Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Dunderry Adult Management 2016

Word is filtering through that the following is the set up.

Football.
Manager Kevin Dowd.
Selectors.Phil Fay Junior,Mickey Molloy,Lee Mulligan.

Hurling.
Mark Nolan.
Selectors.Christy Coogan,Kevin Heffernan,Paddy Darcy.
And Tom Ryan ,former Dunderry and Meath Manager has agreed to give a hand. from time to time.

All these guys have a huge wealth of Experience under their belts and are good guys as indeed were the retiring Managers and their selectors led by Stephen O Rourke and Paddy Gorey.
It is great to see that volunteerism is still alive and kicking in Dunderry for jobs that make you either a hero ,if you succed or a knave ,if you fail.
But would we have it any other way.
Kevin would have more managerial experience at Hurling level including at County level.He is the fourth member of the 2005 team which I managed and was demoted from Senior to Intermediate to take up the challenge of regaining Senior status,the others being his brother Tommy ,Barry Callaghan and Stephen O Rourke.
I will be watching to see if he can succed where the others failed and hope that the players will give him the full loyalty he gave me.
All his backup team is hugely impressive and all were dual players so there should be a smooth relationship with their hurling counterparts.

Older Dunderrians may not know Mark Nolan and Kevin Heffernan.Mark is a Boardsmill man and married to Eunice O Brien whose mother is Mary Newman.He has been involved with juvenile hurling here for some years,Kevin is a fanatical Limerick hurling man doing fantastic work wit the juveniles.He really loves hurling and has a name that is hard to live up to.Paddy was a selector before if I am not mistaken .
Tom I WORKED WITH BEFORE.He knows his onions.
INTERESTING TIMES AWAIT US .

Dunderry Christmas Masses 2015

Christmas Eve 24th December.

Kilbride.6.00 p.m. Carols and Music from 5.30 on under tutelidge of Aoife Stephens on trombone with Deirdre Mc Hale singer,Lauren Finnegan Harp,and David Lamb organ.

Dunderry.7.30 with Carols beforehand and during by Dunderry Church Choir.

Christmas Day 25/12/2015.

Robinstown 9.30 a.m.with Carols before and during by Robinstown Church Choir.

Dunderry 11.00 a.m.with Carols before and during by Dunderry Youth Choir.

Stephens Day.

10.00 a.m. Robinstown.

IT IS ADVISABLE TO ATTEND WELL IN ADVANCE OF STARTING TIME TO GET A SEAT ON CHRISTMAS EVE AND CHRISTMAS DAY

And give a thought to Father Hornick who celebrates all these Masses and organises the shoot bang lot.No easy job that.

Tuesday, December 8, 2015

The seagulls know.

Our land is over 30 miles from the sea,that is the part of it not covered in water from the incessant rain.Today the non submerged part was covered with seagulls picking maggots from the ground as said maggots surfaceed from the earth in fear of drowning from the upcoming deluge. I assume.
If I am right in this analysis we are in for some deluge.And these seagulls have an uncanny ability for foresight and how to turn nature to advantage.
The hoors have set up house in it and have started to squalk to me.Bad cess to them.

Monday, December 7, 2015

Death of J,Doonan and my tribute to,

Word is just filtering in of the unexpected death of the very well respected J,Doonan of the Meadstown Road,Dunderry,husband of the late Breda Stanley .
He was suffering from pneumonia in a Dublin Hospital ,as I understand it and died there..They had no children .
J was  Down man and kicked football with them in his youth.If I remember correctly his brother subsequently played in goal for the County.He also played professional soccer in England and was interested in boxing and at one stage approached me to see would I be interested in setting up a club in Dunderry,Because of my time consuming involvement in the GAA I had to decline and the idea was stillborn.
He was a die hard Republican and spent several years in Long Kesh on remand ,never being charged with an offence ,as far as I know.
He was also a nurse by profession and worked for many years with Sister Consilio in the fields of addiction in which he was an acknowledged expert.
Indeed when one of my extended family had a habit he did all humanely possible to help and I will be eternally grateful to him for this.
I think but am not certain that no State Hospital gave him employment because of his Republican past but that Sister Concilio was above that sort of retribution ,I may be wrong in this.
Well after his retirement date he continued to ply his trade and was working until recently.
I found him to have been a decent guy and good neighbour.
I have no knowledge of the funeral arrangements yet.
Ar Dheis De go raibh  hanam dilis.
P.S  .J.was brought to Dunderry Church last evening at 7.30 to a good crowd of neighbours and a wider congregation of friends and colleagues and Father Hornick paid fair tribute to him and his late wife Breda Stanley,who he  now joins after 9 years separation.
She too died around this time of the year and it is hard to realise that it is 9 years since she walked this earth.
They were devoted to each other and had to be considering the continuing disruption that occurred in their nursing and personal lives because of their Republican beliefs..
Long after he was able to walk with comfort because of wonky knees you would see J.on the bicycle with Breda alongside, as they prepared for the annual Dublin Marathon which they participated in until they were physically unable .I am full sure that all the funds raised were for the laudable aims of sister Concilio.
The funeral Mass took place this morning to a packed Church ,consisting of a combination of neighbours,work colleagues,Down family and  friends ,Fellow Republicans and the wider GAA community from the North.including Oisin Mc Conville and several members of the Kilcoo Club ,the Down County Champions.
Orations were made at the graveside by both Joe Reilly ,Sinn Fein Councillor and Sister Concilio,who were ad idem on a number of things ,particularly that J.was an exemplary member of the caring profession and that he left a lasting impression on all who met him.
Around here we had no idea he was so sick but he himself must have known that the end was near as Sister CONSILIO said that she arranged his final confession shortly before he expired .
I called to see him last summer to thank him for all his efforts regarding my extended family member's difficulties and to inform him of the outcome.
I can say that there was no behaviour in the addiction world that would have surprised J.,HE HAD SEEN IT ALL and more.
I quizzed him about getting his memories down in writing and he said he intended to do this in due course.I hope he did, but suspect that death crept up on him before he could.
No matter.He lived his life by his beliefs and made no efforts to hide them.
Any man who has  moving orations by a true blue Republican and a Sister verging on Sainthood can consider his life well spent.
Ar DHEIS dE GO RAIBH A HANAM.

Thursday, December 3, 2015

PRAY FOR dUNDERRY BURN VICTIMS.

In recent times two Dunderry people ,one man and one woman, have received fairly severe accidental burns.The woman is way worse than the man and he is under some pressure also.
Sustained prayer wouldn't go astray.

Tuesday, December 1, 2015

Down Memory Lane

I was blessed to move to Dunderry in 1986 as that was the start of the Golden decade in Gaelic Games in the GAA  Club.
Tommy MC Cormack my uncle had recently retired as Chairman of the  Club,having thus served for over three decades I reckon.There was never a more fanatic member .In fact he died less than a decade later and his dying wish to be visit the Pitch one last time before being buried was honoured .
I atttended my first AGM shortly after arriving and declined the nomination for Secretary proposed by Gerry Callaghan as I was of the view that one should start on the factory floor ,as it were before looking for the Gaffer's job and boy did I spend many years on said floor before the chance came around again.
At that time we had some of the foremost dual players in the County at underage level and there was no adult hurling team here and the neighbouring hurling clubs were salivating at the prospect of getting their mitts on our boys.
The men and women who had achieved this underage hurling miracle were loath to see these boys dispersed to our hurling neighbours and naturally had a preference to keep them together in our club but were very much aware that there would be stiff resistance within the Club to upsetting the footballing apple cart as it were by entering a hurling team,
So a number of them approached me and requested me to propose such a team as they were somewhat afraid to do so themselves less they be chastised.
At the appropriate stage during the AGM I put the motion to enter a team and it was just carried despite the virulent opposition of most of the top table.To say I was shocked was an understatement.
Anyhow the work went on and there was a fierce buzz around the place.a buzz grounded not only in the high expectations of success on the playing fields because of the undoubted emerging underage talent allied to the acquisition after fierce machinations at Provincial level ,which  enabled Parish residents the Rennicks brothers and Pat Gibbons  transfer here from Trim for whom they had played at Juvenile level and in respect of whom Trim refused transfers, but also because o the excitement of finally acquiring our own Pitch.
Basically it involved the transferees thansferring to another County ,playing with a a club  there and then transferring back to Meath when they could play with whatever Club they chose .
My ex club Saint BRIGIDS of Blanchardstown gave a hand in this process and I AM ETERNALLY GRATEFUL FOR THIS.
By this route we eventually got these men onto our books and they contributed significantly to our unfolding success.
And Dermot Dempsey also threw in his lot with us and added his considerable maturity to the gosoons on the hurling fields of Meath and added to his considerable haul of county medals .
The Rennick transfers s sparked a rule change in the GAA and the new rule now applicable that you play with your home Parish makes those machinations irreverent today
I played a small part in the drive for the top in that I did my best for the adult hurlers on the field of play at full back for as long as my battered and ageing chassis was able to compete and picked up two Junior medals as a player and one Intermediate one as a sub,being usurped at full back by Plug Levy and more luck to him.
On the football front I turned up for training a number of nights ,fully intent of competing for a place ,but never got further than being mandated to kick the ball in between  back and forwards in competing drills.
It rapidly became clear to me that anyone nearing the three o wasn't wanted  and a guy of my vintage, nearer 40 than 30 was not flavour of the month.
I felt huge sympathy with lifelong and ebullient Dunderry men of the era who were thrown on the scrapheap at the time in order to make way for the emerging youth ,in what I still consider to have been premature retirement.
Anyhow what happened happened and the Club prospered,but in due course.
In 1988 the Pitch was opened to great jubilation and to the profound credit of those who had made such valiant sacrifices in putting it there,.
But not everybody in the Parish fully grasped the full extent of our achievement in the overall scheme of things GAA.
On the way to open the Pitch Tommy and Joe were stopped by a man whose hobby and job were farming exclusively and who had never darkened a football pitch ever nor never would  and on being told here they were off to said"Well that's Croke Park fucked ,I hear that Dunderry is so good that Croker will get no more matches."And he genuinely meant that.
Well the pitch was opened and Meath played Cavan in a challenge to a huge crowd .I remember a guy called Cahill fielded for Cavan and I think he was related to our Phil.
Tommy had a prodigious memory and dictated an article from memory to me about the history of Dunderry GAA which i wrote down and it was published in the programme written for the opening.
He concluded by wishing that the Club would attain Senior status in the near future.
Hid wish came to fruition as we attained Senior status in football in 1990,in Hurling in 1991 and as a bonus in Camogie in 1991 also.
And all this in an era when the MEATH on the national stage GAA SPORTS WISE WAS  VERY STRONG.
 to be continued.