A graveyard brought back to life
WordSmith columnist Gerard Smith finds graveyards lively places and is delighted with efforts to revamp the historic Annagelliffe Graveyard on the outskirts of Cavan Town...
“Personally I have no bone to pick with graveyards, I take the air there willingly, perhaps more willingly than elsewhere, when take the air I must.” So wrote Samuel Becket in 1946.
Personally, I enjoy visiting graveyards. In fact, I was once privy to cemeterial talk not meant for my ears when I overheard someone ask at work, “Anyone know where Gerard is?” The response from a colleague was delivered with a catty-scratch, “You’ll probably find him hanging around a graveyard, somewhere.” Meow!
At the time, my favourite haunt was Highgate Cemetery in North London. I’d spend countless weekends there, seeking out its many notable residents, from socialist Karl Marx, to Russian defector Alexander Litvinenko, and multitudes of linguists and luminaries who rest-eternal in Highgate. I no doubt bored my Monday-blued colleagues with my over enthusiastic talk of weekend encounters with dead people.
One warm Sunday afternoon shortly after I’d returned to Cavan, I set off on foot to seek out a graveyard I had a scary encounter with as a teenager. Then, I’d travel for miles on my best friend, my Chopper bike. One weekend I cycled along Cavan’s main arterial road on my way to a cousin in Killygarry. I stopped by a minor artery, not quite a boreen, more a narrow lane that stretched up and away from the Dublin road. Something innate told me, “There’s stories up there.”
Staring up that lane I felt a flick from my old enemy: Fear. I never ran away from my nemesis, always choosing to confront it. So, I put the Chopper in gear, my foot on the peddle and said, “Come on, were going up here.”
I can tell you dear reader, that was one of the toughest fights I ever fought! By the time I reached the pinnacle and literal dead-end of that lane, the heart was thumping in my chest from exertion, and booming in my ears from fear. I’d arrived at the rusting gates of an old cemetery. I got off my bike and peered through the gate as a growing foreboding prickled my skin.
But it wasn’t the graveyard that frightened me, it was the silent solitude that brought stranger-danger to front of mind. Dead people lay before me, but it was live people I was fearful of; and not wanting to meet a living person, I jumped back on the Chopper and freewheeled towards the safety of family life.
But instead; gathering speed overrode the brakes, and I sped out of control towards what I was sure was my impending death. Like the near-death cliché, my young life flashed before me as fast as the cars on the Dublin road. Survival-instinct took over, and I hurled myself off the bike, dislocating my shoulder and giving my face a shave, sheared on the gravelled lane (my first close-shave).
Now, I as I walk Cavan’s main artery I note progress and passing years have widened it, yet despite the bypassing stents, it’s still prone to clogging traffic.
On Easter Sunday I returned to Annagelliffe Graveyard with a friend. I was delighted to see it had been cleared; all the graves marked and many identified. What’s more, my friend led me to a grave on which his own name is inscribed: Michael Olwill, who passed aged 18 in 1786.
My friend and I returned on Saturday, and we met Paul who was busy clearing with a colleague. Paul explained the graveyard is being restored by the Cavan Tidy Towns team, with support from Cavan County Council. As Paul and my friend conversed, I wandered and pondered. It didn’t feel like I walked amongst the dead, for the Tidy Towns team are bringing the graveyard back to glorious life.
During Annagelliffe’s ongoing reclamation, the stories resting will reveal themselves. 18-year-old Michael Olwill is almost certainly a descendent of my good friend; I look forward to hearing the story of his teenage namesake, one day.
As I took in the Annagelliffe air; I recalled my youthful near-death experience on the Chopper bike, and smiled at the irony of feeling so full of ‘the life’ while surrounded by ‘the dead'. As a teenager I sensed this spot was seeped in story; stories propel our life’s cycle, keeping the past alive for present and beyond.
Personally, I perceive Annagelliffe as more than a graveyard – for me, it’s a Monumental-Museum.
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