Lifelines cut by winter.

I remember the endless, grubby freezing winter of ‘63. The drifts were knee-deep, and we walked to school on the tops of the hedges. Our inadequate lunch packs, squashed between books and incomplete homework, festered at the bottom of our satchels. We snuggled our mittened fingers deep into coat sleeves, and our toes, chilblain numb, swaddled and grew damp in home-knit socks and unsuitably porous school shoes. We were hoping our mother would soon come home.

 Crunch crunch on the crusty snow, footprints breaking the new frost each morning, the world looked clean but we knew the same brown mud and debris which lay beneath would be revealed in the thaw.

The sky was always heavy, near-dark. Clouds seemed to hang low, laden with somethingthreatening. We never asked each other what caused that sensation of threat, but it was menacingly there. Over the flat low-lying fields which were our farmland the snow covered the barren concrete paths which cut our land into inhospitable swathes. It had been built as a runway during the war. No plane ever landed there and now nothing could be harvested. In parts it was a wasteland. And the snow continued for months. Our teacher told us that the sea was frozen in places, but that was England so of no interest to us at all. But here, in our northern province, although we were used to bad weather, we had never known anything like this. Relentless. Each day seemed colder and greyer than the last. Even our games changed. Bored by snowmen and snowballs we longed for the

chance to run in the fields with our dog, make a den in the barn and slide down onto piles of scratchy dry straw. The hay was nearly finished, the cows had nograzing and we watched with a growing pessimism as Father rationed out the scant heaps with his pitchfork every morning.

Crunch crunch on the crusty snow, hopping into yesterday’s footprints we trekked a mile each morning to the bus stop. The air all around us was grave-quiet, only us kids and the occasional barking dog broke the silence. Council gritters kept the main road clear but all the farm approaches were packed with brown ice, a mixture of frozen snow and cow dung. Our dog always tried to follow but skidded and slid before turning for home after the first few yards. We could see far across the fields when we walked on the tops of hedges, knowing we weren’t really allowed was an added attraction and who was there to see us? Or care.

We pined for our out-of-school activities, the bus service reduced to a skeleton and wewere as cold and lonely outside the house as we were inside. Only the church stayed open and for once we looked forward to the weekly gathering, at least we would see other people there. I even thought about going to confession one Friday just to get an extra outing. Dad said no, not in the dark and your bike won’t take the icy road so you’d have to walk.  

Mrs Mc Mullin came every day and made our food when Father was at the hospital. She gave us bread and butter with sugar sandwiches, we had never had it before, or since. The inadequate lunches were down to her. Father never made a lunchpack, not for himself or for us. It wasn’t his job after all. He would always wash the dishes on Christmas Day though, he wasn’t just a farmer he was a Helpful Man. Mum was English so she expected a man to do some helping. Irish men don’t do that though. Mum said he’d even pushed me in my pram once. Round the park in Belfast. None of us mentioned such things outside the house though. Perhaps we would in the thaw.

Then one day, while Father was at the hospital visiting Mum, one of our six precious cows, heavily in calf, got stuck in a ditch. My sister and I were supposed to be watching the cattle but we were lost in our books, snuggled around the kitchen range, not intending to move outdoors. The bellowing finally disturbed us, and we reluctantly left our cosy haven, pulling on cold wellingtons and trudging up the lane. I stood transfixed, watching her brown eyes rolling like gobstoppers as she tried to free herself, drool swinging from her great floppy mouth in slimy, bubbly waves. Each time she tried to heave her lumbering pregnant body up the bank of the ditch she stumbled and slid in the slushy snow. She made no progress.

Someone, a neighbour farmer who had a phone in the house, called the vet and several others stood around, watching, as she writhed roaring and crying. There didn’t seem to be much discussion about it, the decision was immediate. The creature had to be put down and as Dad was out of reach we two girls were gravely informed.

We were both sobbing by that stage, whether from guilt, horror or fear of retribution I’m not sure but I remember that it was the udders, torn and bleeding, tangled in the barbed wire which upset me the most. The poor creature's cry was not muffled by the snow and neither was mine. That was a big loss for our family and a bigger one for the unborn calf. Its lifeline abruptly cut.

That freezing night Father woke us with news. The baby had arrived, its lifeline abruptly cut.

‘You have a little brother, born too soon. He is not likely to live. We must pray for him in the morning.’

After he left I climbed into my sister’s bed and we lay shivering under the weight of damp blankets and school coats. Wordless, there was nothing to be said. We looked at each other and we knew. It was our fault. It was all our fault and if the baby died that would be our fault too.

In the morning Father was gone, we had inadequate lunches again and as we crunched to school on the crusty snow we hoped our mother would soon come home. Perhaps she would in the thaw.