CHAPTER TWO

On arriving back in our home town of Charleville in the winter of eighteen thirty, we went straight to our Uncle Michaels house to thank him for the kindness he had shown our sadly departed mother. It was a great surprise for him to see the both of us again; and he instantly invited us into the house and within a few minutes the table had been laid and our Auntie Hannah was busily preparing a meal for us. Later they told us about our poor mother’s brief illness and also that that our bank had given him the funds we had arranged. He then went onto tell us that our parents cabin was now occupied by the O’Farrell family who I knew were distant relations of my father. We sat there chatting that night not realising how late it was, but fortunately both our Aunt and Uncle insisted we stayed with them until we found somewhere of our own to live. Before we went to sleep that night I thanked Owen for insisting we return home as I now understood his reasoning.

The next morning after a leisurely breakfast we went to visit our parent’s grave with Michael and Hannah where we paid our belated respects to our dear mother. On seeing my mother’s grave for the first time tears flooded from my eyes and I realised that I should have been there in her hour of need. All my life she was always the one I turned to when I needed help and advice and she had never let me down. As far as I can remember we had never had a cross word and she had always encouraged me to make something of myself. Both her and my father had struggled for years on a pittance and she had great hopes that Owen and I would better ourselves. When I finally stopped crying I asked my companions to leave me as I wanted to grieve alone, I must have stood there for hours thinking of all the wonderful times I had shared with my mother and before I left her graveside that day I made a solemn promise that come what may I would keep my promise and one day have my own farm.

In the weeks leading up to Christmas Owen and I began to look for a small farm to rent, but we were soon found that everywhere was now closed until the New Year. In the meantime we helped our Aunt and Uncle prepare for the Christmas celebrations. For them money was tight and so they were grateful for the financial help we were able to give them. Both Owen and I had not realised how tired we were after four years of very hard work and so this brief interlude was like a holiday for us. For me Christmas Day at my Uncle Michael’s, reminded me of many previous Christmas’s spent with my parents in the past, firstly we went to early mass, then home to help our Auntie prepare the feast as she had invited lots of our old friends for the traditional dinner. Later the music started with the party carryin