WordSmith: Finding an oasis of warmth and wellness
Gerard Smith, in this week's WordSmith column, is taking us back to 1980 in this week's column to say hello to his inner child...
“The tide is high but I’m holding on, I’m gonna be your number one…” sang Debbie Harry on November the 17th 1980. And she did exactly that, Blondie hit number one in the UK Charts with the song that week. It was also the day that John Lennon and Yoko Ono released their album ‘Double Fantasy’, which went on to win best album at the Grammy Awards. A day to remember for musos.
Why am I starting my column with such a random date?
I’ll tell you why. Last week I went back to school, courtesy of my fellow columnist, Jonathan Smyth and the Reminiscence Group. Prior to this event, I’d heard Ann from the library, speaking on the radio of ‘Reminiscence Therapy'. My interest piqued and I made a note to attend the group. And what a wonderful group it was, a highly engaged gathering of people who spoke warmly and wittily about their school days. As I listened, I felt a warmth and wellness, in which I understood the notion of the therapeutical properties in reminiscing.
But what about that date? Well, at home that evening, I had a compulsion to go into the shed and read through my old school copy books, which I knew mam had kept. If you were born on November 17th, 1980, you’re a Scorpion.
In the shed, I felt the sting of frustration with myself – I couldn’t find my copy books. For in the six years since my return to Cavan, I’d rifled through Mam’s carefully curated boxes, taking their contents into the house to read and not putting them back where they belong. Although, one box caught my eye, a box of Jacob’s Coconut Creams. Opening it, I saw it was full of mouldy old purses. From one such purse, I pulled out a note on a torn piece of paper. The handwriting was naïve, it read: ‘Hello the date is Monday the 17 of November 1980. We are putting beuty (sic) board up in the room and who ever finds this note (Hopefully many years after the above date) is in for very good look (sic), My name is Gerard Smith and I go to Cavan Vocational School.’
Immediately I was taken back to a miserable Monday night in November. I remembered the smell from the gas heater in my bedroom. I remember rocking to the reggae rhythm of Blondie’s tune, recorded the previous night from the radio’s Top 40; a ray of sunshine on a winter’s night. I remember hearing a cousin who I was in awe of (still am), talking of Lennon’s forthcoming album with the informed knowledge of an expert muso. And above all, I remember the socially awkward kid who hid in his house while hiding trinkets and notes in its nooks and crannies to bestow good fortune on future dwellers.
That day, we were having a Beauty Board applied to a feature wall in the living room. I thought it was the height of home-décor sophistication; yet thinking forward I knew it wouldn’t always be in style. Thus, I wrote a note for those who may want to tear it down and stamp their own style should our home became theirs.
I smiled at my lack of grammar and appalling spelling (beuty board); especially in my finale wherein I foretell the finder to be in for very ‘good look'. And the bittersweet irony in the fact that after all these years, the note found its way back to me. I’ll amend my teenage errors and self-accept the ‘Good Luck’ I hid behind the ‘Beauty Board.’
I began thinking of the difference between ‘living in the past’ as opposed to ‘looking back on it'. It took the group and my note to make me see the power in reminiscing and how it can facilitate positive future thinking. Reminiscence Therapy is defined as ‘The use of life histories, whether written or oral, to improve psychological well-being.’ And I don’t think it’s only beneficial for older folk; it’s good to say, “Hello,” to the kid we were, regardless of our age. Give your inner child a ‘reminiscence-hug’ because they never leave us.
I started with music and shall end with a band that’s been in the news of late: OASIS. Sing like no one’s listening, “Don’t look back in anger…”
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