Wouldn’t it have been great altogether if Decker McHugh or anyone else at Macroom’s wake had been sensible or sober enough to tell me that rough seas make the best sailors? Wouldn’t it have been even better if I’d figured it out for myself before it was too late?

2

I have travelled – two bumpy miles from The Hill where I was born to where I live now. If you had to crawl with a pig on your back it would seem like a big journey, says Auntie Eileen. She has an eye for the bright side.

The Hill is my father Frank Rattigan’s place, known as that because it sits on Dergmoy, the highest of the five pudding-bowl hills of the Cloon Valley. The other four are Muckle, Sessiagh, Aghabovey and Glebe, each with its own patchwork quilt of greens, brown and purple. The house is a big square pebble-dashed, two-storey affair with many barns and sheds at its back. It’s also a landmark. Strangers looking to cross over the border into the Republic of Ireland are often advised to turn right at the Ban Rattigans’, which makes it sound like a mighty mountain range when it’s only a farm.

I had sixteen years at The Hill. I learned to pray there and I learned to give up on prayers there. I learned how to keep my mouth shut, to not let a single thing show on my face though my insides churned and burned. I learned that I was nothing. I learned how to take a slap and to never forget that it was no one’s fault but mine that I’d needed it.

I only have to close my eyes to see the way the light caught the corner of the sofa in the Good Room and eventually bleached a pink triangle on the red material. The way Daddy always left his wellies with the toes pointing towards the back door as if he couldn’t wait to be outside again. The way the kitchen always smelt of fresh scone on a wire that was not to be touched. The way there was nowhere to hide. The way my dream of leaving it came true so quickly that it took my breath away for years.