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The Tay is Wet
Book Cover

The cinema and the dancehall played a significant part in providing, not only entertainment, but also some relief from the grinding and unending struggle to put bread on the tables of rural Ireland during the nineteen forties and fifties. Whistling and singing at work made mundane tasks seem lighter. Annual holidays became the norm. The general theme of this book is early cinema and leisure as recalled by the author and conveyed through the character, Timmy Deery, a simple man who makes us laugh but who also commands our respect for his innate good nature and decency.


Cinema was a social phenomenon not only in Ireland but in all countries whose ideology permitted its influence. Many of us who grew up in those times well remember when the main topic of conversation as we “drew” in the hay or “stucked” the corn was “what Judy Garland did last night in the pictures”. Actors and actresses became real people to us. We knew them as neighbours and friends or if they were “baddies” as enemies who deserved their comeuppance.

I have tried, in this little book, to recall some of those events and to add whatever life the written word will allow so that, hopefully, the reader will have a pleasurable and rewarding experience.

The Tay is Wet

Book Cover

Price: €12.00

(including postage and packaging to all areas)

 

Sample story from "The Tay is Wet"

The Black Pony

I had often heard my father speak of Timmy and that evening I asked him about their school days together. He told me that Timmy was a good scholar and that they played together on the school football team. At lunchtime the boys would gaze at a black pony which grazed peaceably in the paddock behind the school. They christened it “Blackie” and twelve year old Timmy would reach through the fence and rub its nose. One day Timmy persuaded two boys (one of whom was my father) to give him a lift up on Blackie’s back. The pony stood quietly for a few moments and such was Timmy’s elation that he began to whoop like a cowboy and the frightened animal quickly threw him on the hard ground and galloped off across the paddock. On hearing the commotion other pupils rushed over and the headmaster, who had been looking out of his window, raced outside and, with a face as black as thunder, ordered my father and the other boy to go immediately to his office. Then himself and another teacher carried the still stunned and unconscious Timmy into the school. Timmy woke up lying on a wooden bench inside the classroom. The boys who had assisted him were standing in a corner, their faces creased in pain. They were deeply upset at what happened to Timmy and also because of the pain they felt from the headmaster’s cane which now lay on his desk.
‘How do you feel now, Timothy Deery?’ said the headmaster.
‘Sore head, sir’
‘You’re lucky that’s all that’s sore. I’m surprised at an intelligent boy like you.’
Timmy’s older brother, Sonny, was ordered to take him home. His mother worried about him. However, he came to school next day and appeared none the worse for his escapade. The headmaster had the pony moved away from the school. About a month or so after these events things started to go less well at school for Timmy. He lost his place on the school football team and from being one of the top pupils academically he began to slip down into the bottom half of his class. From then until the end of primary school Timmy continued to regress and somehow got left behind the other pupils. When it came to moving on to a secondary school there was a difficult meeting between Timmy’s parents and the headmaster. His mother said he should go to secondary school. She said fourteen was too young to start work. The headmaster shook his head. He would not be able for it. His examination results were poor. His father said he could do with more help on the farm. Timmy’s mother always maintained that until the pony incident he was the most intelligent of her seven children, four of whom became doctors.