DIARY: Ruminations, Occasional thoughts & happenings - as they arise
Two Letters - May 2006
One of the things I do is write letters! It comes naturally to me, just
expressing my thoughts - and I can't understand why and how most other people do
not do it! After all, we have many thoughts about many things. It's
natural to express them. We do so in conversation, why not in
writing? Maybe people do not trust this comparatively new process.
It is only 100 years or so since the right to universal primary education was
introduced in Britain and Ireland. Much the same in other countries I
speculate. So writing is not as natural as speaking. But it's a great
thing, a marvellous advance, and why people do not use it beyond filling in a
Tax Form or making out a shopping list is beyond me. It's an aid to
thinking, to personal expression, to communication between individuals.
But a lot of people don't do it, don't develop the facility. Pity.
Now that I have had my moan let me reproduce two letters that
I wrote recently, during and following a visit to my son Conor in Dundee,
checking how he is settling into new accommodation in the city. Got a
great welcome. He cooked some marvellous meals in his new kitchen - much
more creative and adventurous than my plebeian approach to problem of
cooking. Probably this is his strength - my problem appears to him as an
opportunity.
But back to writing.
Passing through Belfast airport prompted the letter below (emailed to
Irish Newspaper Editors):
Sir,The International Airport at Belfast is the least impressive airport terminal I have ever passed through.New arrivals stumble across a dizzy carpet full of irrelevant local adverts - where there should be impressive mosaics of our beautiful countryside & it's people - the Mournes, the fishing ports of County Down, St. Patrick at Slemish & Saul - Antrim Coast waterfalls, the Carrickarede Rope Bridge, Giants Causeway, Goliath & the building of the Titanic - our wonderful golf courses (not merely Royal Portrush & RCD) - along with images of Heaney and his poetry, Van Morrison songs, James Galway and his wonderful flute, actors Kenneth Branagh, Jimmy Nesbitt & Liam Neeson; writers C.S. Lewis & Brian Moore; international sports stars such as Mary Peters, George Best & Darren Clarke - plus references to Harry Ferguson and James Boyd Dunlop.We do not do ourselves justice. It's sad to see such lack of imagination.I see also that it is still not possible to buy a coffee along with a whiskey or brandy at the 'Aldergrove Bar' in the departurelounge (despite the misleading notice outside ).
No coffee served in the 'Aldergrove Bar' at Belfast Airport - despite the notice.
Food? A packet of crisps.One must decide whether to bring one's whiskey to the very basic restaurant - 86 yards away -or risk leaving one's drink on the counter and make a double journey to bring a coffee to the bar.
Belfast International Airport?Ballygobackwards Provincial Aerodrome!Yours,.
Michael O'Shea,36 High Street, Ardglass, Co. Down BT30 7TUTel: 02844841436
I am told it was published in the Belfast Telegraph and some other papers, but I haven't seen anything. I just don't read newspapers anymore. Too much oul' gossip. I get enough basic info from TV & Radio News & Features - and on sleepless occasions on BBC World Radio (fascinating stuff about Patagonia etc. Gets you away from Norn' Ireland!)
David Dunseith also interviewed me on Radio Ulster's 'Talkback' programme, but I never even heard this!
I just hope that NI Ministers, the NI Tourist Board, and those who run the Belfast Airport at Aldergrove, are moved to do something about the dopey dullness that afflicts this airport. It's a bloody disgrace!
Another letter I wrote while in Dundee was perhaps more important. It was to a dear friend who is dying. She will remain anonymous - for she is a very private person - but I cannot help feeling sad, very concerned.
She has a terminal illness that demands home dialysis each day, for about 12 hours. I love her dearly. I know she has very definite feelings about me. She gave me the two fingers when I was last in her house, taking a picture of her drying her hair! A merry lady.
And what a courageous woman!
No complaints. Just total acceptance that she is going to die - and she does not believe in God, in an afterlife of any kind. She has worked all her adult life for physically and mentally impaired people, and is now going to die without any explanation. I could not do it. I want an explanation for everything - including how a good God (whom I profoundly believe in) can possibly have created a world which is subject to so much evil. I'll not go into this now. It's not the place. But if you wish to pursue my thoughts on this you can do so here.
The letter I wrote to her - the first one written longhand for 25 years - is, of course, private, but the last page contains a reflection that may be useful to other people facing death. (That's all of us of course!)
This is it - without comment - except that the handwriting is abominable. My excuse is that I was not feeling so good while I was in Dundee. It took a course of penicillin to bring me out of the dark cloud that surrounded me. Not as bad as the dark cloud that my friend lives in.
The last remaining enemy is death!