The smell of Woodbines and Persil

I was in a supermarket when a lady approached me, “You’re Gerard, aren’t you?” We stepped outside, and, as she introduced herself, recognition came flooding back. She had barely changed from the young woman whose graduation photograph had occupied a place of honour atop my mother’s prized display cabinet in our pristine little palace of a home in Cavan Town.

Afterwards, it struck me that this lovely lady had once been part of my mother’s world. And yet, how much did I really know about that world?

Who was Mam? Of course she was my mother, the woman I loved beyond compare. That much I know. But what do I know about her life before her children came along? Where was she born? I think it was Jubilee Terrace in Cavan Town. But even as I write that, I find myself questioning it. Was she born there, or did her family move into the town from a rural townland somewhere in the surrounding countryside? Perhaps. The truth is, I don’t know. And the people who could have answered those questions are no longer here to ask.

I wish I’d asked Mam more about her background, but she wasn’t a woman with time to dwell on the past. She lived for today, prepared for tomorrow, and had little patience for idle talk of yesterdays. Unlike her son, who has always been inclined to look backwards, wondering about the stories that went untold.

In retrospect, I realise how little time I spent with Mam. Dad was my emotional nurturer, but Mam’s love expressed itself differently. She kept our home immaculate, housekeeping was the way she expressed her love. Our clothes were washed and ironed with such care and precision that they drew attention at school.

When I started school in Cavan, the other kids noticed the smell of my freshly laundered clothes. To my embarrassment I became known as ‘Daz'. And, to my shame, I complained to Mam, “Will you stop using so much washing powder on my clothes, the other kids are calling me Daz.”

Her eyes flashed in anger. She lit a cigarette, inhaled, exhaled, and replied, “Well, they’ll be calling you ‘Persil’ next week, and be fecking proud of it!” What a spoiled, ungrateful little brat I was.

Looking back, I appreciate now what I failed to appreciate back then. The immaculate clothes, the spotless home, the daily attention to the small things – these were Mam’s hugs. Sadly, I was too young to recognise it, too busy being embarrassed by it. Imagine being ashamed of smelling nice!

And now, all these years later, a chance encounter in a supermarket with a woman whose graduation photograph Mam had framed and displayed in our home has reminded me of how little I knew of my mother while she was here. And that’s not a bad thing, it’s a lovely thing. I’ve written before about getting to know aspects of Mam in death that I didn’t know in life, from the things she left behind. And now it’s wonderful to hear about her from people whose lives she touched.

And I think this is true of all your passed loved ones, too. Their physical presence may have left this earthly realm, but aspects of them you may not have known remains in the memory of others. Sometimes, those memories find their way back to us in the most unexpected of places. Like in a supermarket doorway where the lady wistfully said to me, “I can still see her sitting down to smoke a Woodbine.”

Woodbines! I’d completely forgotten Mam smoked that brand. They were strong and unfiltered, just like her.

When I left Cavan for London, Mam started work as a housekeeper for a family outside Cavan Town. She loved it. When I’d return to visit she’d talk passionately about her job and the family; of whom photos began joining those of her own in our house. In fact, I can say those years were the happiest I’d ever seen Mam. Her children had flown the nest, and meeting the lady at the supermarket reminded me she’d found another family in them.

There’s a small tin box in which Mam kept her treasures. In it is a picture of her bottle feeding a dog and a lamb during her housekeeping days; with the ever present duster in her back pocket. It’s a wonderfully candid and playful picture of Mam, revealing a side of her I rarely saw. But a chance encounter in a supermarket led me to see it.

I looked at the photograph, smiled, and glanced skywards, “I bet you’re keeping your corner of heaven like a palace, Mam; and have all the souls smelling of Persil.”