It was late 1984. George Michael was gorgeous, everyone wanted a Gremlin for Christmas and Bob Geldof was the hero of the hour. I was in first year of secondary school, 12 years old and going to bed at night with a wish that I wouldn’t wake up in the morning.
In August, 1980, I’d been through a fire. It was, literally, a blazing inferno at the Central Hotel in Bundoran, Co Donegal. My dad climbed up a drainpipe to get to the room where me and my younger sister were sound asleep.
What I remember is a booming sound and the burn of the floor on my bare feet. I recall my sister shrieking, the air feeling hot and men below the window holding up their hands to catch me. I remember worrying they’d see up my nightie and Daddy shouting “jump!”.
And then, standing with strangers, sparks raining and sirens. Waiting so, so long for my dad to come out. He’d gone deeper into it, trying to rescue the little girl we’d been playing with on the beach. He couldn’t get to her.
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My childish faith in God’s protection went up with the smoke.
If it happened now, a GP, or somebody, would recommend counselling, but that wasn’t the way of things then. I remember the long drive home in clothes that weren’t my own and Granny standing at her open door, waiting. That’s all. Not one person spoke of it again. Well, they didn’t speak of it to me. My parents’ marriage was fractured. Four chaotic years later, my father and sister left.
I was close to silent.
My English teacher was a H.Dip student, a young woman with long, dark hair that was always a bit messy. In my mind’s eye, I’m probably blending the memory of her with an image of Kate Bush. She wore bangles that jangled and fringed skirts with little mirrors stitched into the fabric. She began with Walter de la Mare and moved on to Ezra Pound. She spoke about similes and metaphors, alliteration and onomatopoeia – words with potential.
Hoping we might write something real, I suppose, she set an unusual homework assignment. For one week, we were to keep a diary. We were to resist the temptation to simply describe what had happened; it wasn’t to be our “News of the Day”. We were to write out our feelings. The deal was that she would never see this homework. She trusted us.
I’d like her to know that all those feelings got poured into a novel
This girl took to it like the proverbial duck.
Mostly, I wrote how I felt about Remington Steele and Madonna, and the status of the spot on my chin. But when I needed it, I had a release valve, a way to scream. Writing slowed my mind, cooled it, gave me a chance to parse my feelings. Writing quelled that ever-present panic.
I kept my diary for 20 years, until my eldest child learned to read. I pivoted towards writing letters then, sending those excavated feelings out of the house, through the post to gentle friends.
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Undoubtedly, I overshared. I still do. It’s the habit of a lifetime now. If I pick up a pen, my emotions pour out. Eventually, I wrote a novel, full of my feelings but avoiding my childhood. And then, I got brave and wrote another one.
I believe in my heart that my English teacher saved me, not only in the sense of keeping me alive in a bad moment, but in gifting me a method to make my life better.
To my shame, I can’t remember her name. A friendly secretary at my old school interrogated the staffroom, but my story rang no bells.
My best guess is that she graduated with a degree in English, probably from UCC, in 1984, and was completing her H.Dip teaching qualification at Presentation Convent, Bandon, in 1984/85. She would be in her early to mid-60s now, approaching retirement.
I’d like her to know that way back then, by accident or design, she did a very good thing. I’d like her to know that all those feelings got poured into a novel, and I’d like her to know that my new book is dedicated to her. Fifty-three-year-old me, on behalf of 12-year-old me, would like to say “thank you”.
Lynda Marron is a writer who lives in Cork. Her novel, The Bridge to Always, is published by Eriu.
