He also had a fart, like an ‘officer’s horse’, which was always impressive to little boys.  When my Nanny would tell him to peel the potatoes or tell him off in some way, he would grimace, with his tongue and face pull to the sound of raspberries. On other occasion he would do the same but let out a long, resonating, colonic fart, of immense proportions. Just like the fart on an officer’s horse.  This was a great source of amusement to both my grandfather and myself.

My father it seemed had come back talking differently than when he went away. Now he talked almost like the British Officers do in India, and I think he may have thought we were all the underlings, that he was over in India.  He seemed very strict and austere and I can remember one occasion he demonstrated it.  I had unfortunately peed on the kitchen floor.  Which seemed to enrage my father, although I don’t know why. Anyway he was standing there, towering to the roof, with his suit and moustache and demanding that I clean it up. ‘Why have you done that, don’t you know where the toilet is?’ He wasn’t very big but to my grandfather he may have been a midget. For he came over and put my father straight, about ‘bullying little Bairns’ that he didn’t even know.  My mother joined in saying that he hadn’t done anything for anybody and that all he brought back from India was a suitcase full of betting slips.  She said that if that’s all the officers do in India then they don’t deserve their pay at all. Also how come he sent stuff back to his mother and not to her, his wife. That her mother had to buy him a suit and a fountain pen, so he could go and get a job.  My impression of my father wasn’t that good at all.  It seemed that he was an interloper, with a funny accent and angry manner.  Although, on occasions, he did take me for rides on his bike with him.  I remember we visited a lady with a big cat, which she used to put in the oven for a while when he was sick.  It must have been on low or perhaps it had been turned off already, I don’t know but it was fascinating anyway.

 

       Behind the hotel there were huge dog kennels, for Jackson's the butcher’s hunting hounds, and I used to visit them. I can remember squeezing under the gate and going in the sheds and playing with them, it's a wonder I wasn't torn to pieces, for they were trained to kill small animals.  They were very large kennels and two stories high. I was injured though and still carry a scar on my head. This was from a dog, named Spot, jumping up and licking me, and I was only about two years old. I fell down and hit my head on a steel grate, which caused the injury, which wasn’t actually the dog’s fault.  It's strange how far one's memory goes back. I can remember being about two years old and playing postman with my mother's love letters. I took a wicker basket and posted them all along the High Street, much to everyone's amusement. I was eventually found in Woolworth’s, by a man who recognised me, as being the grandson, from the hotel down the street.  ‘What are you doing here, where is your Mam’ he said.  I had always made it a point of visiting the butcher next door and the milliners down the street and especially Tognarelli’s ice cream shop, near the square. I knew everybody and it seemed wanted them to know all about my mother’s love letters, which no doubt they did.  They turned up one at a time insisting they hadn’t read a one of them, and there was my mother with a red face and everyone laughing all the time.

 

Ellesmere Port....Up to Five years of age!

.

Eventually we did move, for my father obtained a position as a teacher in Ellesmere Port, Merseyside, on the Mersey River. The day we left was a lot of gnashing of teeth and sobbing at the train station, and this portended my future life. We all stayed at my father's parent's place in Newton-le-Willows, Merseyside, near where he was born in Ashton in Makerfield, It was a bungalow house with a long dark hall..I remember my father telling me that my grandfather was coming, and I ran outside but there was no Grandad just Grandpop.So I came back in and asked where my Grandad was. We later moved to Wilkinson Street, number 21 perhaps.  It was a semi-detached anyway, and I didn’t like it, for it was not the two hundred year old architecture, that I was used to. I never did get used to modern style architecture.

 

I really had to get to know my father, Thomas Joseph, because he had been away in India most of the time. I remember that he was a strict disciplinarian, and believed in corporal punishment, as was the order of the day, and read a lot of books. In fact he turned the garage into his study, and we were to keep out of there. I remember him one time telling my mother, that she was a stupid woman and not to go into his study. I was so mad at him that one day I shit in one of his baskets of books; I was about three and a half years old. I probably resented a prolonged, spanking I had received for getting out of bed at bedtime.  I was out of bed in the linen cupboard looking for one of my tin soldiers. My mother blamed it on my sister who was younger than I, or I would have received yet another ‘thrashing’. After that he put a big belt around my sister and I, in the bed, so we couldn’t get out. My sister cried but I knew I could slide under it.  It was not a happy move, my parents obviously did not get on, and they argued and fought quite a lot, and this was physical also. It seemed in retrospect that my mother suffered from anxiety and some neurosis, hardly unexpected considering the circumstances. She used to have outbursts of verbal and sometimes almost violent behaviour, and I think this was when her anxiety or frustration, overwhelmed her.

 On one occasion it was particularly loud and aggressive. Then my father seized my mother and put her over his knee, there was much russling of underclothes, until he was down to her knickers. At this point she was shouting loudly and my little sister Henrietta was screaming, like the banshees. My mother was screaming also, as my father’s hand came down time and time again with loud smack, smack noises. This was a terrible thing and my mother ended up a crumpled heap on the floor, with my sister and I trying to console her, in our fear.  My father strutted out to his ‘study library’, in the garage.  This marriage was no doubt a disaster and this was because they had a "war marriage". Many were expedient and rushed, as the men were sent away to war. Unfortunately we were to suffer because of it.

    My father actually had been an officer in the Indian Army, even though he was an Dual Irish National.    -----There was a rebellion in Dublin at the time...  She and my father also told me that my grandfather arrived in England with a hand gun and buried it in the back garden in grease paper. Why he had a gun and came to England is anybody's guess-----?)


  ..He had been based at Pune and Peshawar. He talked fondly of India and had many stories of the Northwest Frontier, during the perennial Pathan insurgencies. He spoke fluent Hindustani and seemed to have strong ties to India. He also spoke the Gaelic and other languages.  He had many stories to tell about his experiences, as is a common thing with the Irish. So I grew up being favourably disposed to both India and Ireland, even though I was born in Britain and not ashamed of it, I kind of knew that I was Irish as well. Confused perhaps! We had our two outings here, one to Helsby Hill for a picnic overlooking the station and the second great visit was to Chester Zoo, where we went for a ride on an elephant...and that was it.........-Happiness was gone..

 

I had many visits however with my father's parents, Muddy and Grandpop. Grandpop was a nice, friendly, quiet, type of a man that had worked on the Railways, and liked to sing Mozart Arias. The family came from Dublin, and Muddy was a short fat lady with glasses, and  into reading tea-leaves, psychic stuff, and making jam and brawn. I can still remember her reading my fortune and showing me how to read the signs. People used to come over to her house for ‘Readings’, I can remember them well. The Church Catechism said,’ Thou shalt not trust in charms, omens, dreams, and suchlike fooleries!’  Unless you were Irish of course then again one ignored the Priests.Also my Muddy or Grandmother was from an Irish Jewish family and Grandpop's mother was also Jewish Drucilla Sims.  Perhaps the Priest knew more, but all those, that I met, knew more about the races, alcohol, women, little boys, and other pursuits, than anything ‘otherworldly.’  She also used to visit the Spiritualist Church, and go to psychics. This was not unusual, amongst people from Ireland, even though the Catholic Church banned it. The Irish were always very good at ignoring The Church when it didn't coincide with their beliefs. So my entire early life had some ‘other-worldly’ influence.  She was from a Dublin Jewish family , and Grandpop had a Jewish mother Drucilla Sims, according to my father, her mother's maiden name was Ellis, (Elias?), and father’s name was Kelly probably Gelley, and we did spend a lot of time visiting with Jewish shopkeepers. ; (She also took me to  Synagogues in Wallasey, Falkland Road,where the Rabbi had to take me in, as she couldn't go in the male section. He showed me all kinds of wooden benches and a stage of some kind, with curtains and the like. I remember the seemingly long conversation between her and the bearded man leaning on the gatepost). I remember one, particular fellow went to Israel, he used to have the toy, shop. I liked the little red truck he had in the window and I wondered why he didn’t give it to me for he wouldn’t be needing it in Israel, wherever or whatever that was. I also remember her bringing Matzoh bread around the Passover time. This was the unleavened bread and it was a bit like crackers. We would all have some of this, including the lodger; Mr Purkis, who was a very nice man. He bought me jigsaws, when I was ill with some infectious disease or other. I remember on one occasion I was quarantined at my Muddy’s place, with the chickenpox. He came with a jigsaw and we looked out the window and the moon was actually blue. I don’t know how that happened but due to some atmospheric freak out, it looked blue.

 

Earlier, I spent a lot of time with my grandmother, Muddy, after my accident; I was trampled by a carthorse whilst out playing. There was a field behind our house and it took an L shape up and around the street. I used to remove a loose plank from our back fence and go and watch the horses running in the fields. Especially the big cart horse, Dobbin, who lumbered down the field so dramatically.  One day however I went up to the other arm of the L to play. The game we were playing involved walking under a horse's belly whilst it was feeding. I was dared to, by bigger boys, that were playing there. ‘Go on Ant, ( my name Anthony was shortened to Ant), walk under the horse he’s a bridge.’and I walked under the big carthorse. Dobbin he was loved by all the kids and he was harmless enough but very big.  We managed to get under a few times, and even I ran under as well. There they were cajoling me on, telling me to run under the bridge. I looked at the big lump of a thing snorting and farting and shitting amazingly, in huge dollops.  Unfortunately my hair was curly and it tickled its stomach, the next time I went under.  The horse brought its hoof up to scratch itself and I was then trampled. I was very lucky not to have been killed, my Guardian Angel must have been watching. Luckily for me some older boys were playing football nearby and were able to intervene and then carry me home on their shoulders. (Michael Hill was the main boys name and I later met up with him at the St Anselm’s Brother's school.) It was actually three days, before it was realised my leg was broken.  I had difficulty walking and I noticed it was hard to get my shoes on and off.  Mrs Hill, the nurse from over the road came and had a look and said that I should go to the doctor or the hospital, for there was something wrong.

     This caused me to spend a considerable time in Birkenhead Children's Hospital, where I underwent some painful experiences and also learnt how to swear like a trooper. In fact one of the first things I did, when I came out, was to tell my father to stick a matchbox in his bloody eye. The ward was full of lots of little boys from all around Merseyside, and rough as old boots many of them were too. Often I would go for a ride on a big dog on wheels, but the other little lads wanted it also. They were much rougher than I was but I soon caught up with them and could fight them one legged for the dog.  Because my leg had been fractured in three places there was some worry that I would have one leg shorter than the other. Luckily for me a refugee from Hitler's Germany was my doctor; a Dr.Kraut, or Krause, probably not his real name. He had developed a method of stretching legs that were broken. This involved wearing special boots with holes in the heels and heavy leg-irons, or calipers, the total length of my leg heal to thigh. It also required me to come into the hospital on a regular basis for treatment, which involved painfully stretching my leg. On these occasions my Muddy would accompany me, which was a support and a consolation, and she got along with the doctor very well both having a Jewish background. She must have taken a bus and a train to come and get me, and then repeat to get home herself. She was a great support during this painful and trying time, and there was  much love..

     For a year or so I wore the leg-irons, and developed my own swinging gait, for the calipers were from ankle to hip.  I could also ride my little tricycle with one leg pumping and the other stuck out on the mudguard.  They got me a lot of sympathy but I would have traded that for not having to for the stretching at the hospital. It was actually like being racked, so my leg would grow.

     I remember distinctly the time when they would be removed. I decided that I would take them to the church and give them back to God. My parents were bemused, by this, but I insisted. I felt also that some other little boy with broken legs could use them. Of course the irons went back to the hospital but I took the boots and laid them on the altar at the local "Our Lady Star of the Sea" Catholic Church.

 

One of my great joys in this house was my dog "Smokey."He was a frisky little pup and he gave me a lot of joy in an unhappy situation. Unfortunately my mother couldn't train him so he had to go. I was most upset about this and I met him with his new owner once, while walking with my father. It was strange for I couldn't believe it was he, for I had been told that he had died. I started school at four years of age and I walked there with David the Doctor's son from the same street. I soon gave up this and then I walked alone, buying herbal licorice from a chemist shop on my way. I also bought another herb, which was like a tamarind but yellow on the inside, how I knew about these I don't know.  However they probably saved my digestive tract, for my mother couldn’t cook to save her life and everything was fried in lard. The school wasn’t far away, and there was a big bomb-site behind, which backed on to the playground. This was where many a game of Cowboys and Indians took place. The first time I went there was to look for the Indians, but all I could see was a lot of ‘scruffy’ boys playing in the rubble. I asked one boy, ‘Where are the Indians?’, and he answered, ‘We are the Indians.’  Well they didn’t look like Indians to me.

 

  When I used to meet David, I had to go to his classroom, for he finished a half an hour after me. I was only four after all, and in the infant’s class. My teacher used to give me my slate and chalk, so I could do my arithmetic. I found this embarrassing, for everyone would think that I was a dunce.  So I usually hid the slate under my Macintosh, and just listened to David’s lesson, which was more advanced and interesting than mine were.

 

One day on my way home there was a Gypsy encampment by the crossing, which was manned by a policeman, (now a shopping mall).  I walked up to him and pointed them out and asked what he was going to do about them. I like many kids had been told that they were thieves and even stole little children. The policeman said "so what?" He, of course refused to do something about them. This was another lesson, for if Gypsies were bad, why wouldn't the policeman do something about them?  I had listened to too many stories, about them stealing children and being thieves and the like.

 

.."Childhood years. All Religions are true!"........

       I enjoyed my summers, in the Lake District, in more freedom now and I really got around Ulverston.  It was here that I had my first lesson in religious tolerance. Behind the Queens hotel was a large old market square and off this there were many little lanes and streets .In one of these little lanes, or more like a mews, lived a lady, who worked for my grandmother, a one Mrs.Hart. I had been in the habit of visiting all the people I knew, unbeknown to my family, so one particular day it was Mrs Judith Hart's turn. So I walked up through the old square, past the old gaol, (jail) building, and down to the mews, that Judith lived in. I can remember sitting in her back kitchen, drinking tea and looking at the poultry in the back, field. The bank came almost up to her back window. The subject of religion came up, as it did always with me. I asked her if she was a Catholic, she told me that she wasn't.  I then told her that Catholicism was the true religion, which elicited a surprising response from Judith. She told me that all religions were true and that it all depended on what a person believed. This was an embarrassing, surprise to me but it did make sense and I suppose began the questioning that would go on in my life.  Up until this time, I had believed all the superstition of my Nanny’s about non-Catholics not going to heaven. I don’t know where they went to, Hell I suppose, for they must have sinned. I knew if babies died, without baptism that they went to Limbo.  Limbo was an in between Heaven and Hell but was more related to Hell. However it was a place of no suffering but it wasn’t Heaven.  Then there was Purgatory, where we all went before going to Heaven. Unless one was a Saint! However how did one know if one was a Saint, if three miracles had to be done, after you died?

     I was still very young at this stage and this lesson in the universality of religion would have a lasting effect in my belief systems. I really enjoyed Ulverston, It was essentially a Georgian town and most of the central buildings are on the National Trust List. I enjoyed walking the little cobblestone streets and squares and reading about, who came from there. There were little signs to indicate this later on. For example Bill Haley of Rock' n' Roll fame, Stan Laurel of Laurel and Hardy and Lord Birkett of the Nuremburg Trials, amongst many. Also one of my relatives was Uncle Jimmy Brennan, who was in the show and movie business and owned all the Roxy Theaters, which was handy as we got in free...I remember him giving us a ride to  church in his Rolls Royce. My mother thought that he couldn't drive as he had a driver!!!

      Thanks to Dr.Kraut, (Krause?) my legs were in excellent shape and I will always be indebted to him. I found out later that he was Jewish, and that was why he had fled Germany and changed his name. So if it wasn’t for Adolph, I would have one leg shorter than the other. My Muddy always brought me to my hospital visits and she and the doctor talked a lot.

 

During this trying period, one of my great diversions was my great-uncle Tom Kelly, he was my grandmother's brother.( My great grandfather lived in Chicago for 12 years and became a US Citizen in the 1890s). He lived with my grandmother, for he was a retired sea captain. I loved his stories and they no doubt influenced my inborn urge to travel. He was a portly fellow with a Dublin accent and he had run away to sea at fifteen years of age. He actually sailed on one of the last sailing ships. He had fingers missing, that had been pulled off by ropes, in accidents, plus he had a large indented scar in his skull; where a bolt had lodged itself during a storm. It seemed that it had become infected and had to be scraped clean everyday. Uncle Tom went black down to his neck. He was a tough old bird and jumped ship in New Orleans and worked as a cowboy up in the western areas. He was in the 1905 San Francisco earthquake and told many stories about the town burning down.

      He was the first to take a steamship up The Amazon River and even saw "White Indians" in the forests. Another one of his exploits gained him an award for bravery. He shot down a German plane by lying on his back, on the bridge, and firing a sub-machine gun at it. This happened off Antwerp, while evacuating diamonds. So all in all, Tom was a character and is mentioned in The Maritime Museum at Albert Dock, in Liverpool. He was a great help in lifting my spirits at a crucial time in my life, and strongly influenced my investigative urge.  He used to offer us half a crown now and again, but my mother said that I should refuse, as it was good manners. Well I did and he put the two shillings and sixpence back in his pocket. After that anytime he offered me half a crown, I just said,’ thank you and put it in my pocket.’

 

   Moreton....Merseyside.....Wirral......................

 

      When I was five years old, we eventually moved from Ellesmere Port to a place nearer Liverpool, and the beach, where I was to grow up. This was because it was nearer to my father’s mother, or so my mother said,(It wasn't long before they were banned from seeing us anyway; A cruel and vindictive thing to do to small children).The house wasn’t as good as the last one, and it was ‘cheap private’, and only one street removed from the council houses.  In fact the whole town had been an outer suburb, before it was decided to move thousands of people, from sub-standard housing, to the new Council Estates. It was now a majority Council Estate and quite rough in parts.

 The new house was essentially a two and half up and a two and a half down, semi-detached.  It was almost exactly the same as the Council Houses, the gardens backed on to, and could have been built by the same builder.  However we had a bath and toilet upstairs and outside in the yard we had another toilet even. The toilet was used as a store room and also was the laundry and no washing or boiling was done in there. So my mother had only the kitchen sink and bath in the house to do her washing. However as we hardly ever had hot water, as we had no geyser and had to heat the tank from the fire; Our washing was mostly not done,very often,and was a pile on the bedroom floor. We had a vegetable garden in the back yard, which was immediately dug up. I think it would have been better to keep it, or half of it anyway. That way we could have eaten more and more healthily. Although, we weren’t starving, at all. One of my father’s old college mates, Father Haa Evans, was a priest at the local church, so we had instant visitations.  He seemed to be a nice friendly kind of a person, and even played soccer.

 

My parent's marriage problems worsened here, due to Father Haa Evans aggravating the situation, and even became physical again, at times.  On one occasion I happened to come in the back door, and my Mum was up against the wall and my Dad was shouting at her. They both told me to go away, and I found out later that he had broken two of my mother’s ribs, as he punched her.  Money was a problem for they were trying to raise three children and pay the mortgage on a schoolteacher’s wage.  We would have been better going into a council house and paying less rent, like Uncle Larry did. This way we wouldn’t have been so ‘posh’, but we would have eaten, dressed better, and had more hot water and heating.  My sisters were wearing strange collections of pants as knickers, the younger one Marie Therese was wearing my old swim suit at one time. Therese was my father's favourite and he always remembered that, but he didn't have the same affection for me or Maureen Henrietta. Maureen  used to stutter and was very quiet and complain a lot...My mum used to run a tick at the local store, for food. I don’t think that she knew much about cooking for we ate mainly tea and toast for breakfast, potatoes and beans for the evening meal with occasional eggs and meat. We didn’t starve but we could have eaten better and healthier.  My bed was rather strange also. It had a great dip in the middle, where the wire-mesh, had corroded through. Perhaps from somebody’s prior acts of pissing the bed. Anyway when I lay in the bed my bum used to lie in this depression. It was even worse when my little brother Paul joined me in the bed, and he did add to my discomfort by pissing all over me regularly. We used to have ‘Golly’, fights, where we would spit on each other, this way I could return the pissing. There was always a doubt about Paul, and my father and mother had a few fights that I could overhear. My father saying that Paul wasn't his child but Father Evan's. It it would take years to find out for real:Until they could see that he looked like Thomas Joseph.  Paul was special and was treated very well and there was no shortage of funds coming from Father Evans; So he must have also thought that Paul was his as well.So there was a general doubt. So Paul had a good run at the expense of Father Haa...They didn't fully realise that he was Tom's son until they saw him as a teenager. This was apparently the same for everyone else in the family. Later on even Paul himself was considering sueing the Church for the embarrassment he got at school when the other kids heckled him about Mum and Father Evans, as they also did me....

My grandmother reported Father Haa Evans to Bishop Murphy didn't she and this got him a promotion to his own Parish in the Wirral. It seems if you did anything untoward or sexual in the Catholic Church, they transferred and promoted you.

In the winter it was quite cold, for there was no heating.  In the morning, there would be ice, on the inside of the windows, from our breath. Also our heating was only from the coal fire downstairs in the back parlour. As this wasn’t lit all the time or we had no money for coal, bathing was a rare event. For the fire had to be specially lit in order to heat the cistern, behind the fire. Consequently I was rather a dirty boy. The fact that it was freezing cold in the house, when one got out of bed, didn’t help either.  Cleanliness was nowhere near godliness or vice a versa. Splashing cold water on my face and neck was fine, thank you very much.   My heels had ingrained dirt and my socks were also filthy. When they had too many holes in, I used to pull them down and bend the ends over under my toes.  They were never hardly ever washed, due again to the lack of hot water. My underpants used to get so grey and streaky that I gave up wearing them. I’m sure that if you threw them and my socks at the wall, they would definitely stick to it. My shirts were clean though and when my socks and underpants got too bad I threw them away, so keeping the possibility of being a 'smelly boy' to a minimum. I thought only Sissies, wore underpants anyway, the tough boys didn’t wear any. I can remember one winter, when we ran out of coal, and it was particularly cold. I told my mother we should buy some wood, from the timber yard. So she gave me enough money for wood, and off I went. Unfortunately the sack was way too heavy for me to lift, so I was dragging it.  A nice man came along and said, ‘What are you doing son, where do you live.’ I answered, ‘That we needed wood and that I lived in the next street.’  He then put it over his shoulder and carried it to my house.  When he got there, he gave my mum, a good bollocking, about letting a little lad do such a heavy task. It wasn’t her fault anyway, for I had insisted we not be cold.  My father was always talking about getting ‘brickettes’, as they were cheaper and lasted longer than coal did. However we never really did see these promised brickettes, that were going to save us all, from freezing, and give us endless hot water.Also during this time my mother banned the Grandparents so I couldn't visit my Muddy anymore. They never visited us anyway, probably due to my mother, but now we were banned as well.(I think that this was due to some depressive 'anxiety neurosis' perhaps, my mother probably suffered from, it was probably genetic, as I observed similar behaviour in the family. ( Hence the Halls Fortified Wine).Some years later on I would sneak up there, to my Muddy's on my bike on a Saturday, but this loss was something I would remember for my lifetime...As Muddy had carried me through illness and all the time I went for the painful leg-stretching and leg iron splints.-calipers..I wore for a year or two..


I was enrolled in the local Sacred Heart, Catholic, Primary School. I didn't really enjoy school that much and I learned far more from my own books at home. I used to sit in the playground and repeat Uncle Tom’s stories to the rest of the kids. Teddy Donnelly had a good idea, on one occasion. This was to march! He came up and said ‘Ant lets march and get all the kids doing it.” This sounded like a great idea, so off I went collecting kids, boys and girls.  We line up two abreast and started off, stamping our feet in unison.  At the same time, we were singing,

 

‘In 1944 Hitler was at war, our soldiers won, our soldiers won, they stuck their bayonets up the Gerry’s our soldiers won.’

 

Within a few minutes the whole schoolyard was marching along, singing and stamping their feet, and myself and Teddy Donnelly leading the parade.  The teachers stepped in and stopped us for they felt it wasn’t a healthy thing, that we were doing. 

 

On another occasion Teddy came running over to me saying that the dinner lady wanted to see me. I didn’t know what it was for but when I got over to her, I was in for a rollickin bollocking. She said that her daughter was upset with us. It seems that my friends and I had thrown mud and clay at her, when she rode her bicycle down our end of the street. This was par for the course for kids who weren’t in ‘Our Gang’.  Anyway I duly took note, how was I to know the kid’s mother was the dinner lady? I walked away thinking and she not a Catholic either.

(During this time in 1953 I had this overpowering feeling that I was going to marry a Spanish looking lady, and I talked about it to the other kids while out in playtime, and I was somewhat aware of it all the time. Later  my wife's birthday was in June, and she is Spanish looking. So I was karmically aware of when she entered this plane of existence).

 

I did enjoy learning the songs though and, we learned all the normal songs, like Bobby Shafto, Yankee Doodle, Barbara Allen, and a Welsh one, with the line,‘All through the night’, I liked that one. We also were taught the Christmas Carols as well. However, we boys had our own favourite, and it went like this.

‘It was Christmas day in the workhouse, the greatest day of the year,

When every heart is full of joy, and a belly full of beer,

And up spoke the master pauper, his face as bold as brass,

We don’t want your Christmas pudding so stick it up your arse.’

 

This suited us more than ‘Silent Night’, ‘Away in a manger’, ‘ Christmas is coming, and the goose is getting fat.’

 

Miss Connolly taught us these and she was in fact, my first teacher, and she was a terror. She had a big ruler and any nonsense and you were rapped over the knuckles. If you were a girl it was on the legs. She used to ask one of us to go out in the hall and look at the clock, for the time. I couldn’t tell the time properly yet, so I used to say, ‘the big hand is on so and so and the little hand is on so and so.’ She was annoyed by this and asked, ‘How is it you can’t tell the time, you are five years old and your father is a schoolteacher.’ I had no answer, but I made the mistake of telling my parents about it.  My father sat me down, on a little puffet, or foot rest, with a clock in his hand. He then moved the hands and I had to tell him the time. Everytime I was wrong, he would rap me on the back of the head with his knuckled fist. This went on for some time, until I was upset and had a sore head. However I now could tell the time. He said that it was an embarrassment that Miss Connolly knew I couldn’t tell the time, and he being a schoolteacher. I learned to sing all the hymns, like ‘Hail Glorious Saint Patrick, Dear Saint of our Isle’, although we lived in England.  I must admit there were many first, and second generation Irish in the school, though.  Others hymns. like ‘Faith of Our Fathers’, were quite stirring but I decided that I wasn’t going to any ‘prison dark’, or being stretched on a rack, like the Blessed Edmund Campion and others. I had Protestant friends and it didn’t seem bad at all being one. You didn’t have to go to church all the time, say prayers, and go to confession and things like that. Or walk around with ash on your forehead so people could stare at you, on Ash Wednesday.  My mother would say, ’to leave it on and it was a sign of faith.’ Lots of things were left to faith, I thought, and to mysteries.  Oh yes there were the mysteries, in fact any question they couldn’t answer was a ‘Holy Mystery’, and should be accepted.  I thought it is a strange religion this Catholicism, for nobody seems to understand it.  I could never understand why Jesus was hung up on the cross, and the crucifix, in the church, used to give me all kind of horrible and weird visions.  They said that he died for us, and I thought. Well, if he could have lived longer, perhaps he could have explained all the mysteries.  Although I was a little sceptical about it all, I was still spiritual and respected the Holy Priests and of course, Bishop Murphy, who had a nice big pointed hat and walking stick.

 

The next big thing was Holy Communion, and we had to be prepared for it. We had lessons about the wafer host being, transformed into the body and blood of Jesus. Although it would still look and taste like a wafer. We had to line up and rehearse getting the host in our mouths and not dropping it on the floor. However we couldn’t get our First Communion unless we had made our First Confession.  So we had to practice that as well, ‘Please Father forgive me, for I have sinned, and this is my first confession.’ Then we had to recite our sins, and as we didn’t know what sins really were, it was difficult. However we were read a menu to pick from; missing morning and evening prayers, disobeying our parents or schoolteachers, telling lies, stealing,

(I wondered whether that included conkers), and forgetting to do things we should have done. Sins of omission, which was a real tough one, for we didn’t know what we were supposed to do in the first place.  Well I had to get a pair of white shorts, to go with the white shirt and red tie.  The greatest thing about the whole thing was the party afterwards and the five shillings Father Haa, gave me. I was also given a prayer book, rosary beads and a holy picture. At the actual ceremony, I was waiting to see what ‘God’, tasted like. So I was appropriately solemn and holy, when receiving the host.  I had seen all those go before me, and how holy the girls were, walking back with the hands together and eyes down, in respect of the great feeling within them.  I was sure that God was going to talk to me, in some way. I waited as my turn came up and closed my eyes, with mouth open, as the priest approached. All of a sudden he was gone, and the host was on my tongue, God was in my mouth, in fact he was stuck to the roof of my mouth. There was no bells, or noises, or voices within; nothing at all!  I thought this must be another mystery, you can’t see him or feel him either. However I believed it all and went back to my seat, looking suitably holy, for my parents and teachers. What I was really looking forward to was the feast or breakfast, for we had no eaten since prior to midnight the night before.  For some of the kids this was probably an everyday condition, but for me, I was hungry. It seemed God didn’t like sharing your stomach with potatoes and beans and such. I wondered about the men, that used to stand at the back in Mass, so they could leave quickly and go to the ‘Big House’, for a drink. I wondered whether God liked all that beer and Guinness on him after Mass. Sometimes they would get drunk and be singing and staggering around, with God inside them. Ah well it is another mystery!

 

Just like he didn’t like people eating meat on Fridays. I thought it had something to do with the Apostle being fishermen, for everyone ate fish instead. But wasn’t that meat too?  Ah well it was another mystery to ponder on.  The party was great and the Bishop was even there, some got to kiss his ring, but not I. Another mystery, kissing his ring? And him up there with his big high hat on, Bishops always wore big high hats, I’m told. Why? I don’t know, it is another holy mystery.  Bernard Bass thought it was because that’s where they kept their money, from the collections. But then Bernard hadn’t been right, since I threw a piece of ashpalt at him, and it stuck right in his face, in the bone of his eyebrow.  The party was grand, and we had cake and jelly and even pop. As these treats were exactly that, everyone was excited, with all these delights. Some kids wanted to throw a little around but if any kid caught they ate it not threw it back. There was rationing of food, until comparatively recently, to this time. So we were excited about all the sugared items. The Priests and teachers were walking around, milling with the parents, all happy with their latest batch of holy kids.  Little Jimmy had saved a piece of ‘God’, in his hanky. How he did that before it melted, I’ll never know, but what use is God in the pocket?  Jimmy said it will take care of him, until he goes again, as when you eat it, it just melts away, and couldn’t be of use to anyone.  There was some logic in that I suppose, but I wasn’t convinced ‘God’ in his pocket was going to help at all.  I didn’t even know whether ‘God’, himself knew that he was a piece of bread, never mind be in little Jimmy’s pocket.

 

Sports day was one of my favourite days, for there was more sweets and pop to drink, after one had run their race.  We would all run to get our prizes, and ribbons and such, and there was much excitement from the parents. I used to enjoy playing ‘Rounders’, which was like baseball and mostly for girls. Baseball probably evolved from this game in fact. On sports day we had boys playing, to make up the numbers.

 

Another outing was going to see Father Payton, he was an American who gave great rallies about the Rosary. I never heard anyone speak for so long and get so excited about the Rosary. He was an American though, and they could talk a lot about religion and things.  The Rosary to me was painful, and long and I didn’t like the contemplations, about Jesus giving his life and things like that. When my grandad did the Rosary it was for hours its seemed all fifteen decades I think. Luckily my mother and father weren’t in to kneeling down and praying all the time. Although my father used to do special devotions, to different Saints, so he could get a promotion in his job.  First it was to St Jude or Thadeus, he even called the house that. It seemed he was a forgotten saint and a patron of lost causes or something like that. I didn’t think the house should be called that though, now all my friends will ask what it meant. He musn’t have worked, for him, for he got changed and the nameplate was ignored. The new one was Blessed Martin de Porres, he was a Black man from South America. My Dad said if we prayed to him, so that he could become a Saint he may get his promotion as well.

 

The first Black man I saw, up close, I was surprised. I had ridden down to the bottom of our street on my tricycle. As I span around the letter box, as was my custom, I say a Black Soldier standing at the bus stop.  I was very surprised and went up to him and asked him this, ‘Hey mister are you the Devil?’  He laughed and laughed and he talked the same way the Americans did. He said that he wasn’t the devil, and then his bus came, so I was off to my home.  I often wondered why I thought the devil may be black, perhaps because the lived on the hobs of hell and they were very black. The divil, as my Nanny would say, of my nightmares was red with horns and came from fire. I often wondered later if no-one had described the devil to me, would I have been scared?

 

During this period I used to go out with my Aunt May to Liverpool, occasionally. To go on the ferry, with my cousin, who was always very friendly to me. We went to see the movie Bambi, and we watched the Kellys on the bombsite, doing their escapologist thing. They would be handcuffed and locked in chains and then put in a sack. From which they would escape very quickly.  They were also a tough criminal gang, and they even hanged some rivals in a warehouse. They eventually caught one of the Kelly Gang for it and he may have even been hanged for it.  I used to enjoy ‘going into town, as going over to Liverpool City was called.  Especially at Christmas time, when I would go to see ‘Father Christmas’, in the grotto, at Lewis’s Department Store. Lewis’s was famous for it had a statue of David, outside with his ‘thingy and balls’ hanging out, ( the Beatles later sang about a statue exceedingly bare).  He must have been a stupid old man though, for I never did receive, that which I desired. There were many things to see in Liverpool and it was very rough. My Uncle Joe and Auntie Annie lived, in Aigburth, and we used to visit them also. I always enjoyed them for they would sit and have a drink, and Joe would play the accordian and sing songs. Mostly Irish songs but some more topical as well.  It was strange in their house for all the chairs and tables had their legs covered and padded.  They had no children but they had a very old dog that had gone blind. So they padded everything so that he wouldn’t hurt himself on sharp corners.  I was very impressed with the devotion they had to that big old dog.  Often we would walk in the park, down by the Mersey, and we could look over to our side of the river.

 

My cousin seemed to like me a lot, and we got on well together. Sometimes I would stay at her house, on the Council Estate in Leasowe. Her father  was a jovial person and he reminded me a lot of Stan Laurel. He had been torpedoed during the war, and imprisoned by the Vichy French, on Martinique Island, in the Caribbean. They treated him pretty badly, it seems and he still had a few problems, from the experience.  My Aunt Sadie was a lovely lady from Dublin and she would give me great food and even a half-a-crown, just for being there. I have fond memories of those visits and examples of what life could really be like. I knew we should have lived in a Council House, then we would have eaten better.  These estates were tough, though and one had to be able to defend oneself. Down the end of my cousin’s street lived the famous ‘Fanny Landrum’, who was the best fighter on the estate and could even beat up a man, like Jack Pugh could do in Moreton. I was glad that he was a Catholic, for some people were not.

 

Buster Saunders was my best friend. He also was the ‘Cock of the school’ and could beat anybody in a fight. I remember one day a new boy started and he said he was now the ‘Cock of the school’.  This resulted in a bloody fight in the schoolyard and Buster beat the kid up, before the teachers came.

 One day in Miss Brennan’s class, I fired a paper plane over to Raymond Gee and he fired it on to Buster. Miss Brennan was most upset and sent us down to the Headmaster’s Office, to see Mr Carolan. He was not impressed and opened the punishment cupboard, where he kept his canes.  He selected a large one and bent and swished it around. Shish, shish it went, as he swished it over his head and down. Buster and I knew that we weren’t going to cry, but poor Raymond G looked like he was ready already. Carolan gave a speech about upsetting the classroom and not behaving ourselves. I just wished he would get on with the whacking and get it over with. We had wet rubbed our hands on our pants to set up friction, so the cane wouldn’t hurt so much, and it was wearing off. We stood there with our little hands out as Mr Carolan brought the cane down, three times, on each hand. Raymond was really crying by this time, but Buster and I never made a sound. We went to the washrooms and put our hands under the cold water tap, but it didn’t help much. As we entered the classroom, Raymond was really bawling, and Buster and I were Stoic.  The girls looked sorry for us, some of the boys seemed happy, and Miss Brennan was also sad, and regretful for her impulse. We vowed to get the lads, who were happy about our whacking, later on.  That evening I walked home with Raymond and Gerald, to the council estate, behind our street. We had decided to spend our bus fare on a packet of sherbert and a halfpenny licorice. Poor Gerald was complaining about wanting to go to the toilet.  ‘I want to do a shite.’ ‘I wanna do a shite.’ Raymond was trying to console his little brother, as he shook his leg and turds fell out on to the pavement.  I thought this was hilarious, but poor Gerry was crying and Ray was trying to console him, as people walked by giving us a wide berth.  ‘Look Mam, that boy has shit on the pavement’, shouted one little boy.

 

 Mr Carolan was one for directing orchestras, except there weren’t any at our school, just kids in assembly. So he used to direct us in the singing of great stirring songs, like ‘Land of Hope and Glory’, and ‘Jerusalem’. They seemed to both apply to England but I could never figure out where it could be, for on the council estates there were a lot of poor. It didn’t seem the mother was looking after them all so well. The same with Jerusalem, I couldn’t see what that had to do with England’s green and pleasant fields either. However Carolan used to get all worked up, with his up down, across, one, two, three, four. Just like blessing yourself almost! Spectacles, testicles, wallet and watch! I really didn’t like this new type of group singing at all, but we were captured, in assembly every morning and had to do it. We had to learn the National Anthem as well, but we sang different words, as we did to all the songs.  Not that we thought about it much, it was just natural irreverence.

 

‘God Bless, our Gracious Queen, hit her in the gob with a Wall’s ice-cream’. Prior to that it was, ‘God Save, our Noble King, hit him in the belly with a kipper on a string.’

 

Mr Carolan would be up there doing his orchestra conducting, with his little stick and we would be heartily singing away. He had a quizzical beam on his face, but he didn’t know that we had our own unrepeatable, words for most of the songs.

Now that was an event, the Coronation. The Coronation and Richard Dimbleby. The King had died and now the new Queen would be crowned. This meant more bloody songs from Mr Carolan, about ‘ In a Golden Coach there’s a heart of Gold’, and suchlike themes. Also all the children in the area were to go to New Brighton Baths to put on a gymnastics display. I failed to comprehend how the Queen would know or care about what we were doing in Merseyside. However we had to train and march and do all kind of little displays. Unfortunately I was not to participate, for I had an accident. I was playing on the waste, land, we called ‘the field’, and I fell on a lump of concrete embedded with glass and iron. Well it opened my knee up the bone, I could see it all white, before all the blood started coming. It was quite a painful gash, and my friend John had to help me home. Uncle Haa,  was there so it was off to the hospital. The same hospital, that I had been in, with my broken leg.  I mentioned something, when the doctor brought the big curved needle out. Father Haa said, ‘Don’t be a big baby, be a man.’ I actually wasn’t being a baby at all; I was just looking at the gash in my knee, the exposed bone of my leg and the big needle. He then asked the doctor to give me something, so he gave me a piece of leather to keep in my mouth. It wasn’t a pleasant experience, but it saved me from the gymnastics display at New Brighton Baths.  I still got my little book and my mug, with the Queen’s picture on. Somebody said that Richard Dimbleby had paid for all these, for the schoolchildren. I was quite happy about these souvenirs and I like books a lot. In fact I must have had about one hundred, including a nine volume ‘Arthur Mee’s  Encyclopedia’. It should have been ten volumes, but it was old and had a volume missing. I didn’t mind though and I read those volumes, along with ‘Pears Cyclopedia’, just like one reads a novel.  I wanted to travel the world and go to America, like my ancestors had done.  Where everyone has lots of food, and clothes and even have washing machines and things like that. My mother was always talking about such things, but I couldn’t imagine them and besides we had no coal to heat the water with, or food to put in a big fridge anyway. To me America was a place of Cowboys and Indians, and I knew all the tribal names just about.  I knew my relatives had been pioneers in the Montana Territory and even had a horse ranch. They were real cowboys for sure. My Nanny said we all should have been born there, in Montana. In the meantime I could read about it in my encyclopedias.  Occasionally I would see an American magazine, with pictures of people all dressed up and getting into big shiny cars.  Also there were the ads in the back of my ‘Yankee Comics’.  So it all seemed like a wonderland of goods and technology to me.

 

In school, we used to sit with girls and boys together. Katherine Heaney used to sit next to me and she liked me, I think. However at this time, I had already decided that I liked Patricia Duncan, she was so beautiful, with her dark hair and flashing eyes.  I used to walk home with her and her sister Kate, and try and hold her hand. I saved my penny halfpenny bus fare this way also.  This allowed me to buy a packet of sherbert and halfpenny licorice stick.  My love for Patricia was unrequited though, and so I dropped the idea altogether. I think at one time, I had even given her a ring, of sorts but her mother told her to give it back to me. Perhaps now, I would now fall in love with Kate Heaney or Pauline Standish, she had long legs. However I was much impressed with Georgina Brouchet, after I won the Easter Raffle. She came from Switzerland and her father made chocolate eggs. Later they moved the seating and I had to sit next to ‘Smelly Kevin’. He used to stink and was always dirty. I didn’t like sitting next to him but I did feel sad for him when his mother died.  Now he was miserable and stinky too, poor boy.  There were a lot of poor and scruffy boys in our school. Sometimes I would bring these raggedy boys home for a visit. My mother was never impressed with me bringing these boys home. She called them scruffy boys from the council estates, which was true. However they probably ate better than I did, unless their father’s drank all the money. Tommy Goss was one such boy, and he would feature later in my life, in a very strange and ominous way.

I remember my mother telling me, on  my tenth birthday ' you are in double figures now'. I can remember that I could not see the importance of that at all....I was already thinking along different lines it seems.

 We got a new teacher, one year, a Miss Swiniton and she was a looker! She seemed very young and unfortunately she didn’t teach our class. We had Mr O’Grady instead and he definitely wasn’t a looker, and was strict.  A couple of the male teachers fancied Miss Swiniton, as did all the boys as well. We had lots of suggestions about Miss Swiniton, I can tell you. Mr Wade, who played badminton with my mum and Uncle Haa, was after her, and the school Glamour Boy was as well. He liked to do P.E. was stern, well dressed and seemed generally up himself. At lunchtime she would stay in her classroom, and one or the other would visit her.  Glamour Boy looked like being the winner, for he got more visits and did better. He didn’t teach our class, which was probably fortunate for him. We used to peep through the keyhole whilst another boy kept ‘nicks’, in case anybody came. We would have Teddy Donelly down one end and Tommy Gossen down the other. Glamour boy used to kiss and hug her in the classroom, whilst we watched from the keyhole. Whoever was peeping would give a running commentary on the state of play, while the boys oohed, aahed or, just said ‘Shite’. ‘Give us a gander wack, she’s great Judy, I wanna look too.’ Eventually Glamour Boy married her and nobody was surprised. Although we wondered, whether Mr Wade felt sad about it. Perhaps he didn’t put in enough work, for he didn’t kiss her. Not while we were looking through the keyhole anyway.

 

One day Buster brought a little game to school, that he had borrowed from his older brother.  It was a box with buttons on and as you pushed the buttons, a lady took her clothes off. Each button one more piece until she was naked. This was quite exciting and I asked could I take it home for a day or two. Buster said yes as long as your mother doesn’t find it. Well I was quite excited about this little stripper game. In fact I asked Paul Walsh would he like to see it. So we went to the toilets and I showed him the naked lady. He was very enthusiastic about it, and asked if he could take it home. However that was not to be for on my arrival home, I was on my way upstairs straight away. This was a dead giveaway for I never did that. So my mother is out seeing me with something in my pocket. She asked to see what it was, I was sprung!  She looked at it, as I protested that it wasn’t mine and it had to go back. Well she threw it on the fire and burned it. She then asked me if I had showed it to any other kid. For it was a mortal sin and that I would be responsible for their sin too. For I had caused an ‘Occasion to sin’, I hadn’t had much of a time to do my own sinning with it either. Walshy had sinned alright and his tongue hanging out proved it. He probably wanted to take it home, so he could take it to his bedroom and sin some more. I denied it all, for Walshy didn’t need my help to sin, for he looked very capable there in the toilet, sinning and sinning, as he pushed the buttons.  Buster was quite upset about his brother’s stripper machine being burned, but was happy my mother hadn’t reported it to the school.

 

 

One great support at this time was my friend John, who was going through a similar home life as my own. His father was on the boats and was away for months at a time. During this time his mother would be alone and eventually, John ended up with an ‘Uncle Alec’, who was a great man for drinking and falling off his bicycle, and beating the kids. My mother’s only friend was, Father Evans-----Haa, from the church, who used to visit and take us for rides in his old Rover. We, later, called him our Ha, for my baby brother couldn’t say Father. The Rover had a green grill and that was because it could go fast or something. It also smelt of leather and had nice big seats. My mother used to go to badminton and tennis with him a lot and people didn’t like it. Saying, being friends with the priest isn’t right, and she shouldn’t be doing it.; Especially walking around town holding hands and the like. He used to visit a lot and then they would go to the pictures together and take me, so it didn’t look too bad. People might get the wrong idea, but himself all dressed in black and a grey scarf on, he was either a Priest or Palladin, and stuckout like bulldog’s balls.  I got to go to the pictures a lot!  The kids at school used to ask me about it but, I had no answers. Also the altar boys used to ask me about them as if the scandal was something to do with me. In fact I remember the head altar boy Steve P**man telling off Conroy for asking about it, ( poor Steve died young of cancer). He said. 'This has absolutely nothing to do with Tony and I don't want to hear you asking him about it again'. I also didn’t mind the occasional coin that I would get either. We had a way of enjoying ourselves, although we did act out a little, and were a menace to the neighbours.

 

Various neighbours were treated in different ways. It depended how much they complained or called the police about our noise and antics. One poor woman was given the full treatment. We packed the lady's letter box with banger fireworks and blew it off. Unfortunately she was in a wheelchair and her sister was mentally ill. Well it seems it was such a shock that she jumped out of the wheel chair! Her sister threw plates through the cabinet windows then went up the street, with egg on her face. This was an unexpected result and we were somewhat worried about it.  Another couple were always complaining about something or other as well. They had just had their side of the house snow-cemed and it was all white and lovely. Well John and I got big buckets of mud and pasted the entire house, until it looked like a Dalmatian dog.  Fortunately it could be washed off!  I don’t know quite why we behaved so, but it did get us a few good hidings. I suppose the worst thing we did to the poor fellow was eat his grapes from the greenhouse. He had been tending them for ages and he had a nice big bunch. Well we ate the lot, only leaving one hanging from the vine lonely and not good looking. Another bollocking for that one! We were somewhat nasty to other children as well, throwing clay at them and such like things. At one point we had a stake in our camp that we used to tie kids to and throw sods at them. So we weren't the gentlest of little children.  One particular kid was named Snowden and he was desperate to join our gang. We thought he was a bit ‘Posh’, and nesh though. He was given the full treatment, tied to the stake and pelted with sods of earth and a few arrows.  He was proud to pass the test, but he told his mother and she wasn’t happy at all. There was a teacher down the street a certain, Mr Tomlinson who also had stuck his oar in. So we bombarded his house with snow balls. Unfortunately one was a bit icy and went right through the front door, hit Mrs Tomlinson, and knocked a tray of tea and biscuits from her hands. He came around to the house and we had to pay for the window.

 

       I had lovely times playing on this field opposite our houses, except when we set them on fire in the summer. This would bring the fire engines and much commotion. We never really wanted the fires to go out of control but they always did. We built dug-out forts and imagined that we were whatever picture we had seen recently. There was an old air-raid shelter on the field as well.  We used to climb on its roof and jump off on to a mound.  We only went inside if we had to piss, for it stunk of shite.  Kids would get lazy, or be too far away from home, so would shit in the shelter and wipe their arses on grass. We also went collecting conkers, ( horse chesnuts), and apple gorging, as all little children do.  The apple gorging and conkering were done in the same place, ‘the Old Miley’. Conkers was a game, where one conker was held up on string and another boy hit it, with his conker, on a string. If one was broken then the other gained another notch, so to speak. I had an old, skinless, yellow, hundreder and more, for quite some time.

 

The Old Miley was a convent home really, surrounded by untended orchards. There were pears and apples and all kind of berries. The conker trees were great as well, conkers coming from the horse chesnut tree. On one occasion we were caught, by the gamekeeper, with his double barrel shotgun. This was quite terrifying and we were down the tree in a shot and off across the fields.  We of course came back, to raid the place again for all the fruit. It would have rotted on the trees anyway, for nobody was picking it. We would stagger home with bags, pockets and jumpers full of fruit.

 

       Around October we would start building our bonfire and we ended up with the biggest in the area. We had to guard it from other children, who wanted to come and rag it. This was to celebrate Guy Fawkes, who was a Catholic plotter, who was going to blow up the Parliament.  The Protestants burned the Guy, in effigy, for his perfidy, I, as a Catholic, celebrated his intelligence. During this period we set up our own venture, so to speak. We would ride for miles, canvassing houses for, clean up weeding, and garden work. We brought along clippers, for the privat hedges and we had spades for the garden. It was tough work but we earned a few shillings. Our other venture was lay-line fishing. This involved going to the beach, when the tide was out and laying lines with hundreds of hooks on.  We did this everyday, following the tides. We would set out in the dark on our bicycles, spades strapped to the cross bar, for bait digging. It was quite a few miles to Hoylake from Moreton, but it was worth the while. For we fed our families and sold the rest door to door down the street. We were quite an enterprising bunch of kids, and all the family would be involved.

 

Around this time my shoes became a problem, or lack of them rather. My father decided that I was wearing them out too quickly and something drastic had to be done. So he got these studs for the bottom of my shoes. They were metal and shamrock shaped, and he covered the whole soles with them. No leather could see the ground, never mind touch the ground.  When I walked I had to lift my feet, like one of those, prancing ponies, they were so heavy. I got used to them though, and sounded like a whole army, marching down the road. The inevitable happened though, and the sole gave way, as all good soles must do eventually. So now I walked around like a crocodile or snapping turtle for feet. I tied a little dark lace around them to stop them flapping, but there was no hiding the condition of my feet. So I was issued with an old pair of my father’s shoes, with toilet paper stuffed in the toes, for they were too big. So I went from armies, to snapping turtles, to finally I am wearing boats! Not boots!

So I still played like a child and enjoyed the diversions immensely. However life was for me still something to be endured, except when I could be diverted by games, or visit Esha, and my Grandparents.

 Summer was always a great time. I stayed in the hotel of course and it was fun. I remember back in the early days of my visits. I used to sneak down to the top of the stairs and listen to the men singing in the bar. Old Charlie used to play the piano, and sometimes during the day, I would take him his sandwiches. They used to sing all kinds of songs, English, Irish, American and usually noisily. Detective Knowles used to come at closing time, and all would leave, except he would stay for his free drinks. There used to be some commercial travelers staying at the hotel, and I used to enjoy talking to them. One of them sold Mansion Polish, and I sometimes accompanied him on his rounds, around town and even into Barrow.  As I spent a lot of time there, I knew lots of people and had many friends. One was Gilroy, the comic book collector. We used to talk about and swap, ‘Yankees’, that is American Comic Books. We would spend hours on this matter of comics, as it was of supreme importance.  My Grandad used to sleep in his rocking chair, in the back kitchen, while we were out in the cobbled yard. He used to snore abominably, with his mouth wide open. This provided an opportunity for some fun.  So I got some little pieces of soap and put them on his tongue.  Gilroy saying, ‘What happens if he wakes up?’  Well he did and swallowed the soap, which wasn’t part of the plan. By this time we had retreated to the back yard and were sitting on a high stone wall, between the butcher’s place and ours. My grandad came out spluttering and vomiting into the drain, for the soap had made him sick.  Whilst this was happening, my Nanny came out in her corsets and slip, shouting that she was going to tan our asses. She said asses, like an American, for her father being Irish-American talked like that. Myself and Gilroy stayed on the wall, out of harm’s way, until it had blown over. My mother gave us a good telling off, and we had to apologise to Grandad, and explain that we didn’t think that he would swallow it. However Gilroy and myself were getting a bad reputation, Kilhouly, Esha called him.

 

One time we were in the back yard and we were arguing over a comic that he wanted to steal. A really good one, and it got vociferous.  My father came out and asked what the noise was about and I explained that Gilroy had my comic. My father, impressing the world as usual, ordered me to give it to Gilroy, over my protestations. After all, a little boy’s comic didn’t matter did it?  Gilroy left immediately and I never saw him again, if I had done I would have smashed his nose.  My father was a shit, and unfair, I thought! My father had never let me have comics for years and years as he thought they were rubbish and I shouldn't read them. Even though I had a hundred of my own books and it would have been nice to be like the other kids. Eventually I broke the spell by swapping good stuff for an old battered annual comic book, and he gave up.

 

 

"The Energy Stone.”     

       The farm, that I spent my summers on,was a hill farm and I spent many a summer and winter there. Esha and Gregg had leased it after their wedding, and it was to be the start of big things. It was a ‘hill-farm’, and carried sheep and a few milk cows, as well as pigs and fouls.  It was a stone affair and was many years old. It was said that the forerunner, was built, by the monks, from Furness Abbey, more than a thousand years before.  I could believe that, for there was no electricity or modern amenities at all.  The water came from a spring and tank, on the side of the fell and ran down a pipe to the farm. I would sometimes go up and clear the tank of bracken and rubbish. Esha cooked on a wood stove, unless they had calor gas. The toilet was a dry one outside, and it had three different sizes of holes on it. I didn’t know whether this was for different size bums or for communal shitting. It used to stink pretty badly, in the summer months, and had to be emptied from the buckets at the back. It was over by the Midin heap, where all the food scraps and stuff like that were kept in a big pile. It was a festering mound, and one time my Nannie put an English Flag on it. She said it was a fine place for a Union Jack to be. This arose because she asked me to draw the national flag, and I of course drew the Union Jack, for we had just done that at school. She made her own Green, White and Gold Tricolour, and I didn’t have the heart to tell her that St Paddy’s flag was on the midin also, as part of the Union Flag.

I enjoyed the company of a dog, called Roy, who was a border collie and a working dog. He seemed to like me as well and we spent many an hour running through the fields and fells. (Hills.)He was sent back to Maurice's farm as Gregg said that I had spoiled  him by treating him as a pet. I used to lie down next to him as i felt sorry for him in his shit floored stone room. The farm was supposed to be haunted, for a man had lined his family up against the barn door and shot them to death. There were holes in the barn door but I don't know whether they were shotgun holes or not. Also there was a strange "upright stone", behind the farmhouse, which I used to go and lean against. This stone used to give off a pleasant vibration and the energy feeling went through me. I knew somehow that it was some kind of sacred stone from ancient days. I never did tell anyone about it for I knew I would be thought mad.

       There were other "Druids Circles" in the area, from thousands of years ago. This stone must be left over from some sacred site. There was also a soldier's grave of some kind up in the fells as well. The locals talked about it but I could never find it, even though I searched for it. They said he was a Scots raider who had died in the fells there.  There was also a tarn or lake up in the summit of one of the fells and I felt that this also was a sacred place.

       When I look back I can imagine a Druid worshipping the Son-God there, saying in Celtic, "Dtan I'n cunis lemnhn gor usgis Goll."  "Light the fire of the Almighty Father, Son-God, Goll."

       I was a solitary boy and often I would go to the top of the high fells and have a "sleep", up there, in the cold and wind. I also used to imagine being in America and these hills were in the bad country, full of Indians. My Aunt Esha and I used to walk miles to the local town, Broughton-in-Furness, for groceries. I was always rewarded by a bottle of Tizer but it used to take all day to walk home, and the Tizer never lasted that long. Greg didn't have a car at the time and taxis were very expensive. So we would labour, with sore feet, the miles we had to walk. It was an all day job, and hardly ever did anybody stop and give us a lift. Perhaps it was because we were Catholics, and there weren’t very many around there, I thought. Also Uncle Gregg was a very late person and i didn't understand why the cows were milked late and the dogs were shut in  a dark room all day except for less than an hour a day outside. Also the byers for calves etc were almost a foot high in shit... Gregg said it kept them warm in the winter????People said he was lazy even his brothers, and i did wonder..Later I realised he had PTSD from the war where he was the last of 7 in his SP unit to survive the war....However in those days they did not understand the condition. He ended up a corporal and did not seem to like officers but his stories were fascinating...Esha had four or five mis-carriages as well, and my mother said it was from helping to carry heave milk churns or kits when she was pregnant. Why they couldn't use a wheelbarrow or a set of wheels i would never know....more ptsd i suppose.

     On one occasion, during the summer, my sisters and cousin John, who I found to very funny, were visiting. So we were playing on the fells, when we found a mortar bomb left over from manoeuvers in the war. We were throwing it down the hill to see if it would explode, and then repeating the exercise when it didn't.  John said it was a 'water bomb', which is close to 'mortar bomb' so where he learned that I don' t know..Eventually we took it home to Uncle Gregg and we were told we could all have been killed. He was quite white in the face about the whole thing. He buried it, until it could be picked up, by the Army.  Sometimes the cows would get ‘Mastitis’, and I would be sent to another farm for streptomycene. One particular night they were really bad, and we had run out of medication. So I had to run over the fields, in the dark, for a few miles. It was quite scary really, every shadow was a ghost or spirit, and what if the ‘Beast of Kirby Moor’, was there?  I had to run and climb over walls, push through bracken, even cross a stream, to reach my destination. Finally arriving at the next farm, and having to explain the problem.  I was then given tubes of medicine to take back to my Uncle Gregg.  Major Ball from another farm was there, when I returned, and he was going on about ‘Streptococci’, being the cause of the infection. He had a very posh accent, and in his last home, the local kids used to throw stones at him.  He wasn’t popular in the district at all.  However I quite liked him and often used to go for a chat with him. He was very educated and used to teach me French words at the table. He was much into modern techniques of farming, which made him instantly unpopular with all the local hill farmers.  I don’t know why they hated him so much, perhaps it was because of the way he talked and his ideas.

 

On another farm there was a girl, that I liked, Patricia Hill, was here name. I thought she was the bees knees, and I visited her as much as possible. She spoke with the local accent, which was really a dialect. For little she would say, lyle, for big she would say, grt, for some she would say, lot. For going home, she would say, ‘I sa gin yam!’  However we used to enjoy each others company, and I got to lift her up and carry her around in the hay loft. That was about as sexual as it got.  She actually moved to the other side of the fells, when Major Ball took over their farm. So I walked and climbed through the fells for a visit.  As I was walking up the lane, I could hear a patter, patter, behind me.  I looked around and there was a sheep or rather a Tup, that is a Ram, charging at me with his head down. I ran as fast as I could but he was gaining on me, so I jumped, in one great leap, on to the top of a stone wall, about five feet high, at least. Under normal circumstances I wouldn’t have been able to perform this feat, and never did again.  The Ram sat at the bottom, eyeing me for a while and then left.  Whey he had picked on me, I don’t know.

 

At the end of summer, I used to help out with the haymaking, which was enjoyable. The lads from another farm, the Robinsons, used to come and help. In return, Greg and whoever would go and help them, do whatever they were doing. There was a lot to do, cutting hedges, harvesting kale, shearing the sheep, dipping the sheep, rounding them up from the fells, and so on.  Besides that we had to milk the cows everyday.  We didn’t have milking machines, there was no electricity for years, so we had to do it by hand. Uncle Greg taught me how to milk, and I did my portion everyday.  In fact I would bring the cows in for milking. They knew when to come home anyway, it was just a matter of calling them, and taking the dog along. Unfortunately Greg was a late riser and on most mornings the cows wouldn’t be milked until 9 or 10 o’clock. This lack of enthusiasm, for running the farm, by Greg meant financial difficulties and if it were not for Uncle Father Ted contributing funds;Probably from Nanny's estate, on advice from Nanny before she died,the family would have been in worse states between 'milk cheques'. They  may have run quite a debt to Father T. This continued for years and years...I sometimes wondered whether Greg was born unmotivated, or it was something that happened to him during the war, (they call it post traumatic stress disorder these days). However he used to like doing his trade which was brick-laying.

 

Dick Hadwin was another neighbour, and he was different. He lived with his father and the house was an eclectic mess.  He had a Druid’s circle on his land also.  When we pointed them out to him and explained what they were. He said, ‘ I oft wondered what that lyle circle of stains be.’  He was famous for going to the pub, on his tractor.  He would then drive home drunk and on one occasion. I found him asleep by the side of the road, still sitting on his tractor.  We could see him coming down the road everyday just about. The pub he went to was situated, in Broughton Mills, and was called the Blacksmiths Arms. I think it was built in 1640, and it had low ceilings and wooden beams.  I used to enjoy going there myself, for I would get a Tizer, or a Sarsaparilla, whilst the men drank their pints.  It was fascinating listening to the locals, with all their stories, about the area. It seems that the Quakers, Fox and friends, used to live locally and had gone to America from here.  There were many stories like this, all spoken in ‘soon to be abandoned’, dialect. There was a little shop attached to the pub and I often had to come down for some errand or so.  On one occasion I say a pack of hounds literally tear a fox apart in front of me. This of course put me off fox-hunting for life, and other blood sports. It was mostly idiots that followed these sports anyway.  The Mill, that gave the village its name, was now defunct and used for other purposes.  The big wooden paddles wheels were still there though, and one could imagine them turning the grinding stones. (One thing I remember is Gregg always talking about strontium 90 checks for the milk...I later found out this was due to an escape of radiation from Windscale plant, and Esha died of bone cancer at 72, no doubt due to this radiation. Although for some reason she and her extended family, and siblings, were never told the full extent of her illness and that she was actually dying, so there was no time to alert the relatives; I was later given contradictory reports on this by the family, which left me without closure and highly suspicious as to the reasons.)

 

My Grandad and Nanny were by this time retired, and living in a terraced cottage, in Little Urswick, as opposed to the neighbouring village of Great Urswick. They were known, respectively, by the locals as; Lyle Ossick and Gurt Ossick!   There were four small cottages, in a row, with an outside toilet for each.  There were no bathrooms, and only two rooms up and two down. (They were only worth a few thousand pounds at the time but by 2010, they would be worth 100+k pounds each). They were very comfortable, but tight. I usually slept with my Grandad, as my Nanny didn’t want to sleep with the old goat.  He was a great farter, and gave off the deepest resounding, colonic, farts in the world, a fart like a 500 Norton.  He also used to get up in the night to pee in the ‘Po’, or chamber pot, just like a racehorse. I occasionally would use it also, and deposit even the odd turd. We weren’t supposed to do that, but it was too cold and inconvenient to go outside, to the toilet, in the middle of the night.  On one occasion he was out the bed, to use it, but it was full, full as the family Po.  Unfortunately I had left it out in the middle of the floor and he stood in it; A pot full of piss and floating turds.  The response was predictable. ‘Och! Och !who left the po out? ‘ ‘Tis a disgusting thing, ye’ll nay be praised for this un.’  I feigned sleep but I was shaking with laughter, at the same time.  In future there was to be no shitting in the Po and all Pos had to be stored back under the bed, after use, so people don’t tread in them.

 

The village itself was quite pleasant and the big business was the local co-operative store.  If one wanted more, then one had to walk to Gurt Ossick where there were stores, shops and pubs.  The General Burgoyne, I think, and it faced the deep Tarn or Lake.  There was a legend, that at the bottom of the Tarn, there was a village.  There really wasn’t of course, but these legends were extant, throughout Britain and Ireland. It was here, that I had to tell my Nan that Yuri Gagarin had gone into space.  She wouldn’t believe a word of it for wasn’t it a fact that Russians were Communists and not even Catholics.  How could they go up there and do such a thing. The Starry sky was part of the Heavens, was it not?

 

  DOUBTING!

Around about this time I was starting to have some doubts about my religion. The example of the local clergy needed a lot to be desired. There were scandals involving drinking, girls, gambling amongst some of the younger priests. One used to walk around with girls on his arm, and give racing tips in the confessional. I went to the presbytery one day and he was dancing down the stairs to rock ‘n ‘roll music. I thought he was cool. Another ran off with a choir mistress, who he was converting to Catholicism.  The lessons he was giving her were obviously not about religion. He came back the next week for his golf clubs, bold as brass. I remember him well from being the summer camp chaplain. Of course these days nobody would raise an eyebrow about this behaviour but in those days, religions held sway.

 

 Every summer I used to go to the Ozanam Boy’s Camp, with skallywags from all over Merseyside.  We went to a place called Abergele in North Wales, and it was fun. I don’t think that the locals  like all these kids for Merseyside though. We lived in ex-army bell tents, and ate in a communal mess hall. We were divided up into rows and each row was a colour and a name. Our last one was the Obos. At night we would sneak out and attack the other colours or raid the local Boy Scout Camp. Before the raid, we would drum out a sound on the giant oil drums, we used for garbage then take off on our patrol. This would of course bring the police to patrol between the tents. Inside we would be getting drunk on illicit Bulmer’s Cider and stuffing our faces with junk food.  We would go to Rhyl to the fairground or to the beach occasionally. In our tent was an American boy named Mike Cook, who I got on famously with. I shared my home made army blanket, sleeping bag with him. Sometimes we would go to Gwyric Castle, where the boxers trained for big fights, and the Jewish kids had lived during the war. All in all it was a great time. On one summer I played a cannibal in the play, and I covered myself in soot.  I regretted that for it took hours, standing outside, by the washbasin, in the cold, whilst somebody scrubbed away at my skin. I wonder whether I ever got all the soot from out of my pores. Father Furlong was our Chaplain and he was the one who ran off with the choir mistress.

 

      I was also starting to think a little and the thoughts I had were quite strange for a little boy. One thought I had recurring was always baffling to my parents and that was; "Have you ever thought what it would be like if there had been no creation, what would exist?" I can remember looking out the window and imagining the world disappearing, and being left with nothing. I used to say to myself that this would make me scratch my brain. These were strange thoughts for a primary school child and some of my other ideas were just as strange. For I also believed that there were cities at the bottom of the sea, from previous civilisations and that man would go to the moon. I knew nothing about Atlantis or Mu, at this time. I can also remember having a conversation with a Priest about plants. I can remember saying to him that I believed they had souls. He told that was fine as long as I didn't go against Church teachings that only humans had immortal souls. I never did believe that humans were the only beings with souls.

 

 Anyway life went on except I was afflicted, by large painful boils, on my arms and legs. I believe that the boils were due to extreme stress and poor diet, but I still had to go to school with them. However I had become adept at limping as a little child, so they could be overcome. Eventually the dinner lady, school yard minder, told me to go to the clinic and get them treated. She had been lancing and cleaning them for me, as she had been a nurse. I only had bus fare for my normal trip, so I had to walk the couple of miles, in much pain. These painful boils continued for several years right up until I was about thirteen years of age. I actually still carry the scars from these abscesses. My little sister Marie Therese was also suffering from kidney problems and an infection on her cornea, which left scars. I can remember her hallucinating on one occasion, before being taken to the Birkenhead Children's Hospital , where she spent quite a bit of time.  Her Doctor was called Charteris but didn't seem to be able to treat her successfully..The same, children’s hospital, that I spent my early days in, for my leg stretching and leg irons. I think she caught a virus somehow.May be from my Dad's family as I remember my grandmother or Muddy had to go to hospital as she had ulcers behind her eyes and they had to take the eyes out of the sockets..Where did she catch it though? Probably came from somebody bringing it back from the tropics. My father was in India and my Uncle Larry was a prisoner of the Vichy French on Martinique and was treated badly by the local jailers...Today we probably would call it a herpes virus or cold sore virus.

        My mother wasn't a nurse and I don't think she knew quite what to do and I was not a complainer. (What could she do anyway?) I usually kept my problems and complaints much to myself, as there was no point.

       I think my mother was probably depressed, and likely somewhat neurotic, by her situation and felt that she had invested her life incorrectly. Her unhappiness and my father's became something that the family had to bear and life wasn't a pleasant experience. She was in a bad marriage with my father and due to the Catholic fact, and nonsensical belief, there wasn't much they could do about it.

        So life at home wasn't a happy experience on a day to day basis. My mother and father sometimes fought physically. On one occasion she had broken ribs even. I can understand his frustration considering the circumstances, of Father Haa Evans, but he shouldn't have got that violent. He was probably more interested in his image outside the house as usual. I actually remember that fight, where he had her up against the wall, in the hallway, and was punching her. It was no wonder she had a 'friend' like Father Haa from the Church. This is no doubt a common experience of many children, and I don't claim anything special or unusual. The only thing that bothered me was that boys used to ask me about it, as if it was my fault. They would say, ‘What’s the story with your Mum and  Father Haa then?’, as if it were somehow my fault. It seemed everyone in the town knew about it, including the Protestants. I remember on one occasion climbing over the locked back door and peeping through the back window, and seeing my mother sitting in the chair and Father Haa kneeling on the floor and they were kissing..with my mother holding his head in her hands. This really blushed me up and I wished I hadn't seen it so I sneaked away...more boils to come! He was always rubbing and massaging her legs in the dining room, in front of the fire anyway..I don't know why they were like they were, in the house and out of it...I loved my mother but this contradiction in behaviour between preaching Irish Catholicism, and behaviour conflicted me somewhat.

On one occasion my mother stood outside the Priest’s house after Mass with me with her. Everybody leaving the Church had to walk past the Presbytery and could see us...standing there. They all knew about the ‘friendship’, as did the whole town, and they were glowering at us.......There went Mrs Fagan with a dark face and then came Conroy with a shocked face, then came Donnelly with a great grin on his face and then came my mother’s friends with incredulous looks on their faces and there was my mother standing there as proud as could be with an ‘up yours’ expression on her face...Father Haa Evans didn’t come out though, he was probably behind the curtains shitting himself. I was really worried about it for I knew the kids were going to ask me about it again....later-which of course is exactly what happened. I was wishing that a hole would form and swallow us up but no luck...It always came back to me at school or when I was an altar boy, from the other boys...Also having to accompany them to the movies as a cover was humiliating, especially in those days, as everyone could see Father Haa was a priest. I used to cringe down in my seat when they were kissing hoping nobody would recognise me..I really resented having to be this kind of cover, whilst my mother was with 'Paladin'...

 Luckily I could retreat into my imagination and the many books, that I owned. I think I had about one hundred by the time I was ten years old. I also used to buy a season ticket for Hoylake Swimming Baths, where I learned to swim and dive quite well. I used to spend a lot of time there with my friend from school David Evans. I think that it was a retreat into something else, for I used to ride my bike up there and then spend the entire day. I was in my own mind and it was distracted, by the swimming. The Baths were a Godsend for the poorer kids also, for it gave them an opportunity to learn to swim and somewhere to go during the summer holidays. No doubt many a life was saved by the experience learned at these baths. The total idea was an enlightened thought for the ordinary people, and I used them for many years even into my mid-teens. They also played all the current pop songs so many teenagers frequented the place.

       I can remember Esha trying to explain my mother's mental and emotional problems one time, but it solved nothing, as I was too young to understand the  psychology. This was after I told Esha I wished she were my  mother, not unusual for many kids to do this. Though in retrospect there probably was a dearth of affection in my early life, due to my  mother's condition at home, and the presence of Father Haa Evans. Later my mother started to take more of an interest in life by getting involved in outside sports and pursuits. Esha and family thought that Father Haa Evans was an aberration in the Church, and he wasn't a proper Priest. They were somewhat naive in this respect, as the catholic church has proven to be  a rotten apple full of physical and sexual pedophiles and abusers generally. Not taking into account the superstition, exploitation and manipulation that is generally practised in there.

My Mum used to keep a bottle of 'Hall's Tonic Wine' 18% at least, in the kitchen cupboard which she used to take when necessary, which was necessary a lot!!! I can still see her climbing on the chair for the hidden bottle of tonic, hidden along there with her personal piece of cheese...and telling me she needed it for her blood and nerves. (At one point after I left home a photo of myself, Nanny and my brother and sisters was spoiled by my mother stabbing the girls eyes out, which I found to be odd). One of my major problems was that I was extremely sensitive and I still am. If for example someone is depressed I not only notice it, but actually feel it, and distance has nothing to do with it. Unfortunately the problems in and around my parent's marital breakdown, affected me, emotionally for many years to come, and the conflict with the Church and Father Haa didn’t help either. I loved my mother but I was disturbed at her behaviour generally and it used to make me frustrated. When we had our quiet times together and talked generally, I enjoyed it very much...

       During this period I noticed an increase in the frequency of vivid dreams that involved falling. Each time I "fell", I immediately awoke in my body. It seems that I was experiencing traveling dreams.

 

A little bit of artistry was stirring. I painted Mount Fujiyama, and my Father-note*2, gave it to my Muddy, it is still in the family. As for some time, as we were banned by my mother, I had to sneak up there on my bicycle.  I’m told. It was a major effort, on my part and I covered it in a plastic frame and cover. Artistry was never bigger than with the play though. I wrote a play about Black Bart, the Whale-A-Shark, Redcoat Dragoons, and the Smugglers.  We all thought it was a great play, and we all had at least one part.  It was going to be presented at Easter Time.  So we all rehearsed our parts, and even made up costumes, and make up. The Whale-A-Shark came in for we needed a monster as well. To go along with Smugglers and their caves, Redcoats chasing Black Bart and other adventures.  It was all a little surreal! Well after dinner, time for the play we had spent weeks on. There was my Mum, my Father and Uncle Haa Evans.  Well all they could do was fight and argue, through the whole thing, we were all disappointed; my sisters Maureen and Therese and my little brother Paul.  We would be saying our pieces and have to stop, while they argued about something or other.  We would ask them to be quiet and we would continue, until they argued again. It was a terrible disappointment, seeing as we had spent weeks on learning and writing the play.  It put me off trying to be a playwright, and I never did write anything again for forty years or more. All the paper, moustaches, tricorn hats, made out of cardboard, and other things we used, were all just work and that was all.

(I was staying with my mother when she heard news of Father Evan's death and she was devastated. Maureen my sister told  me at the time that Mum didn't want me to know he was dead and also that he had refused to leave the Church for her. ---typical ego . I think she harboured hopes that when he retired properly they could have got together. She should have divorced my father earlier in her life and married Evans but he wouldn't leave his Church anyway..).

At the time of writing my father was long dead and my mother suffers from dementia so is unaware of most things, and doesn't recognise family as we are. So no offense can be offered. My mother finally was released on the 20th June 2012....she passed in peace from a body that was holding her back.....The next day she 'visited' me and she was lucid and clear albeit a bit of  a weak manifestation, but a good forgiving visit.



NB. That lady died or did she? will she? Facebook posting. ( Most will not understand this post if they are attached to and believe they are the body).

 

The 89 year old Lady was a bright articulate intelligent bubbly person with the occasional depression or down. However as she aged she became demented over the last few years. She became so bad she couldn't recognise. her own children or family. She would listen and fake it but ask afterwards who they were...She need a carer to bathe her...She was becoming severely demented...and the person that was in that body had died...Just today the  relative called me to tell me that she had died,for a while. Apparently she was found with cold and clammy with no discernable pulse...---the entity was trying to shake off the mortal coil.A tipping point had been reached where the entity knew if it did not leave the mind would deteriorate to a point to where it would be stuck in misery..However the carer in a well meaning way and not fully understanding what was happening punched her a couple of time in the chest and revived her and sent her to hospital...I thought it was a pity she didn' t let her pass over and perhaps the old lady will leave at the hospital...as her life was just meaningless to her...obviously at some level she knew that...

The carer,  told me that as a guardian she had informed the hospital that if she died again to revive her...I asked why did you do that? She said so she can come home to die.. But she had already died at home and she was revived...Anyway I disagreed with the carer signing revive and resuscitate if dead papers and suggested it was the ego of the carer that was doing it and it was unfair on the old lady who was obviously trying to pass over..This was taken very badly and I was hung up on...The other children of the old lady want no resuscitation of the old lady..

In fact it would be better if she dies instead of come back to the life she is living..I look forward to a call sometime soon to say that she hopefully and mercifully died.. For to keep her alive is  only selfishness and misguided emotion on the part of the family who want to do so.Also Ireland is still half Priest ridden and under the influence of Catholic Superstition..they won't even allow abortion if the mother's life is in danger..and the EU judged against them. So if the lady is half alive and on life support they won't pull the plug..or she could go home brain damaged or get another painful disease...I hope the carer get to see through the egos and sentiment and see what the old lady wants.....( This was an anon notification on FB.).

My  position philosophically on this resulted in people  sending me ignorant, abusive foul emails regarding this..I HAVE KEPT THEM ALL, INCLUDING THE FILM STARS.The only one in the carer's family that didn't get involved in the ignorance and abuse was the one with most of the awareness; the second son.There is always one in a family that is more enlightened than the rest he was the one in his. The so called film star was sending me bullying and threatening emails as well. NO UNDERSTANDING OR CLASS AT ALL!


IN THE END SHE EUTHANISED HERSELF BY REFUSING FOOD AND WATER FOR TWO WEEKS AND LEFT THE BODY  BY STARVATION.



Q. Is it obligatory to live out one's natural life span?

M. Natural -spontaneously -easy-yes. But disease and suffering are not natural. There is noble virtue in unshakable endurance of whatever comes but there is also dignity in the refusal of meaningless torture and humiliation....



Maharaj's body suffered with cancer in its last stages...but there was nobody home to accept the pain...
When you are awake you are consciousness when you are asleep you are only alive. Consciousness and and life---both you may call god but you are beyond god beyond being and not being....Nisargadatta Maharaj.



 

In the end result love is letting go...if you love something let it go....otherwise it is just emotional sentiment and attachment...which is of the Ego not of the 'Soul'. The soul or higher mind will always give you a message.........



ROSETTA and talking to her on the other side.


I talked to ROSETTA on the other side..along with, (She said she had said sorry previously another sensitive.),...Rose said sorry again and she said she didn't know the big girls were like that---the way they are...*She said she never told me  about her illness and that I believed sometimes without question so she didn't bother..She was in  nice place but felt a little confused...She told the sensitive that she had had a problem in her mouth on the upper gums..( She always had rotten teeth as she was afraid to go to the dentist due to paranaoia, even when I had a lot of money and suggested it many times...).There was some other spirit around with a name beginning with M...or could have been an N...

The last thoughts are important when one dies...They carry over as the mind is not in the brain it uses it and can be affected by it..For example mentally ill people need to be peaceful when they die for if they commit suicide for example they will be in a place of light and peace but everything else on the astral will be confusion as it was in life..
It seems they are in a place of their own, but then are not we all?

THIS IS WHY THE HINDUS PLACE MUCH IMPORTANCE ON THE THOUGHTS AT DEATH...T.

She was a little worried about Siobhan's***'s health ...who works many hours...

She didn't have any memory of Brigid at all…??

*What she meant was i believed what she told me about going to sewing circles and womens doctors etc....when it was mental health visits...



ASHRAM Visit from a Siddha.

On another day in my room,just before the afternoon siesta,I was lying there comletely relaxed,in between sleep and wakefulness.When a little Siddha-Yogi appeared,an old man dressed in virtual rags.He was old,balding and wore a brown robe of some sort.He told me to touch his back near his right shoulder,this was all done telepathically,I must be on the Astral Plane,and I didn't know whether I was out of my body or what.I touched his shoulder then he took me up through all kinds of planes,from Astral to Mental and more.He took me through the level of form to a level of colours,shimmering vibrations.I saw forms,beings on the different levels,the shimmering colours,and energies were also beings.He took me up to another level I have no memory of,but I knew that I had been there.I awoke on my mattress and realised that I had been travelling out of my body.It was different from dreaming,so real, so conscious,and he set the agenda not I,or so it seemed to me.I had had "out of body experiences" before but not like this.
     One time in Brisbane,before coming to India,I had a very strong experience,but at a lower level.I awoke one morning to find myself out of my body and kneeling beside it.I was examining the body and in particular some wiggly sun growths around my chest and neck area.I can remember thinking how cold and clammy my skin was.I then realised it was nearly 7a.m.and I had to get up.Instantaneously I was awake in my body but I realised what had happened and noted it.I then rose from my bed,which was on a cold ,damp,sleep-out verandah,hence the cold clammy skin.



 



Note *1.

After I gave up drinking...I went on the 'spiritual path' and for a while I was sucked in to following a fake guru..who turned out to be a crook and a pedophile, what's new? I was the first to put an exposure of him on the net but they tried to do a character assassination on me. Hacking my computer using my name on posts, posting in my name answering them in my name, to make me look bad so people wouldn't look at the truth of sai baba. Luckily I got into Vedanta at the time and this philosophy saved me from the disillusionment associated with the phoney guru....

Note *2. Many years later I sought out my father and put him in touch with the rest of my brothers and sisters. He had mellowed a lot and I think this was due to his wife...'A'. We also paid separate visits to the same ashram in India as had been predicted for him by a palm reader some years before, where he was told he would visit India on two more occasions. I visited him several times and we had a lot in common on the academic and philosophical level. I also made a special trip from Canada when he was dying of lung cancer, in order to say goodbye and bury any differences.  Life is but playing roles to other people also playing roles.

Note *3. Before volunteering for Abyssinia my father had a relationship with a German girl in Bavaria...Munich I believe, although he visited at Nuremberg as well..Apparently he traveled backwards and forwards from the UK. On his last occasion there he was having a meal in a restaurant when two men, dressed in trilby brimmer hats and long leather coats, stood in the door way and shouted out his name. The Gestapo had come for him and it seems they didn't approve of his relationship with the German girl...whether it was due to the fact of his mother's Jewish family or the girl's I don't know. He was probably lucky he was an Neutral Dual Irish National, for otherwise he may have been detained, although at this stage Britain and the UK were not at war.. He was however instantly deported to the UK. The Germans had the name of every  Jewish person and family in the British Isles going back to a grandparent to qualify. My father's mother would have been regarded as 100% due to her mother's status, at the very least, making myself, and siblings and cousins, also a candidate qualifying for the camps at Auschwitz and elsewhere...The Germans on the conquest of the British Isles were going to round up all the Jews and deport them to the camps along with other such as Communists etc..Bavaria would have been handy for the Gestapo as that was were Dachau, and Flossenberg, were situated; so my father's Dual Irish Nationality saved him from going to that local concentration camp.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dachau_concentration_camp

http://www.thirdreichruins.com/flossenburg.htm



 

 

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