ABSTRACT
ANGELA. I went up to see my sister Maude this afternoon ... I wanted to tell her all about yeh. But I couldn't. It's funny, there was a time when we used to tell each other everythin' . Until I discovered that I was doin' all the talkin'. We used to go nearly everywhere together - myself and Maude - off to all the dances and all. We were as mad as hatters, the pair of us. Well I was anyway! (She chuckles.) [ARTIE. What?] We joined the Irish dancin' one time. We used to come out onto the back of an auld lorry or somewhere and your man'd
start up on the accordion. Bum bum bum bum bum bum bum. Bum bum bum bum bum bum bum . . . All the boys'd gather round and try to look up our dresses. Meself and Maude used to give them a right eye full I can tell yeh. [ARTIE. Were yeh any good? At What? Dancin'? No we weren't.] Sure we hardly ever practised or anythin' . I just wanted to get up and show off in front of the crowd like yeh know. I probably should have been a singer in a band or somethin' Artie shouldn't I? When we were young I was forever draggin' poor Maude down to stand outside the Town Hall every Friday night. It was durin' the Rock 'n Roll days and we could see them all jivin' inside - the boys in their snazzy suits, the girls in their big dresses and all. I used to be dyin' to go in there. I'd've loved that now - clackin' along in me high heel shoes . . . By the time we were old enough to go though the whole scene had started to change . . . Keep away from Padraic Lacy, me mother said to me when we were goin' off to our very first dance. Why? says I. Never mind why, says she. Just keep away from him that's all. Padraic Lacy had a car and there was a rumour goin' around that he had slipped a girl a Mickey Finn one night after a dance and while she was drowsy he put his hand up her skirt. He was one of the first boys I ever went out with. I thought he was a right creep. He started to cry when I told him I didn't want to see him again. Maude was lookin' for a prince or some sort of a sheik to whisk her off to God knows where. She was goin' out with this fella from Tuam who came to town to work in the bank. A real good lookin' fella with sultry eyes. Maude dropped him like a hot brick when she found out that his Da was a plasterer. She was a real snob. She married a guard in the end and went off to live in suburbia . . . I never really wanted all the things that other people seem to long for Artie yeh know. Maybe that's why I got them hah? .. . Donal is still down in the dumps over that auld handball match. The young fella ran rings around him I heard . He won't go out
nor nothin' now. He just mopes around the house all day drinkin' mugs of tay. I think he feels it's an end of an era or somethin'. And maybe he's right . . .
