Warmth of others after my brother’s death

We met strangers who were friends of his, with tears in their eyes at his passing. It was very touching and comforting.

A truly brutal truth of the family kind is that we lost a beloved and special brother, Seán, last week, suddenly, savagely, unexpectedly.

For many years, in his role as agricultural correspondent for the Irish Times until retirement last year, Seán was a true friend and champion of Irish farmers.

The family saw that, at his weekend funeral in Dublin, when all levels of the industry paid their respects, and even President Higgins, himself a countryman, was represented.

Seán’s longtime colleagues in the industry, notably including Ray Ryan of the Irish Examiner, were there, with real grief and shock inscribed on their faces, mirroring that of our heartbroken clan, and especially his immediate family. It will take us a long time to recover, and that is the pure truth altogether.

At a time like this, it is much too easy to become too sentimental and maudlin. I will not go there.

All I will say is that my brother, only 66, and healthy all his hardworking career in journalism, was a lovely and gentle countryman, a mighty brother and friend, a good husband, father and grandfather, and great craic in social circles.

I am delighted to say that we met far more often than usual throughout this past summer, always at joyful family celebrations, and that is some comfort.

No more than the rest of us ordinary Irishmen, he was not perfect and, by my reckoning, he will spend six weeks and four days in Purgatory, before eventually being admitted to a well-earned Paradise.

Seán lived in Rathfarnham in Dublin and, especially since his retirement last year, hugely enjoyed his weekly music sessions in Saint John’s GAA Club, five minutes walk from his home.

He was a core member of the musicians who sang and played for the members of a warm-hearted club which is central to the community.

He enjoyed the session there on the night of his death, the last song he sang was his younger brother Mickie’s classic, ‘Only Our Rivers Run Free’, he walked home afterwards, and was stricken by a major heart attack, apparently, in his own bed in the small hours of the morning.

It was as quick and simply lethal as that. It was what he would have wished, had he the choice. And that is the pure truth too.

Forgetting altogether for the moment about one family’s tragedy, the concurrent point I would like to make arising from our clan experience after his funeral is the vital centrality and worth of the GAA and its community clubs to Irish lives.

After Seán was cremated, in Mount Jerome, we went back for the routine reception to the Saint John’s clubhouse, and the largely rural clan from the four provinces were quite astounded by the compassion and genuine grieving of the urban club members and staff.

We met strangers who were friends of his, with tears in their eyes at his passing. You don’t expect that in the city. It was very touching and comforting and inclusive.

Given his Fermanagh background and interest in music and song, it was magnificent that the Saint John’s club men and their community built a traditional Irish countryman’s wake, with music and song in his honour.

There was a minute’s silence too, the previous evening. It was altogether apt and heartwarming, and emphasised for all of us the special place which the GAA has in our communities in both country and city.

As we grieved together, we saw juvenile hurlers and footballers and their families gathered together around the clubhouse tables, joining in the wake’s music and song, warmly sympathising and empathising with another family’s hardest hours, kinda holding our hands, tears visible in the eyes of many.

You would not get a stronger community sense in a remote parish anywhere in the provinces.

And, meanwhile, we were all only 48 hours away from the epic spectacle which the Cork and Clare hurlers would serve up in the hurling final. That thread of excitement was also in the gathering which probably included men and women from most of the counties of Ireland.

The atmosphere was healing, and the beauty of it is that the continuing strength of the GAA and its magnificent games and organisation mean that there are clubs in every parish in the country with the same level of communal support, sporting excitements, and compassion and understanding for the side that is having a bad day, on the hard pitch of life and living.

Thank you to the people of Saint John’s and to their counterparts, in all the GAA clubhouses throughout the land. You are a precious resource indeed.