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Thread: Whenever I see Fascists I think of helping out in my neighbour’s garden in West Dublin.
He was in his late 70s & started telling me, a young boy, of the D-Day Landings.
Things that happened to you in your youth can be prompted in old age.
He was in his late 70s & started telling me, a young boy, of the D-Day Landings.
Things that happened to you in your youth can be prompted in old age.
Bill (I’ve changed his name) was from a strict Presbyterian family in Belfast.
He joined up in WWII with his best mate from school. They did everything together.
Maybe it was the 78y old man & the 12y old me amiably planting vegetables together that reminded him.
He joined up in WWII with his best mate from school. They did everything together.
Maybe it was the 78y old man & the 12y old me amiably planting vegetables together that reminded him.
Bill was a man of God, a proud Belfastman, a proud Dub & a proud Irishman who also saw himself as fighting for ‘King & Country’. He’d have been delighted with the Belfast Agreement with its insistence that you could be Irish, or British or both. He was all these things.
He said he’d been on board a warship.
He loved ships, he sailed ships & he built boats in his garden.
Every night, when we were young, his arc lamp would glow from the end of his garden as a vessel came into shape.
He loved ships, he sailed ships & he built boats in his garden.
Every night, when we were young, his arc lamp would glow from the end of his garden as a vessel came into shape.
When I was a toddler I believed that his shed was connected by a wire to the heavens.
I was sure that the fierce flashes of welding light & spark showers, visible from my bedroom window, were powered from the light up there, in the moon, glowing over our village.
I was sure that the fierce flashes of welding light & spark showers, visible from my bedroom window, were powered from the light up there, in the moon, glowing over our village.
The ships, he said, waited out at sea & he & his mate scurried into a smaller craft so that they could land on the beach.
The noise was like hell he said. A man of God, he meant it. His voice was low as he recalled that time some 40y before.
The noise was like hell he said. A man of God, he meant it. His voice was low as he recalled that time some 40y before.
The smaller boat set off for the French beach & their sergeant told them to run as fast as..F- [here he realised a child was listening], run fast, don’t look back & keep your head down.
They waited, water to their ankles, anxious.
![The smaller boat set off for the French beach & their sergeant told them to run as fast as..F- [here he realised a child was listening], run fast, don’t look back & keep your head down. They waited, water to their ankles, anxious.](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EkNJLE5XsAEQcPB.jpg "The smaller boat set off for the French beach & their sergeant told them to run as fast as..F- [here he realised a child was listening], run fast, don’t look back & keep your head down. They waited, water to their ankles, anxious.")
They waited, water to their ankles, anxious.
The boat scraped the beach, the panel was dropped & his buddies & he were like one animal racing up that beach in a surge of adrenaline & fear.
He looked at me when he said ‘fear’.
He wanted me to know, as a small boy, that men can be frightened too.
He looked at me when he said ‘fear’.
He wanted me to know, as a small boy, that men can be frightened too.
He said that the noise was deafening, it was hard to keep upright & running, & that it was difficult not to fall over (I didn’t ask, but in films you see the surf trundling dead men’s bodies) & he ran.
He said he focused on one foot in front of the other.
He said he focused on one foot in front of the other.
Bullets, he whispered, sliced the air. He could feel them all around.
And one particular sound. An impact, a groan & a sodden splash.
He ran, fast as fuck, he didn’t look back & here he was standing, leaning on a rake looking at 12y old me.
And one particular sound. An impact, a groan & a sodden splash.
He ran, fast as fuck, he didn’t look back & here he was standing, leaning on a rake looking at 12y old me.
That splash, he said, that was my best friend’s body.
I looked at him & he was reliving the past; his still clear blue eyes regarding a Dublin garden & a French Beach.
I looked at him & he was reliving the past; his still clear blue eyes regarding a Dublin garden & a French Beach.
That generation, who fought, because they morally believed in defeating the evil of invasion & defying the nihilism of Fascism, have almost all left us now.
Bill was a moral man, a sailor & someone who shared the worst moment of his life with me.
He made the world safe for toddlers to dream of moons & welding.
I know he would be horrified to think that Fascists have taken over the streets of his beloved Dublin.
He made the world safe for toddlers to dream of moons & welding.
I know he would be horrified to think that Fascists have taken over the streets of his beloved Dublin.
