That's dedication for you.

Last weekend a significant milestone was reached in Dunderry.After 40 years Jodie Weldon retired from washing mending ,drying and folding the adult team jerseys for Dunderry GAA Club.Jodies father played with the 1934 Junior Hurling Team that won the Championship for Dunderry,her husband Tommy and his brothers .families  and her sons played with the Club.My uncle Jimmy and my mother's first cousin Sean Mallon are tied up with Jodie's people and I am proud  of this.
Very often in her earlier years on this entirely voluntary job she used the needle and thread as often as not to effect running repairs in the jerseys.She maintains that in latter years the materials used are more robust and tears are less frequent.My personal opinion is that the present day players are not as ,shall we say ,as competitive as some of those I remember in the past who would ate you without salt.
As one who delivered jerseys to her for the Jodie treatment in the past and who collected them after wards I  can vouch for the fact that she too would ate you without salt if any were missing and she would be relentless in pursuit of the missing item.
I am certain that because of her dedicated application to the job on hand that the Club never went into the red nor had to reschedule repayments  on anything to do with jersies nor their replacement.
She is the epitome of what the backbone of the GAA is.
We wish her well in retirement.

Paddy Keeley,Sage od Dunderry,is dead.

Paddy died on 25th July 2016 in Navan Hospital where he had been for a short while.I understand he was 93 years old.Predeceased by his wife Dillie,son Pat and grandson Andrew he is survived by his children Kathleen,Dick,Mary,Mark,John,Sarah,Joan,Phyl,Angie,Jenn and Lucy ,sisters ,grandchildren ,great grand children ans a wide host of in laws ans friends and good neighbours.
For a man of his generation and background Paddy was very well educated ,an achievement down to his mother ,who was widowed at a young age, and he was the possessor of a massive store of historical ,geographic and  folk knowledge of Dunderry Parish and indeed further afield.
As  a matter of historical fact thr father of my good friend Liam Dalton worked on their land for a number of years after Paddy's father died .
Luckily for us and future generations he ,along with his son Johnny and the historical Society recorded much  information in a number of publications.including a historical account of Dunderry GAA Club,which I am proud to say I commissioned from the crew and which was published after exhaustive research mainly by Johnny.
Purely from memory I am fairly sure he met the last native Irish speaker from the Parish long  before our  Irish speakers neighbours people landed from Galway in Lambay in 1935,met people who survived the famine of 1845 to 1847 and knew a man whose folk memory went back over 200 years from the time they conversed.I will have to look these things up again.
His remains are reposing in his residence today Tuesday from 6.00 p.m to 9.00 p.m.
Tomorrow they will be reposing there from 3.00 p.m until they leave to reach Dunderry Church at 7.00p.m.
Funeral Mass is Thursday at Noon with burial after wards in Dunderry Cemetery.

True Love.

For sure he hadn't long to live.Maybe a few days at most as his bachelorhood drew to a conclusion.He was a nice guy and had made many true friends during a fulfilling and well lived life.And as he was still coherent and pain free those friends were calling to bid adieu.
Many years beforehand he had had a torrid and beautiful relationship with a beautiful woman which came to nought when she suddenly broke it off and married another older man,settled down and raised a family.She was widowed now ,her family reared and she wanted to see him one last time after all those years.
She got word to him and he said he would certainly see her one last time.And he did.
She sat on his bed and she said amid a surge of tears "Do you forgive my love for doing what I did to you all those years ago.Of course I do my love.I could never have afforded to keep you and a family on my wages then nor now,You did the right thing and not for one minute did I resent you nor hold it against you my love."And they hugged and kissed like teenagers and the tears flowed copiously.And most tears were mine because  circumstances  and both parties dictated that I should be present.
Talk about a love story.My God,

Dunderry Grave Blessings 2016.

Dunderry. After 7.30 p.m. Mass Saturday 9th July
                After 11.00 a.m. Mass Sunday 10th July.

Churchtown.  7.30 p.m.Tuesday 12 July

Retaine. 7.30 p.m. Wednesday 13th July.

Claddy.7.30 p.m. Thursday 14th July

Kilcooley .8.00 p.m. Thursday 14th July.

Kilbride .After 7.00 p.m.Mass Sunday 17th July.

Moymet.7.30 p.m. Tuesday 19th July.

Tullaghanogue.7.30.p.m.Wednesday 20th.July.

Blackchurch.7.30 p.m.Thursday 21st.July.