Free Country Days by Alice; Taylor

jars.
    In a deep cupboard
    Spirit of warm days,
    Bring to barren winter
    The taste of whitethorn honey.

A P RAYER AND A P INT
    A RRIVING IN B ALLYBUNION at one o’clock in the morning with rain lashing off the windscreen and flickering neon lights reflecting off the glistening street might not be everybody’s idea of the right start to a holiday. But as I left the town behind and pulled up in front of the pink-washed house perched high over the sea, the holiday anticipation of childhood awakened within me.
    Waves thundered against the black rocks below, shouting an awesome welcome, while sea spray like natural holy water showered me in a returning benediction. The one-walled castle silhouetted against the black angry sea presided over the restless monster at her feet with the ghostly eeriness of another life.
    The following morning, after sleeping the sleep of the holiday-maker, I awoke to a howling wind which invited me out to do battle with it along the empty strand and up over the cliffs. The sea was at its most aggressive, belting off the grim, black, forbidding rocks that faced it with towering arrogance while the sea shot sprays of contemptuous spittle into its dark,brooding eyes.
    Leaving turbulent nature behind, I arrived at the church where quietness was preserved inside the old grey stone walls and candelabras of flickering candles penetrated the gloom. People slipped in quietly. Women with gentle faces and elastic stockings, the hallmark of childbearing years. Professional men with greying hair and soft leather shoes, their faces wearied from absorbing a daily barrage of other people’s problems. Here they sat, relaxed in a temporary haven from their demanding world. Three priests came forth from the sacristy. It was to be a concelebrated mass, as holidaying priests swelled the presbytery staff: the first, a dark young man with the strutting arrogance of youth, the next a middle-aged one less assured, and finally an older man serene and confident that having come down a long road he was still going in the right direction.
    Afterwards the people trooped out: the gentle women, the grey-haired men and others with tight, hard faces who had failed to find what they came for. Going into the paper shop across the road, I met the old priest coming out. We shook hands and chatted because we had known each other when he had been a young priest, I a brash teenager. We talked about the Ballybunion of my childhood, when people brought their own food and the guesthouse owners did the cooking. He told me how they had identified the different pieces of meat in the pots with bits of coloured ribbon. What gay pots bubbledon the Ballybunion cookers in those days!
    Breakfast over, my energetic brood departed for the beach and I walked with my mother, now in the winter of her years, up into the town. The old on holidays are far less demanding than the young, as they have slowed down in the restful waters of old age and draw you into their tranquil pace for temporary respite. Other old people walked slowly along, shepherded by middle-aged sons or daughters, the role of former years reversed. Sometimes the shepherd was a jeans-clad, sneakered teenager, and granny and grandchild laughed happily together as he made fun of her infirmity, the young infusing the old with their reckless energy and carrying them along on their wave of high spirits.
    My mother had a brooch in her bag that needed repair, so we set out for the jewellery shop at the far end of the town. Over the years she had brought stopped watches, alarm clocks and even bigger clocks on holidays to be repaired by an old man in this shop. He had been a wonderful watch and clock repairer and over the yearly holiday encounters had become a friend. He had died during the previous winter and now his son was in charge, so she was sailing in uncharted waters. When we arrived in the shop, she slowly opened her bag and took out a matchbox. The puzzled jeweller and I viewed the