'Are ye doing anything tonight?'

It was often my father’s first comment when we came through the door of No. 87 for a weekend at home from Glengormley, or later on, Craigavon. I knew what was coming. He was after a lift to Blake’s of the Hollow, or Connolly's in Arney, for a Friday night drink, or to a wake or ceili anywhere in South West Fermanagh.

My father never drove, and indeed we never had a car during all the years growing up in Derrin Road. The taxi runs became a regular feature of weekends for those of us who bought cars when we began to work. I would often deliver him, and collect him again a few hours later, from those evenings of condolences, or cards, stories, slander, and sometimes songs.

“There’s an old friend of mine dead in Africa. He went for a swim, got into difficulty and drowned. I’ll be expected at the wake,” my father continued.

 "There’s a wake in the home place, even though the body will stay in Africa. I’d be killed if I didn’t go.”

An hour later we were rolling along the Derrylin road from Enniskillen to “the home place”. My father rarely travelled outside Fermanagh but knew every field and house from Reilly’s Cross to Florencecourt and beyond, the way the older generation of countrymen did.

As we approached the wakehouse, my father suddenly said,

“Pull the car in here and park her close to the hedge – it’s a very bad road, this, too many accidents. Watch yourself when you’re getting out.”

I did as I was told and looked at him suspiciously for further instructions.

“Here’s a Mass card. Walk down the road and turn left into the lane. Go into the house and give them the Mass card and say Hughie Corrigan sent you, and he’s sorry for your trouble.”

“And where are you going?" I asked him.  "Aren’t you coming in yourself?”

“If I went in there,” said my father “I’d never get out. Some of the people in there I won’t have seen for years. There’ll be a fair bit of drink there and I’m not fit for a late night. Just say I have the ‘flu. You’ll be back up in a minute.”

Disgruntled, I shuffled down the road, turned into the lane and knocked on the farmhouse door. A smiling, elderly woman appeared and insisted I come in before I had a chance to give my message. I followed her into a living room where four men of a similar vintage sat around a fire. Everyone looked at me as I began.

“I’m a son of Hughie Corrigan. He sent me out with this Mass card and says he’s sorry for your trouble.”

“And where’s Hughie?”

“He’s at home in bed with the flu. He’s not fit to come out, but he’s very sorry for your loss”

Once the first lie was told, the nightmare began.

“It’s not like Hughie to lie down under any ‘flu. It must be serious. Have you got the doctor yet?”

“No. I was going to, but you know him. He didn’t want any fuss and he wouldn’t let me phone Dr. Brady. He’ll be alright, though. It’s hard to kill a bad thing", I joked.

“I wouldn’t take any chances, no matter what Hughie says. I’d go straight to Dr. Brady on your way home, and maybe you should think of the priest too. Some too many people didn’t want to make a fuss and they're now pushing up flowers in the graveyard”, said the oldest man as he spat in the fire.

And so it went on.

“Has he lost any weight?”

“Does he still have his appetite? Is he eating?”

“How long is he laid up for at this stage?”

I stood there, burning, feeling like a trapped bird, and silently cursing my father. The inquisition finally ended, and I made my way towards the door. Just as I thought my ordeal was over, the lady of the house opened the door and said.

“I’ll walk up to the road with you.”

If she had her suspicions before this, they were confirmed by my rising sense of panic, and my over-zealous protestations.

“Not at all. I wouldn’t hear of it. You have the house full in there. There’s no need at all.”

Taking absolutely no notice of me, she walked on ahead up the lane and onto the road, and I followed sheepishly. When she reached the car, she squeezed herself between the hedge and the front passenger door where my father sat. He rolled the window down and said,

“How are you, Cissie? It's been a terrible shock”.

“Aye, an awful shock for all of us.  How about yourself? Will you live?”

“I’m not ready to meet my maker just yet, Cissie” he said, with not a bother on him.

“Sure, come in and have a drink when you’re this far, won’t you?”

“Aye, maybe I will, Cissie. Move the car out a bit, Joseph, so I can open the door.”       

“You needn’t think I’m going back into that house", I protested. "I’m after lying for Ireland in there for you, in front of the whole room. What time do you want me to pick you up at?”

“Any time around 12 will do if that’s not putting you out.”

“OK, see you then.”

He and Cissie walked back down the road, and disappeared into the lane, chatting and laughing as they went.

I seethed, and cringed, in equal measure as I drove back to the town, at the amusement they all would have when Lazarus walked into the wake-house. The Irish wake, then as now, was therapeutic and supportive, but back in those days, it could take on a life of its own.

It was a celebration of life, as much as a commiseration at a loss, and humour was an important part of the evening. On that particular long-ago night all of the old folk there seemed familiar with, and comfortable with, these rural rituals, except me - I had been discommoded and educated in equal measure, I suppose!