Size Matters

This story is not about the big city but is set in the heart of the country. The people in it are for the most part ordinary country folk or in one case someone who has had the country thrust upon him and which he has come to accept.

The people are big-hearted people who are the victims of their own history. Except in the case of Eoin Bradley the people are the children of rural Ireland and have the strengths and weaknesses of the history they were born into. Eoin Bradley is a townie but circumstances in his life have thrust him into an Irish rural parish. The bias prejudices and trends of thought compose the mentality of the people found in this story.

The story is set in two neighbouring rural parishes in Ulster; these two parishes form a small-scale model of Irish society. One parish called Ardum is all Catholic and the land in this parish is of poor quality and is composed of stony glacial deposits laid down in the ice age. The people are hardy and resilient and make a living by sheep farming, the family income being eked out by thrifty housewives in hen rearing and       egg production. Each household further supplements its income by maintaining a few milk cows. Sheep farming provides cash income for the households in Ardum. This parish is 100% Catholic and they are of indigenous Irish stock. These people lived in the good land of the neighbouring parish of Ardee but were evicted from this fat arable land at the plantation to make room for English and Scottish settlers. It has to be said in favour of these farmers in Ardee that they managed and farmed the land

 assiduously. The farmers in Ardee specialise in dairy farming and enjoy a much higher standard of living than do the people of Ardum.

The river Mel separates the two parishes. It’s a slow moving meandering river with a run of salmon in the spring. There is an ancient penal law, which has never been repealed forbidding Catholics to fish for salmon in the river Mel. While the law is no longer mentioned only the people of Ardee fish for salmon but the people of Ardum never do.

There is a bridge across the Mel connecting both parishes but the political divide that separates the parishes is evident at both ends of the bridge. At the Ardee end of the bridge there is a British Unionist Union Jack on display while on the Ardum end there is an Irish Tricolour. In this way it is made clear to all that the two parishes are polarized into two conflicting sectarian camps.

 The central figure in this story is a freelance journalist called Eoin Bradley who lived initially in the parish of Ardum. He is a professional journalist who publishes in many papers but locally in the Derry Herald.  In his writing Eoin castigated the Traditionalists, the I.R.A. who rule the parish of  Ardum. Because of this Eoin and the Traditionalists were archenemies and the I.R.A. were baying for his blood.

Eoin had a partner, Helen Mongan whom he loved dearly. The relationship was strange in that Helen had been involved with the I.R.A. that Eoin was vehemently opposed to. Time and time again Eoin had done his best to persuade Helen to leave the

 organization but Helen would explain once you were in it is impossible to get out.