Just Mary (3 page)

I hated boarding school with a passion. Just as my mother had vowed to send her daughters to Loreto, I vowed that as regards any children I might have in future, I would never send them away. I
missed my home; I missed my father and all the family; I missed my friends. I hated the cold; I hated the food; I suffered with the loneliness of it all. Yes, I made friends but somehow I never got
over my wish to be at home rather than where I was. I became a prickly teenager, noted for being vaguely subversive and not at all like my ‘good’ sister, with whom I was constantly
compared. But there was one sterling aspect about life in Loreto, and that was the way we were taught and with this came the realisation that learning could be exotic and interesting, and that
there were worlds outside ours to be explored through books and through conversations and in classes. I loved the wonderful library there, where I could continue to enjoy the adventure and
excitement of reading, which had begun in my home in my very early years. I developed a schoolgirl crush — we all had them — on a Mother Benedicta, who taught us Latin. Looking back
now, I realise that she was a brilliant woman who instilled and fostered in me a love of the Latin language, of the
Odes
of Horace and so many other classical works. I enjoyed sports too,
and in my last year was appointed captain of all the Dublin Loreto schools at netball. All of this side of school life was exciting and it made up in important ways for the barren loneliness of
being a boarder, as I experienced it. It was always cold and we were always hungry: these were my two dominant impressions at the time.

My love of Latin flourished, however, and has stayed with me. I got Honours in my Leaving Cert Latin and indeed when I started my teaching career, it was Latin I wanted to teach. But of course
it eventually disappeared as a subject from the general curriculum and is now taught in just a few chosen schools. I think this a great mistake because Latin is the foundation for all other
languages and its concision, language structure and clarity of thought are qualities which would stand many a writer now in very good stead.

By the time I left Loreto Convent, Bray in 1954 at the age of 17, my brother Brian had concluded his law career at
UCD
. Meanwhile Paddy had begun studies in agricultural
science, but left after one year to go to England. My sister Anne had completed her hotel management training in the college based in Shannon Airport, while my father and mother had purchased and
re-established the family home in the Hodson Bay Hotel in Athlone. So life had changed utterly for me during my final years at school.

That summer of 1954, and indeed during the long college holidays in subsequent years, I helped out in the Hodson Bay Hotel: like my siblings, I was expected to work — there was no such
thing as three months spent hanging around. I worked in the kitchen, washing dishes; I worked in the bar; I worked in the bedrooms. I can’t remember if I received a regular payment, but from
time to time my father would give me money — enough for me to get by on. I had friends in the area and we went for all of our entertainment to Athlone town and the nearby rural areas, where
marquee dancing was the excitement of the day. A large tent would be erected in a field, miles from nowhere, and one of the foremost bands of the day would play until 3 a.m. There we young girls
met our opposite numbers in the young fellows, and the encounters which followed were often strange, interesting and exciting.

I learned to drive when I was very young, just 16 or thereabouts. An experience from those days has always stayed in my mind as one of those key moments in my life, and very much indicative of
my upbringing. I was barely 17 at the time and very useful to my father during the holidays as a driver. The railway station in Athlone had to be visited every day to pick up fresh chickens and
fresh salmon, which would be sent via rail from Limerick and Monaghan and such places for the numerous weddings we hosted in the hotel and for which we had quickly established a good reputation. My
father had a big, old-fashioned, two-tone Rover car and one of my first drives on my own was into
CIÉ
to collect boxes of fresh provisions. With some help, I loaded
up at the station and then set out on the road again, to drive the three miles back to the Hodson Bay. I careered into a ditch, however, and got a right fright. There were no mobile phones then of
course, but I went to a neighbouring house: that of Delia Donnelly, who ran a typing school — I knew she had a landline. We telephoned my father at the hotel, and I told him what had
happened.

‘Are you hurt? Are you alright?’ he said. Fortunately I was fine.

‘Did you hurt anyone?’ was the next question.

‘No, just a ditch.’

‘Well then, you’re fine. I’ll be there for you shortly.’ And so he was.

The very next day, without any hesitation, he sent me off again in the car. I have always thought how that was the right thing to do at the time, as I have been a fairly fearless driver ever
since. It was a lesson well taught and a lesson well learned.

I had what was considered a good Leaving Cert — Honours in English, Latin, Drawing, History and Botany — a strange assortment of subjects. My parents could afford to send me to
college and it had always been assumed I would go to
UCD
. I remember my father asking, ‘What would you like to do, what would you like to be?’ I had replied,
‘I would love to be a journalist’, but back in 1954, there were very few women journalists about. It is funny that I was always interested, and continue to be interested, in the world
of media and journalism. Anyway, my father insisted that the first thing I needed to do was to get a good
BA
degree, and of course he was right. I was enrolled at
UCD
— which was then in Earlsfort Terrace — to study Arts.

My first term at
UCD
began in early October and it had been decided that I would lodge in Loreto Hall, which was a hostel for first-year students. I ended up staying
there for the three years. Earlsfort Terrace was literally beside Loreto Hall, so if you had a lecture at 9 a.m., you could get up at 8.55 a.m. and still be there on time — and that was the
way I lived those early days! I also developed a habit that has remained with me throughout my life. I was not what one would call a steady studier — although I was a consistent attendee at
lectures and always keen to absorb everything which passed within the confines of the campus between the students and the tutors. My pattern of study had quickly developed into that of a
last-minute ‘spurter’, with a frenzy of work in, say, the last six weeks before an examination, when I would study flat out and really achieve results. Somehow my brain wasn’t
suited to the long slog, but rather to the hard, frenetic, eleventh-hour dash. To this day, if I have study or work to do, I will always leave it to the very last minute, as this is what works best
for me.

I liked the atmosphere of college life — there were always things to do and people to talk to — but my enjoyment of those years was based above all on my thirst for knowledge and the
stimulation of learning. I went to my lectures, even though I wouldn’t have been a great note-taker. In the first term of my first year, I took Latin, English and Sociology. There would be
300–400 students in the English lectures, if you chose to go, which I did — there was a wonderful English lecturer called Lorna Reynolds, who later became a professor at University
College, Galway.

My father’s first cousin, the historian Robert Dudley Edwards, was the head of History in
UCD
at the time. One day I was seated in this vast lecture hall and in
came Dudley Edwards with long, flowing, curly grey hair, wearing his gown, as he always did. All at once, he boomed out at the top of his voice, ‘Is there a Mary Lenihan here?’ I was
mortified. I put up my hand and when he commanded in that loud, resonant voice, ‘Come with me’, everyone around me started murmuring and laughing. I followed him outside, where he
questioned me, ‘How come you didn’t join my History class?’ I replied in a mumble and he just said, ‘You are to start taking History
now
!’ And I did. Later
on, I was delighted I had followed his advice, as he was a wonderful lecturer.

I enjoyed hostel life, as restrictive as it was, certainly by today’s standards. My older brother Brian was living at that time in Dublin in an apartment quite near me, with two other
fellows. Any time you wanted to stay out late, you would have to get permission, so Brian would say to the staff at the hostel, ‘I am taking my sister to . . .’ — it would always
be a worthy place. Of course I wouldn’t be going out with him at all: I would be staying over at a friend’s flat. In that sense, I was never restricted. I was reared in a house with two
boys, so meeting the opposite sex wasn’t a big novelty for me. Of course though, we girls would be eyeing up all the boys at college. I remember at one stage, I used to sit three seats down
from Tony O’Reilly in the lecture hall!

I completed my first year and I always remember how my English lecturer Lorna Reynolds wrote to my father and mother, saying that I should continue English as I had got a very good mark. My
parents were delighted and it was decided that I would do a ‘Group 4’ English, which was a complete English degree with an ancillary subject — French was mine.

I met Enda O’Rourke that summer while working in the Hodson Bay Hotel. I was just 18. I was playing tennis on the court adjoining the hotel and he was there with some of his friends. I
heard him say, ‘Who is that girl?’ and we were duly introduced. I fell for him straight away. Two years my senior, he was interesting and a bit of a lad, but initially, it was above all
a physical attraction: I loved his looks, his dark hair and dark skin. It was this physical liking which turned into love and led to us getting married. Throughout our long married life together,
Enda and I never lost that sense of attraction and delight in one another.

The Crescent Ballroom in Athlone was the favourite place at the time for my age group to go. It was owned by the legendary Syd Shine (who is still alive today), and he played there with his
band, the Syd Shine Orchestra. In the beginning I would just arrange to see Enda there on a Thursday night when the band was playing. We didn’t have proper dates, with him bringing me there
and so on, but we soon graduated to that. I remember standing outside just before we went in, watching people weaving in and out and dancing. I have a very vivid memory of them dancing
old-fashioned quick steps and foxtrots, and so on. Enda and I went there on a regular basis. I had been out with guys in Dublin — harmless things, like walking home from English Lit. debates
— but Enda was my first serious romance. I knew pretty quickly that he was the one; I don’t know if he knew as quickly as I did. I also knew, however, that I had to finish my degree, as
I had only completed one year.

After that summer, I went back to
UCD
and Enda would come up to Dublin to see me. It was quite intense and I would go home on a more regular basis because I had something
to go home for. When I was about 19, we made the joint decision that we would break up for a while and see what happened. I don’t remember being upset about it, so it must have been a mutual
decision. We decided we should ‘play the field’ for a bit, just to see if what was between us was real. Looking back now, I suppose it was a pretty modern way of approaching the
relationship. Before Enda had met me, he had had a girlfriend and I used to tease him about her. She was away doing a Physical Education course, which was very glamorous and up-to-the-moment, I
thought.

During the period when we temporarily broke up, we both went out with other people, although not in a very serious way. I met a guy called Gerry O’Malley, who was a very well-known
Roscommon footballer. He was quite a few years older than me, and very quiet and shy. We started to go on a few dates. From time to time, I would hear that Enda had been out with his girlfriend
from before. Of course, we ended up getting back together again. I think we must have met somewhere and when we saw each other again, we knew that this was it.

I remember how Enda and I were out at something in Athlone — I must have been about 19 or 20 years old — and we both knew, without saying it, that we would be together for the rest
of our lives. He asked me something like, ‘We’ll stay together won’t we?’ and I replied, ‘Oh yeah, yeah.’ And he then said, ‘You know what I mean,
don’t you?’ I told him that I did, and I asked, ‘Forever?’ and he said ‘Yes’. I don’t think he actually said the words, ‘will you marry me?’
and there was certainly no going down onto one knee or anything like that.

In those days, there was no such thing as living in sin — absolutely not. Now, you went pretty near to the edge from time to time, but you didn’t take the final step. We are talking
about 1950s Ireland, where the worst thing that could happen to a young, unmarried woman was to get pregnant. That really was the very worst thing — worse than failing exams or falling out
with your parents or people throwing stones at you! I had sufficient awareness of the facts of life to know that it was very easy to tip into, and while we had a very sexual relationship, we always
stopped short. It was constant self-denial, which was very frustrating. But you knew you had to wait until you had been to the church and had the ring firmly on your finger.

Meanwhile I was nearing the end of my time at
UCD
. In my final year, I studied Old and Middle English texts, such as
Beowulf
and Chaucer and so on, which were of
great interest to me because of my background in Latin. I also loved Wordsworth. There were only 12 in my English class, among them the late Gus Martin, who would later become renowned as author
and editor of some key educational texts, including the seminal
Soundings
poetry anthology for Leaving Cert.

I got an Honours
BA
, which was regarded as a good degree. When I was preparing for my final exams, a delegation from Newfoundland came over: it was like a hiring fair,
and they were looking for people to teach over there. I went for an interview, and lo and behold, I was offered a job as a teacher in Newfoundland. I came home and told my parents that I was going
to teach in another country. ‘Well, you certainly are not!’ said my father. Years later, I remember telling that story on
RTÉ
Radio 1 and afterwards
getting a letter from a fella — a real Fine Gaeler, I assume — which simply said, ‘Pity you didn’t go to Newfoundland’!