A few weeks ago I was exactly where I needed to be – back in my home county of Fermanagh; out in a boat and enjoying the last of the long evenings at the Friar's Leap – pronounced lepp.
According to local lore the Friar’s Leap is named in honour of an evasive manoeuvre made by a startled monk from nearby Devenish Island. It seems he jumped across this particular stretch of water having encountered the Devil wandering about in the rushes.
Devenish – the site of a 5th Century monastery founded by Saint Molaise – lends itself to many such stories. My favourite is an even older tale that contains the significant news that, in this very vicinity, there exists an actual entrance to the Otherworld. And while the jumping monk is likely to be a yarn, a portal to the Otherworld – in this very special locale – is something I can well believe in.
It was a very beautiful evening. My pal was fishing for bream and I was watching the swallows as they gathered for their long return to KwaZulu-Natal. A few months ago there’d be lapwing and curlew and drumming snipe but now, so late in August, things are much quieter and thoughts turn to impermanence and the cycles of life. The end of summer is a strange and even sad time and the Erne will invite – as it always has – quiet contemplation.
I’m not suggesting that I’m in any way enlightened. Far from it. In fact all it takes to turn me from a meditating monk into a fulminating crank is the damnable sound of an approaching speedboat. My pal, who is so Zen he doesn’t seem to care what Zen is, simply shrugs at any such disturbance, but at the very first hint of excessive horsepower I start muttering choice Fermanagh curses and wondering if they sell torpedoes in Lidl.
All it takes to turn me from a meditating monk into a fulminating crank is the damnable sound of an approaching speedboat.
In fairness, Fermanagh being a tourist destination, we do get all manner of craft and there’s probably room for all of them – somewhere or other – and it’s certainly true that even speedboats can be driven with consideration and good manners, especially as they pass Zen monks in the rushes. But even so. The only sound I really want to hear in these parts in late August is the faint sound of Saint Molaise’s Bell – lost in depths for centuries but still audible on the quietest evenings.
Anyway, just as the sun began to set, I thought perhaps I really was hearing things. From out of nowhere I picked up the sound, not of a bell, but of loud pumping music getting louder and louder over the whine and drone of a very powerful engine. Moments later the cause of this outrage came pounding into view – a speedboat all souped-up with massive speakers like some waterborne mobile nightclub from Hell; its driver clearly of the belief that this was Florida during Spring Break rather than the site of an actual portal to the Otherworld. I readied myself to leap the Friar’s Leap.
But then, just before I jumped, the music suddenly changed and went from a relentless thud, thud, thud to something really bluesy with cool trombone and sax. When I realised what it was, I nearly fell over the side. It was Mose Allison! Mose Allison singing Stop This World on a 1963 album called Swingin’ Machine. Mose Allison! One of the two truly wise men of music, and one of my absolute favourites. I was completely thrown.
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The sound of his voice blasting across Lough Erne from a speedboat that I’d just been elaborately cursing confused me greatly. I didn’t know what to think. I didn’t know what to say. All I could do was sit back down again and breathe. Breathe in and breathe out.
Was it the Buddha, Molaise or Mose who said that whoever judges others digs a pit for themselves? Or maybe, come to think of it, it was my pal who said it – on the way home in the pitch dark, a bright light strapped to his forehead.
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