Chapter Seventeen - ‘Mary Fanning Visits Grandma Lizzy’
After young Mary seemed to be settled in at her private educational establishment and residential home from home, Mary decided that the time was now right to visit her Grandmother Lizzy Lanigan at ‘Meadow Vale Residential Home’, on the outskirts of Waterford City.
Not having seen her grandmother for many years, Mary Fanning wasn’t quite sure if her Granny Lizzy’s dementia had now progressed to the extent that she would no longer be able to remember her granddaughter.
Mary was warmly greeted upon her entry to the home as a welcomed visitor by one of the care workers. She felt both pleased and slightly anxious to be seeing her Grandmother Lizzy again after so long a period had lapsed.
Every Irish family has a matriarch who commands the undying respect of every relative in the family tree, still alive, however much, or little contact they have enjoyed with the Queen Bee. And this was no exception in Mary Fanning’s family tree, where the Queen Bee was undoubtedly Lizzy Lanigan!
“Don’t be alarmed if she doesn’t recognise you,” the care worker told Mary as she was escorted to the Resident’s Lounge. “Some days our Lizzy can remember all the way back to her childhood years, and on other occasions she doesn’t know her own children or can’t remember what she ate for breakfast!”
“I understand,” Mary replied, adding, “I used to be a nurse before motherhood.”
Lizzy was having one of her usual days that afternoon Mary visited her. Her memory proved to be hit and miss; forgetting much of what had happened in the past while remembering some things which held no meaning for Mary.
When the care worker introduced Mary to Lizzy, she seemed to perk up instantly upon hearing the name of her visitor as being, ‘Mary Fanning’.
At first, Mary was pleased that she could remember her, but a few minutes into the conversation it became clear that she hadn’t remembered her at all, and if she had, she had forgotten her within minutes of recall.
What Mary Fanning didn’t grasp that day was that it hadn’t been the announcement of ‘Mary Fanning’ that had made Lizzy’s ears prick up, but the mere mention of the name, ‘Mary’. Mary Fanning could have been called Mary Murphy, or Mary Poppins for that matter; it wouldn’t have made the slightest difference! It was the Christian name of ‘Mary’ that resonated with Lizzy’s memory. However senile or forgetful Lizzy Lanigan would become before she died, the name ‘Mary’ would always carry a special significance for her.
Not having seen her grandmother for many years, Mary Fanning wasn’t quite sure if her Granny Lizzy’s dementia had now progressed to the extent that she would no longer be able to remember her granddaughter.
Mary was warmly greeted upon her entry to the home as a welcomed visitor by one of the care workers. She felt both pleased and slightly anxious to be seeing her Grandmother Lizzy again after so long a period had lapsed.
Every Irish family has a matriarch who commands the undying respect of every relative in the family tree, still alive, however much, or little contact they have enjoyed with the Queen Bee. And this was no exception in Mary Fanning’s family tree, where the Queen Bee was undoubtedly Lizzy Lanigan!
“Don’t be alarmed if she doesn’t recognise you,” the care worker told Mary as she was escorted to the Resident’s Lounge. “Some days our Lizzy can remember all the way back to her childhood years, and on other occasions she doesn’t know her own children or can’t remember what she ate for breakfast!”
“I understand,” Mary replied, adding, “I used to be a nurse before motherhood.”
Lizzy was having one of her usual days that afternoon Mary visited her. Her memory proved to be hit and miss; forgetting much of what had happened in the past while remembering some things which held no meaning for Mary.
When the care worker introduced Mary to Lizzy, she seemed to perk up instantly upon hearing the name of her visitor as being, ‘Mary Fanning’.
At first, Mary was pleased that she could remember her, but a few minutes into the conversation it became clear that she hadn’t remembered her at all, and if she had, she had forgotten her within minutes of recall.
What Mary Fanning didn’t grasp that day was that it hadn’t been the announcement of ‘Mary Fanning’ that had made Lizzy’s ears prick up, but the mere mention of the name, ‘Mary’. Mary Fanning could have been called Mary Murphy, or Mary Poppins for that matter; it wouldn’t have made the slightest difference! It was the Christian name of ‘Mary’ that resonated with Lizzy’s memory. However senile or forgetful Lizzy Lanigan would become before she died, the name ‘Mary’ would always carry a special significance for her.
~~~~~
That afternoon visit was repeated by Mary Fanning many times over the following months, and there were a few occasions when Lizzy would repeat a name or word that her granddaughter, Mary Fanning, might have said in conversation with her. Whenever there was a mental association taking place in Lizzy’s mind, Mary was able to discern a sparkle in the old woman’s eyes.
Never knowing how much her grandmother understood at any given moment in time, Mary would talk with her on the assumption that Lizzy understood everything that was being said. Mary considered this way to be the most respectful and productive way to proceed, however little Lizzy understood.
One day, Mary Fanning visited her Grandmother Lizzy and was telling her about her own daughter with Cerebral Palsy; her firstborn of seven children she had carried, and the only one who had lived. As her granddaughter spoke, Lizzy’s mind went back fifty years, to a day when she’d had another visitor to her door; a travelling Romany.
The next words that Lizzy spoke took Mary somewhat off guard.
“My Mary was ‘special’, you know. The gypsy said so! ‘Your first of seven will be a special child' she foretold, and she will be a daughter. Do not tell another or blessing shall turn to curse!’”
Mary instantly began to question her grandmother Lizzy about what she’d just uttered, but it was pointless. Lizzy’s mind had already taken flight to another plane of thought. Lizzy remained as quiet as a mouse and stared at her visitor with a vacant glare as spit started to dribble from her mouth before stretching down like a string of snot from her bottom lip and coming to rest within a hollowed dimple in the centre of her chin.
That evening, when Mary Fanning returned home, she couldn’t stop thinking about her grandmother’s words regarding the gypsy’s prophecy fifty years earlier. Then, suddenly, she had a horrible thought. It was the first time she’d given any consideration to the matter of ‘blessing turned to curse’.
“Could I have been cursed instead of blessed?” Mary asked herself as she thought about the sequence of emotional hardship and heartbreak to have beset her over the years, starting with the death of her parents and siblings in one horrible motorway crash.
“And the stillborn delivery and deaths of six of my little ones! Were all these bereavements no more than the power of a gypsy’s curse, or did they represent the evil of drink and the cruel fate of chance?” she mused, struggling to make some sense and to give some meaning to such heart-breaking episodes in her life.
“But I’ve never brought blessing to curse by revealing the secret of the Romany,” Mary said to herself. “I never broke the promise I made to Mammy at the age of seven! And what about Little Mary! She surely isn’t the product of any gypsy’s curse, or is she?”
For most of that night, Mary Fanning’s thoughts deeply disturbed her as she tossed and turned in bed. It took her ages to get off to sleep but when at last she did, Mary had an unsettled sleep and kept dreaming, before waking up in a sweat around 3.00 am, having had a nightmare.
“The hospital therapist!” Mary said as she wiped the sweat from her brow. Her night clothes were sticking to her body with the amount of perspiration she was giving off and her breathing had shortened as though all oxygen in her body was at a premium.
Mary’s mind travelled back to the days of her alcoholic addiction, which had led to her eventually being obliged to participate in counselling sessions and attendance at AA meetings. As she tried to recall those dark days, Mary held a vague recollection that she might possibly have said something to her counsellor in a moment of unconscious disclosure, after having been coaxed to lower her emotional defences and mental guard.
Mary Fanning fell into despair that this might be so. To think that her lovely daughter would have to go through her life severely handicapped, and never being perceived by others as being ‘normal’ was difficult enough to live with. But to know that it was down to her inability to keep her trap shut, was insufferable!
The more Mary Fanning thought about the many lifetime tragedies that she’d experienced since those counselling sessions had been forced on her, the more she concluded that she was to blame for the cross which little Mary had been forced to carry ever since birth; a cross that would only become heavier to bear year-on-year as her condition worsened.
Mary Fanning concluded that such disasters had befallen her from a gypsy’s curse; and that she’d brought them on herself, through her careless breach of confidence she’d vowed to share with no other than her firstborn daughter, when her own child reached the age of seven.
Never knowing how much her grandmother understood at any given moment in time, Mary would talk with her on the assumption that Lizzy understood everything that was being said. Mary considered this way to be the most respectful and productive way to proceed, however little Lizzy understood.
One day, Mary Fanning visited her Grandmother Lizzy and was telling her about her own daughter with Cerebral Palsy; her firstborn of seven children she had carried, and the only one who had lived. As her granddaughter spoke, Lizzy’s mind went back fifty years, to a day when she’d had another visitor to her door; a travelling Romany.
The next words that Lizzy spoke took Mary somewhat off guard.
“My Mary was ‘special’, you know. The gypsy said so! ‘Your first of seven will be a special child' she foretold, and she will be a daughter. Do not tell another or blessing shall turn to curse!’”
Mary instantly began to question her grandmother Lizzy about what she’d just uttered, but it was pointless. Lizzy’s mind had already taken flight to another plane of thought. Lizzy remained as quiet as a mouse and stared at her visitor with a vacant glare as spit started to dribble from her mouth before stretching down like a string of snot from her bottom lip and coming to rest within a hollowed dimple in the centre of her chin.
That evening, when Mary Fanning returned home, she couldn’t stop thinking about her grandmother’s words regarding the gypsy’s prophecy fifty years earlier. Then, suddenly, she had a horrible thought. It was the first time she’d given any consideration to the matter of ‘blessing turned to curse’.
“Could I have been cursed instead of blessed?” Mary asked herself as she thought about the sequence of emotional hardship and heartbreak to have beset her over the years, starting with the death of her parents and siblings in one horrible motorway crash.
“And the stillborn delivery and deaths of six of my little ones! Were all these bereavements no more than the power of a gypsy’s curse, or did they represent the evil of drink and the cruel fate of chance?” she mused, struggling to make some sense and to give some meaning to such heart-breaking episodes in her life.
“But I’ve never brought blessing to curse by revealing the secret of the Romany,” Mary said to herself. “I never broke the promise I made to Mammy at the age of seven! And what about Little Mary! She surely isn’t the product of any gypsy’s curse, or is she?”
For most of that night, Mary Fanning’s thoughts deeply disturbed her as she tossed and turned in bed. It took her ages to get off to sleep but when at last she did, Mary had an unsettled sleep and kept dreaming, before waking up in a sweat around 3.00 am, having had a nightmare.
“The hospital therapist!” Mary said as she wiped the sweat from her brow. Her night clothes were sticking to her body with the amount of perspiration she was giving off and her breathing had shortened as though all oxygen in her body was at a premium.
Mary’s mind travelled back to the days of her alcoholic addiction, which had led to her eventually being obliged to participate in counselling sessions and attendance at AA meetings. As she tried to recall those dark days, Mary held a vague recollection that she might possibly have said something to her counsellor in a moment of unconscious disclosure, after having been coaxed to lower her emotional defences and mental guard.
Mary Fanning fell into despair that this might be so. To think that her lovely daughter would have to go through her life severely handicapped, and never being perceived by others as being ‘normal’ was difficult enough to live with. But to know that it was down to her inability to keep her trap shut, was insufferable!
The more Mary Fanning thought about the many lifetime tragedies that she’d experienced since those counselling sessions had been forced on her, the more she concluded that she was to blame for the cross which little Mary had been forced to carry ever since birth; a cross that would only become heavier to bear year-on-year as her condition worsened.
Mary Fanning concluded that such disasters had befallen her from a gypsy’s curse; and that she’d brought them on herself, through her careless breach of confidence she’d vowed to share with no other than her firstborn daughter, when her own child reached the age of seven.
~~~~~
Each subsequent weekend that Mary Fanning and her daughter was to spend together became sadder than they otherwise would have been. Mary was laden with guilt and felt responsible for her daughter’s condition and restricted lifestyle. Whenever mother and daughter spent weekends together, while Mary Fanning maintained a constant smile and happy face for the benefit of appearances and her daughter’s sake, her heart stayed heavy with an acute sense of responsibility she carried.
~~~~~
Within that same year of renewing her contact with her maternal grandmother, Lizzy Lanigan passed away after contracting a bout of pneumonia. Mary decided not to attend the funeral of her grandmother as she had no immediate desire to meet up again with her mother’s brothers and sisters. She knew that to do so would only have necessitated the need to speak about past events she didn’t want to speak of with another, especially family members.
Mary knew that there was much of which she might feel ashamed and didn’t want to share with another. Besides, the last thing she needed at this time in her life when the Queen Bee of the Lanigan line was being buried, was to be seen by remaining relatives as the ‘black sheep’ from Waterford; the bad penny that always shows up at the wrong time!
Mary knew that there was much of which she might feel ashamed and didn’t want to share with another. Besides, the last thing she needed at this time in her life when the Queen Bee of the Lanigan line was being buried, was to be seen by remaining relatives as the ‘black sheep’ from Waterford; the bad penny that always shows up at the wrong time!
