Cahore Girls

You know that feeling? A smell or an atmosphere or a certain light? It transports you way back when? Well, I had it today. I was suddenly back in Cahore, County Wexford. Fuck knows why. I was in Oakville, Ontario beside a massive outdoor pool but it hit me anyway. It wasn’t the fact that there wasn’t a shop for miles and I couldn’t understand their accents or they couldn’t understand mine. It wasn’t the fact that the sun shone all day. It wasn’t the fact that I had nothing to do and all day to do it. Well, maybe it was all of those things. But I was transported back to Cahore nonetheless.

In Cahore I’d wake up about ten. I’d head out tousle-headed for breakfast in the mobile home my Mam and Dad owned. I’d be greeted by my snivelling little brother who would accuse me of wanking the previous night and keeping him awake (I was 13, he was 10) and to be truthful, it was definitely the other way round. He was a proper delph-rattler in his time was my brother. Every fucking morning we had to go through that particular charade. He knows the truth...

Anyway, most of my cousins had mobile homes in the same park. One or two or all of them would call in around 12 and off we’d go. What did we get up to? Well I can’t speak for my brother but the rest of us(and him) would just get our bikes and piss off. Freedom? You can’t put a price on that.

Cahore was and still is less than a one horse town. The Strand Bar, a pier, a beach, Eddie Sinnott’s pool hall...and that was it. Oh, and a couple of tennis courts. During Wimbledon, you couldn’t get a booking. Pretend Stefan Edbergs everywhere.

When we were really small kids, my Dad and my uncles Joe and Damien would drag us down to the pier of a Sunday and make us jump in to the freezing cold waters. Waters that sometimes had ‘floaters’ in them. To this day, I see no difference between Dad, Joe and Damien and Hitler, Goebbels and Herr Flick. Proper sadists. They created a fictional club called ‘The Geronimo Club’. And if you didn’t jump in first time, they’d discuss your ‘membership’ in The Strand afterwards. The cue for them to get out was “Look, the Heineken sign is lighting up”. Actually, upon mature recollection, they were fucking genii. Get the kids down and get plastered...hats off.

Tuesday night was ‘Disco Night’. Ooh, the epitome of glamour. A bus would pick up all those of teenage years at the gate at 8 and it would be bound for the Hacienda of Kilmuckridge, ‘The Hydro’.
I’d lash on the hair-gel so I’d resemble Marcus Tandy and throw fuckloads of my Dad’s Old Spice on my baby-esque face in the hope of “getting me hole”. Funny that I never managed it isn’t it? Well, maybe with some Wexford girl who knew no better but the Dublin girls knew the score, God bless ‘em.
The night was spent in the corner talking to nobody except the Dublin lads until the slow set. The slow set usually consisted of some Bon Jovi offering or God forbid and more than likely, fucking ‘Patience’ by fucking Guns ‘N’ Fucking Roses. Couldn’t wait to get on the bus back to Cahore so we could spit on the bus driver’s head...

The next day was spent avoiding the girl you didn’t kiss and didn’t talk to. We were all as guilty as each other. We should’ve stuck together, right here, right now, in sweet harmony (to use the lyrics of a popular song of the period) but we didn’t. We were idiots as teenagers. As teenagers are now. And always will be.

Wednesday nights were back to playing a football match at 7 in front of the tennis courts ,trying to impress the girl you should’ve talked to the night before but didn’t and spent the whole day avoiding. “I’ll impress her by making Geoff look like a fucking mug” you thought to yourself. And you made him look a mug, but it didn’t impress her.

And for that attitude alone, I raise a glass to the girls of Cahore(Dublin ones) in 91-92-93-94. Throw your hands up at me...and Kev...and Jimmy....and Barry...and John...You ain’t no WAGS and never will be.x.