Siobhan's Memories of Paddy

Written by Siobhan Walls, Paddy's younger sister by 16 months.

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• Fighting over opening the blue foil paper on the chocolate fingers Daddy used to bring home to us from work.
• Opening the cardboard box Daddy brought home with two kittens inside
• The two of us squished in the boot of the VW Beetle with a single of chips on the way home from the baths on Friday night in Cork.
• Going for a picnic in Corry’s field.
• Hitting my head on the wall when he was teaching me how to flick my fringe.
• Looking at each other as we crouched together by Mother’s armchair in the sitting room in Glounthaune in the late afternoon of Sunday March 24^th, 1968 and deciding that as everyone else was crying we probably should too.         

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• Swanning around the Phoenix Park in Uncle George’s chauffeur driven car when me and Paddy were staying with them, but all their kids were at school.
• Arriving at Carrickbrack in the chauffeur driven car.
• Playing out the back garden in Carrickbrack.
• Leapfrogging over the trees Grandad had just planted in the front garden of Carrickbrack.
• Meeting Paddy at the top of the stairs on my way to bed where he’d be waiting to make me talk. I had a self-imposed rule that stated I could talk to no-one once I’d kissed Mother goodnight. Paddy would wait for me, somehow make me talk and I’d have to go all the way back down to say good night again.
• Him telling John to dance on my head while he held me down.
• Playing spin the bottle with Scorie, Brenda McLoughlin and Gerry and Brendan Hannon (Paddy had that sussed in that I was his sister and Scorie was his cousin, so no matter where the bottle stopped he got to kiss Brenda).
• Going to Fintan’s disco on Friday nights (I had such freedom being accompanied by my big brother).
• Him and Claire and Eamonn swigging a drinks mixture behind the bushes at Sutton Cross before going to Fintan’s disco (I’m not called Miss Mustard for nothing.).
• Going to the disco in Howth Community Centre and head-shaking to Black Betty till our heads hurt.
• Waiting for the bus at the top of the Baldoyle Road in the freezing cold to go visit Claire and Eamonn.
• Walking home from the bus stop at the top of the Baldoyle Road in the freezing cold after visiting Claire and Eamonn .
• Covering for him for some misdemeanour that Grandad was on to (having friends in the bedroom if memory serves).
• Seething with him for inviting the whole of Sutton and Howth back to Carrickbrack one Easter Saturday night when Ma was away.
• Going around the next morning with a nail scissors and glue to repair the cigarette burns in the sitting room carpet.
• Making him a birthday cake that consisted of 20 pancakes stacked high.
• Dancing with him to Earth, Wind and Fire on the chairs in the kitchen.
• Walking home from the Summit at 2am.
• Buying my first car which he drove to the petrol station in Portmarnock for me before I dared get behind the wheel myself.
• Being collected by him from Heathrow when I moved to London in ‘88.
• Being dropped by him to Luton when I moved home from London in ‘89.
• Going to his and Shelagh’s wedding in Kingston.
• Asking him for advice on a boy thing when Michael was a baby.
• Listening to Michael ask 30 times “What doin’ Paddy?” as Paddy re-tiled the bathroom here when Mother had split the house into two flats.
• Listening to Paddy answer 30 times “Sticking those tiles on the sticky stuff Michael”.
• Listening to Michael telling Paddy (after due consideration and reflection) to “Dick dose diles on de dicky duff Paddy”.
• Ringing Paddy for advice some years later on how to “dick diles on dicky duff”.
• Eating his savoury mince dinner in the upstairs flat at 38 Bayside Walk.
• Eating dinner with himself, Shelagh, Stevie and Savanagh in Baldoyle.
• Going to the Hillybilly in Dingle with him and Muiris on my 30^th birthday.
• Watching him and Mother argue with and against each other in Kerry.
• Playing cards with him and Mother terrified I’d make a mistake.
• Getting to Kerry with a 3 week old Rachel to find no floor in the sitting room.
• Running out to Paddy with a 3 week old Rachel in my arms screaming at him to chase down the hill after Robert who was chasing Nick who was chasing Michael who was chasing Mister the dog who was chasing a sheep over a cliff edge.         

          

• Watching him watching Sam on Coomeenole as we all played in the waves.
• Putting my head in the kitchen door in Kerry to tell himself and Robert to drink less gin, carve more meat and make more gravy.
• Getting a lesson in how to wear a peaked cap at just the correct Dingle angle.
• Accompanying him on the train as far as Mallow when Rachel and I were going to Tralee to visit Mother in hospital in September 2005 and watching him get off to meet Dessy to go to re-hab.
• Refusing to give him money the night before that and buying him phone credit online instead.
• Watching him take photos all night at Robert’s 50^th birthday about a month later – he wasn’t drinking.
• Feeling so relieved when he got to Beaumont before Mother died.
• Going on a wonderful winelands tour with himself and Claire in South Africa.
• Being so touched the week the house in Slea Head was being cleared out when he gave me and Rachel a 50 euro note cos I was so broke.

          

          Pic courtesy of Deirdre Kearns' facebook page (Dee Keating I think .)

• Meeting him in Banna in June of last year.
• Meeting him in Dingle a couple of times in July of last year.
• Meeting him and Maura, her daughter and Peadar in Dingle last June.
• Meeting him in Peter’s house in August.
• Talking to him for the last time a few Sundays ago while I was walking the dog up in Howth.
• Seeing his bloodied, bloodless nose when I walked into the ICU in Tralee on Sept 4^th
• Wanting to hold my nose for the smell of decay coming from him.
• Kissing his face and holding his hand and telling him that I loved him.

          

Christine's Memories of Paddy

Written by Christine Brennan (nee Walls), Paddy's older sister by 18 months.

Have been feeling very low since we came back from Kerry and have written down some of my abiding memories of Paddy to help me. I thought I might share them with you all.

Sneaking a look together at the builders in Glounthane with fascination as they were allowed drink their tea with their teaspoons in their cups.

Walking the old road to Flute head's and meeting Paddy coming out of the Ashbourne House hotel with a pack of cigarettes. He was seven maybe eight. Of course we all had to have one. Siobhan was six years old..

Dreading  a family quiz as I knew he would always get the answer before I did.

Listening to the Doobie Brothers at least 20 times a day.

Paddy telling me The Facts of Life.

Dancing with him up and down the kitchen in Carrickbrack to Elton John and Kikki De after I received my leaving cert results

Laughing with him  until we cried at Morcombe and Wise jokes.

Paddy running away from boarding school and being sent straight back.

Paddy and Tim hanging around Carrickbrack when they were meant to be at school.

Watching him and snoops come down the road in his triumph car. Always hard to work out whether it was dog or human driving.

 

Paddy tying the feet of my tights together (when they were on me) and making me walk up and down the dinning room.  I couldn't walk but only because I was laughing so hard.

Holding me down on the ground and telling John to 'Dance on her head'

Visiting Paddy and Shelagh for Sunday dinner when Eoin and Stevie were toddlers.

Paddy working in our house. For the past fifteen years I have been trying to find some fault in his work but never have.

About 5 years ago,sitting in my  car with Eoin at the traffic lights at Sutton Cross when Paddy passes, wearing his hat and the coolest shades I had ever seen, driving a Mercedes. He looked like he had been driving this style of car all his life. I remember looking at Eoin. We both just laughed and said. The jammie .........

Lunch with him and Claire in Gardenworks one sunny day, when he was not drinking and really enjoying the company of a real gent.

Listening to his excitement about his first trip to Spain with Claire.

A wonderful chat we had in Mam's porch a few nights before we closed up the house. He never complained to me, although I know the selling of the house was breaking his heart.

Giving all he had to give playing  against the nephews on Ventry beach. Think he excelled in cheating!

Sitting at the bar in Foxy John's one summer's afternoon just talking shit...

Taking his hat off to push his hand through his thinning hair.

A bloated face in Banna strand. (you're pretty fat yourself !)

Once again playing soccer but this time as a druncle in a very stylish nightdress and of course his hat.

Wearing shades when the sun was definitely not shining as his eyes were so sore.

A short but lovely trip down memory lane with him at Declan's 40th birthday party.

A dying brother in Tralee hospital on Saturday 4th September.

I loved him dearly and will hold on to these precious memories as long as I possibly can.

Christine x x

Eulogy for Paddy Walls, Died 4th Sept 2010, Aged 49.

Delivered at his cremation in Cork on 9th Sept 2010.

"Let's have a quick 60 before we go" said Paddy. The house was silent and completely bare. The removal men had long since removed themselves and we were about to leave Carrickbrack House for good. This was the house I grew up in with Paddy.....Paddy, my big brother, a huge and ever-present influence in my journey to adulthood. Now we were leaving the only home I had ever known, but Paddy wanted 'a quick 60' before we left.

'A quick 60' was nothing more than a game we played in the back garden involving a football and a shopping trolley. Most respectable homes in Dublin at the time had at least one shopping trolley in the garden. We had 2....but kept one hidden behind the hedge so as not to lord it over our neighbours, 'the Beirnes', who had to make do with a Superquinn basket which they kept all their tennis balls in.

'A quick 60' involved one of us crossing the ball 60 times in a row. The other person had to try and head it in to the shopping trolley, more difficult than it sounds, believe me.

Well, the record had stood at 14 for weeks now despite hours spent trying to break it in between packing up the house.

Our final 'quick 60' in the back garden of Carrickbrack House has since passed into legend. With one cross left, the sun setting and the house already locked up, the score stood on a record-equalling fourteen. I crossed the final ball.....and Paddy soared into the air like a man desperate to catch a glimpse over the wall of his neighbour's wife sunbathing......and planted that ball squarely into the shopping trolley.

It was a glorious and perfect way to say goodbye to our childhood home. It also reminded me what it was exactly about my big brother that so inspired me growing up. Quite simply, Paddy always delivered when it really mattered.

Paddy always caught a fish when we went up to Howth Harbour when the mackerel were running. Paddy always hit the shot of the day at Deer Park golf course and he made the pressure putts more often than not. Paddy always got the sparrow first time with the catapult. Paddy always chose exactly the right moment to click the shutter and capture the perfect shot.

And Paddy always got the girl. Not just any girl, but the best girl, the one that everybody else wanted........something which, I am pleased to say, he continued to do right throughout his final years.

I suppose you could say he had a great sense of timing, an essential characteristic if you're going to be funny. And Paddy was funny. I remember another occasion in that same back garden watching Paddy expertly direct the football right into the middle of the enormous 3 metre x 2 metre dining room window. The noise of a thousand pieces of falling glass was quickly replaced with a  stunned silence. Three, four, five seconds passed and then Paddy, with perfect timing, said "Do you know how much out of 10 I hate that ?"

Paddy's sense of direction wasn't quite as good as his sense of timing. In particular he seemed to struggle to locate his own bedroom after visiting the bathroom in the middle of the night. Now while this might have produced a night of excited anticipation for any of Siobhan's friends who were staying over, it probably only further added to Paddy's morning-after confusion as he tried to piece together the hazy memories of another night.

When people hear of the death of someone not directly related to them...the mother of a work colleague for example, they tend to try and pigeon-hole that death. It's not malicious, it's just how we cope and how we explain the world to ourselves. Like..... "Ah, your mother was 87? At least she had a good innings." Or if a person led a troubled life then maybe their death is somehow more acceptable than that of an untroubled person. We think we can measure a person's contribution to this world just by looking at their achievements or their 'happiness barometer.'

I don't agree. I think the true value of a person's life is measured by what others learn from them. Paddy's true beauty often got obscured by his pain. But the fact that his most beautiful traits endured despite that pain.....to me that's what makes those traits even more powerful. I learned a fortune from Paddy. From watching him and listening to him; from his successes and from his mistakes.

Paddy taught me about patience.......the patience required to catch a fish every time, and the patience to know that the answers might not come in this life.

He knew how to catch a fish.

Paddy taught me about gentleness. He had compassion for the smallest and most helpless. His love for animals was well known and and the names Snoopy, Jessie and Cara would feature prominently in his biography. My mother-in-law from South Africa was struck by Paddy's gentleness. She had been so taken by the beauty of the fuschias growing wild all over Kerry that Paddy picked a number of slips and then spent a long time wrapping and packing them carefully in newspaper so as to keep them from dying on the journey back to South Africa. Needless to say, the fuschia slips survived because not only was Paddy gentle, but because when he decided to do something he generally did it very well.

Paddy taught me about fear. I think he had a lot of it and I think it paralysed him. Where it came from we can only speculate, but I know for certain that he doesn't have it any more.

Paddy taught me about loyalty. At the age of 9 I tried to switch from supporting Leeds Utd to supporting Man Utd. I was distraught because Leeds had slipped to 5th place in the top division. Paddy gently explained to me the importance of sticking with a cause through thick and thin. "Hang in there" he implored me, "it's only a matter of time before Leeds start winning again." And so I did. I hung in there and waited........and 34 years later I'm still waiting.

Thanks for that Paddy.

The flip side of loyalty is stubbornness and, oh yes, Paddy could be stubborn. Back in 1978 he told anyone who would listen that U2 were overrated and that the Bogey Boys were much better. This was back when U2 were playing the Community Centre in Howth. In 2010 Paddy would still have told you that U2 are overrated and that the Howth Community Centre is too good for them.

Paddy even taught me about girls. I remember as a teenager feeling down cos' I couldn't get a girl. So I consulted The Master. "Look at how you make us, your family, laugh John. Just be yourself, make the girls laugh and they'll fall for you."  Well, whaddya know? It worked ! Girls have been laughing at me for nearly 30 years now.

And finally, Paddy taught me about love. He taught me that some people just have that special quality about them that makes others want to love them. Paddy had it. He drew people in. They couldn't help themselves. I sometimes think he was the only one who couldn't see it.

But he had plenty of love to give, especially, I found in his later years. I know I felt the warmth and intensity of Paddy's love these last few years. I don't know if he had mellowed or what, but he just seemed able to express himself better than he used to.

And he knew how take a pic...Table Mountain on fire 2006

Since the weekend I've been trawling through my memories of you Paddy...and I have to say I am astounded at just how many there are. You have been a massive part of my life, maybe bigger than I realised, certainly bigger than you realised. I suspect a lot of people here today feel the same. Your impact on this world was much greater than you ever gave yourself credit for. You only have to look at the havoc you created when you finally jumped on that bus last Saturday night.

Speaking of buses.......while Colette, Siobhan and Christine were sitting having lunch just outside Tralee on Saturday, waiting for Paddy to be transferred to Cork......his ambulance sped past them at high speed. With a sense of timing that Paddy would have been proud of Colette turned to to the others and invoked the spirit of Eric Morecambe and one of Paddy's all-time favourite jokes; "He won't sell many ice creams going at that speed !"

Sorry Christine...not an ice cream van.

Paddy wasn't used to ambulances or hospitals...but he did spend the first few weeks of his life in hospital. Our mother had had a minor complication after Paddy's birth and so needed to stay in hospital while they sorted it out. When we asked her why Paddy had stayed in hospital with her and not come home she uttered one of her famous 'Ma-isms': "You have to remember", she said, "that Paddy was very young when he was born."

As it turned out Paddy was also very young when he died.

I wish we had time for 'a quick 60' right now Pads. I reckon we'd break the record again.......even with you lying down.

Thank you for everything you taught me Paddy. Goodbye....for now. We will always love you; our brother, our father, our lover, our son, and our friend. It has been a privilege to know you.