Originally from Belfast, John Connolly now lives in Dublin and is retired…
I really enjoyed Barton Creeth’s lovely recent article on moving to Belfast.
My wife and I did something similar in the late 1960s. I am originally from this city and moved to England in 1964. There I met a beautiful young woman from County Mayo who became my (so far!) life partner. We decided she married in London in 1968 and moved to Belfast in 1969. I soon got a job and my plans were solidified.
So in September, just as things were starting to really take off (perfect timing!), we arrived in a city we barely recognized. I was on the No. 12 bus in Falls (where I grew up) and saw barricades blocking off street after street, including Beechmount Avenue, which was my own neck of the woods, and I was completely shocked. I clearly remember being shocked.
We spent a total of three years in Northern Ireland and were blessed with two daughters. We lived primarily in Carrickfergus, which, on reflection, was probably not the most obvious place to live for a Falls Road man and a “Free State” woman. As it happened, our neighbors were wonderful, but of course none of us lives in a vacuum, and the harsh reality of what was happening around us was increasingly encroaching.
So we reluctantly came to the conclusion that we needed to leave before the UDA or UVF made a decision. 21stcent On ‘Bloody Friday’ in July 1972, I was in Belfast and was in three of the locations where bombs exploded, but obviously and thankfully at different times. It inspired us too.
A few weeks later, not unlike the family in the movie Belfast, we flew to England and headed to the city of Birmingham, where my parents lived. Instead of 2 parents and 2 boys, we were 2 parents and 2 young girls (one still in diapers).
We spent seven years in the English Midlands, where three more children joined our family. We never returned to Belfast, but we flew back in roughly the same direction and have been in Dublin more or less since 1979.
I think we have lived a wonderful life. Six wonderful children, lots of grandchildren (with a great-granddaughter on the way!), a nice house, decent health, money in the bank, etc. How can there be any regrets?
Still, after watching the movie I mentioned earlier, I cried. I realized that I had (have?) a deep sense of loss. Of course, a lot of it is about my childhood, my beloved older family members who have passed away a long time ago, friends I’ve lost contact with, football at the Oval, GAA at Casement (then an open field). ), etc. “Fluffing” on Clonard and wiggling Porter on “The Crown” before heading to Sammy Houston’s house – this sentence could go on for a while, so I’ll stop here.
But another part of the loss is that over 50 years ago I felt obligated to my wife and children to leave home and take them out of the basket case of where they lived at the time. And we were, and still are, outraged that we were put in a situation where we really had to go.
And sadly, it’s still a basket case.
So where can you find warmer, more generous people? (He is surrounded by an unacceptable number of eezits.) That’s the conundrum. Maybe this is just a long rant about how we can get the guy out of Belfast, but we all know how that ends.
This is a guest slot that provides a platform for new writers, either as a one-off or as a prelude to becoming part of the regular Slugger team.