Beyond Belfast by Will Ferguson

Author:Will Ferguson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Canada
Published: 2011-02-14T16:00:00+00:00

ESCAPING PATRICK’S PURGATORY

A statue of a 1920s IRA man, his rifle pointed toward the border, welcomes you to the Republic. This was Pettigo. A river ran through it, and a border. The taxi had dropped me off on the UK side, beneath a giant oak tree that spread its shade over a small square, and I walked down from there.

Technically, the UK side of the river was not Pettigo but Tullyhommon, best known for a narrow escape it had during the 1980s, when an IRA bomb failed to go off during a Remembrance Day service attended by more than two hundred members of the local boys’ and girls’ clubs. The goal had been to wipe out an entire generation of Protestant children, but the detonator hadn’t gone off, and the ceremony continued without anyone realizing the threat they were under. Only a faulty wire had stood between them and carnage.

I crossed over into the Republic, where the Quiet Man statue squared off with the border, rifle ready. On this side of the river the police stations were not fortresses, the IRA having shown a magnanimity to the Garda that they did not show the RUC. On this side of the river, there was no razor wire encircling the stations, no bolted doors, no watch towers.

I found a room in a guest house filled with joyously squabbling children and ongoing debates. As I was signing in, the lady of the house cornered one young boy and, with arms outstretched, corralled him in for a hug. “This one’s the baby,” she said as he squirmed to escape. It was a fine place, clean and spacious, considering the size of the family, but the plumbing was indecisive: in the bath the water was first cold, then lukewarm, then very lukewarm, then almost hot—then suddenly cold again. Looking back on it later, I realized the plumbing was simply a foretaste of the penance to come.

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