I Think I Settled On

I Don't Believe In Happiness Anyway... It's Too Much Of An American Pastime, This Search For Happiness. Just Forget Happiness And Enjoy Your Misery.

I Don't Absolve My Father Completely Of His Responsibility For What He Did To Us I Feel Compassion, Maybe. He Had His Demons. But I Still Can't Understand How A Man Can Walk Away From Children. And Leave Them To Starve, As We Nearly Did, If It Wasn't For My Mother Going Out And Begging.

You Have To Give Yourself Credit, Not Too Much Because That Would Be Bragging.

Sit And Quiet Yourself. Luxuriate In A Certain Memory And The Details Will Come. Let The Images Flow. You'll Be Amazed At What Will Come Out On Paper. I'm Still Learning What It Is About The Past That I Want To Write. I Don't Worry About It. It Will Emerge. It Will Insist On Being Told.

People Everywhere Brag And Whimper About The Woes Of Their Early Years, But Nothing Can Compare With The Irish Version: The Poverty; The Shiftless Loquacious Father; The Pious Defeated Mother Moaning By The Fire; Pompous Priests; Bullying School Masters; The English And The Terrible Things They Did To Us For Eight Hundred Long Years. Above All -- We Were Wet.