Phil Quinlan doesn’t get as annoyed as you’d think he might when he sees someone parking in a disabled space. Oh, it rankles, don’t worry about that. But he learned a long time ago that whatever itch he has when it comes to this stuff is better scratched with humour than with anger.
“I’m delighted it worked for you,” he shouted one time at a lad who was walking away from his car having neatly covered the painted wheelchair sign with all four wheels.
“What?”
“Such a pity it didn’t work for me – and I’ve been there twice!”
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This is who he is. Maybe it’s who he always was, maybe it’s who he had to become. He was 16 years old when he went up for a header in 1989 and came down to a life transformed. A clash of heads with a schoolfriend left him in a coma.
When he woke, he was paralysed down his right side. Over time, he got the use of himself again but the 34 years since – the anniversary is next weekend – have been filled with chronic pain, a signature limp and a constant battle with his legs and feet to find some small level of comfort.
The life he had was one of non-stop sport and activity. He ran cross-country for Meath. He played soccer with Parkvilla, he won county medals with his school. That whole side of his life turned to vapour in an instant and he’s spent 3½ decades since trying to get back on his feet.
Quinlan spent plenty of time being miserable. He spent plenty of time being bitter. He doesn’t have the time or inclination for any of that these days – married, with two kids, working with special needs students, he has far too much present going on to spend any time stewing on the past. But he has always wanted to write about it, to piece together what happened then and since. Hence his book, And A Bang On The Ear.
“I started it in 2016,” he says. “It was initially written just for Eileen and Joe [his two kids]. Something to leave them, something for them to read when I’m gone and go, ‘I never knew this, I never knew that – Jesus, he did more than the average disabled punter.’
“Because there’s not many left like me who lived to tell the tale. I’ve been called loads of names from Hop Along to Keyser Soze. I was dropping a friend up to Beaumont Hospital about six or seven years ago to get test results. And I came across a porter who used to bring me up and down to physio and occupational therapy from the Richmond Ward where I was. Elvis was his nickname because he always had a big quiff.
“I said, ‘Elvis! You won’t remember me. I was in the Richmond Ward in the early 90s.’ And he looked at me and he said, ‘Son, there’s not many f**kers still alive from the Richmond Ward back then.’ That was the main head injury ward. It was heartening to hear.
“I know other people on their disabled journey might be bitter. I was bitter in 2001 when my back went on me. For four years, the chronic back pain really hurt me and really got to me. I was living on my own so I could afford to sulk on my own. Now when the pain sets in, Helena [his wife] tells me to cop myself on. That works for me, having been reared on that sort of tough love in the 80s.”
The book is almost a kind of scrapbook, like a collage of memories or a series of flashed moments that come at you like subliminal advertising. The moment that changed his life happened in November 1989 and though he talked to dozens of people – family, friends, people who were around Navan at the time – what he found most of all was that no two people recall it all the same way.
The opposition never know how to take me when I’m flying up and down the sideline on the powerchair. They’re very nice with their insults to me
That’s the thing with memory. It’s unreliable and mercurial and eternally a swing at a moving target. He laughs when he says the one thing he’d love to have would be mobile phone footage of the clash of heads. Just to see. Just to check if the picture of it all that he has in his head tallies with how it all happened.
“I was better travelling solo. Because people are quicker to approach you, especially abroad. In Ireland, we keep the head down. But abroad, they come straight over to you. The language barrier is broken, the disability barrier is broken.
“I broke out of the cotton wool syndrome that Mam and Dad wrapped me in. Obviously, they were going to wrap me in it. Because they didn’t think I was up to much maybe. But I needed to get out and make my own way. They were just sh*tting bricks when I did it, when I went to France the first time. Then I left a good job in the Meath County Council to go to work in New Jersey. I went to work in a special needs summer camp for three months. That really opened my eyes.
“Then I went to Australia and had to stand on my own two feet. I went over with 300 quid in my arse pocket and a one-way ticket. You chance your arm, you do anything to make a few quid. I was just ambitious.
“I went over, straight into the computers. When they saw me walking in, they thought, ‘Aw here’s a spoofer’ so they said they needed to assess me. But I got in and showed them typing skills of 70-80 words a minute. I love changing people’s minds like that. Changing their perceptions of me. I love seeing the smiles of people’s face when they start thinking, ‘Oh this f**ker is showing us up here.’”
His life now is richer and deeper and wider than anyone could have imagined when they were calling for the priest to give him the last rites in 1989. Joe is nine, Eileen is 12. He lives through them and their sport and their ups and downs.
“I can be on the sideline barking encouragement. And the opposition never know how to take me when I’m flying up and down the sideline on the powerchair. They’re very nice with their insults to me. These days, the world has gone PC-mad. I have taken it for 30 years and I can give it back a wee bit as well.
“The most apparent outcome of writing my book was when people I’ve seen noticing me for years, finally approach me and apologise. ‘Great read son but sorry I never knew what happened you and what you go through on a daily basis.’ Some only want to see my limp. They don’t realise all the extra baggage that comes with a brain injury.
“Others don’t realise the daily pain or the immense thought that goes into me having to navigate a few steps. They didn’t realise it was just playing a friendly game of football and I don’t have a contagious disease.
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“It’s always been sport. I couldn’t have married a more fitting sports fan. Helena knows what she’s on about. She won a county final in 2009 a couple of weeks before we got married. Sport has always been something to dive into, to better myself.
“Maybe subconsciously, I’m trying to better myself. This morning, I got into work before seven and did 20 minutes on the bike. I need to keep going. If I get too used to this powerchair, my legs won’t be any good any more. So I want to keep going as long as I can. I think I have 15 years left before I retire and I want to be able to keep doing the job I’m doing because I love it so much. The only thing that will stop me is the legs.”
They haven’t stopped him yet.
– And A Bang On The Ear by Phil Quinlan and Stephen O’Rourke (O’Brien Press) is available now, priced €17.99
