Another Memory Of A Place From Another Time

Another Memory Of A Place From Another Time

By Paul McCann

There is a place in time that once existed and in my memory I like to remember the people and the places where I grew up as a child . The wonderful thing about that is  memories  never grow old .

There were the markets like Smithfield and those around the City Hall and Sailortown that offered produce and a smile for anyone who came .  

When I close me eyes I can still see Belfast as it once was . A port city and a merchant place for trade and characters that made a living by just being human.

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In the early days in Belfast there were the weighbridge market men who pushed their little hand carts into town each morning and set up their stalls selling things like hot mutton pies and chelsea buns,  or loose potatoes from out of a sack . Even soup bones and bacon slices were sold .There was a great sense of the wider family experience that existed between merchants and their customers .

In the villages around Belfast the tiny little terrace houses were made of brick and mortar but withing there were people with a love for life that connected them to a thick fabric called the community spirit .In my village of North Belfast the community spirt was like a transfusion of love into the heart that run through the veins of everybody .

There were front parlour street shops in my village were lifelines for a lot of people . Some folk had transformed their home into shops and they sold wee buns , fruits , cigarettes sweets, drinks and newspapers as well as milk and bread . These little shops were gold nuggets among the concert streets of our village .  How they ever made a living , God only knows .

All the lads back in those day would buy Woodbine cigarettes , five at a time . There were things like Christmas clubs where people could put away a few pennies each week and then before Christmas they could draw it all to do Christmas shopping .

They could also order products like lipsticks and perfumes . Some of the  other little parlour shops sold baby goods and products to help in busy households with young uns .People then always loved having big families . There was a great  need then for babysitters . Lots of young girls often minded or looked after other peoples kids . There was a trust in that time where no one feared leaving their children with other people  That trust lived within every heart where there was a special place for everyone .

There were those people who became a thread to the fabric of community life . Like the wake up man who for a small price would wash your upstairs and downstairs windows early in the morning and before he would leave he would knock on the upstairs bedroom window to wake up those who had an early start in their jobs  . I suppose that’s one way of not sleeping in .. All around the girls went chattering off on their heels to the Mills after the wake up man had been and then men off to their factories after he came around knocking on the upstairs window . I suppose that’s one way of not sleeping in  back in the day  .

There were hard time then but humour existed through it all . Some mothers who were unmarried , fostered their children out so they could go to work in England to earn a few shillings to feed and clothe their children .

Yes indeed bread and butter wasn’t easy to find for some , but people all got through somehow .

I remember as a child playing marbles on the cobblestone streets and we had  games of conkers with the nuts from horse chestnut  trees tied to a string . We played football on the streets from dawn to dusk and lived with a passion for simple fun and games . We made up songs and stories and not one was every written down or recorded . Not many people owned motor cars back then so most of the streets were traffic free . It was safe for children to play on the streets . The young girls skipped and swung on ropes tied to the top of old lamp posts . The kl

Then there were the special folk , talented with poetry and song who frequented  local pubs . Those with the real heart of folk music and stories . .They were well known performers gifted with a lilt in their voice and a natural way of telling stories and reciting by heart , the green eye of the little yellow God and other known pieces like Dangerous Dan McGrew . There were storytellers who could talk the leg of a stool and singers who were walking jukeboxes able to remember songs at request from anyone would ask on the spot , without thinking and  all for the price of a jar .

There were weekly dances in the community hall on a Friday and bingo in the same hall on a Saturday the on a Sunday  people went to their church services which then were very popular with the people  . The community also has bus trips for the elderly l who couldn’t get out . Then there was the men’s confraternity  with their regular missions and devotions . All of these things were the threads of life that became the social fabric in my little village 

There were the social clubs and little huts where young lads liked to try lifting heavy weights . There were other little huts were cycling clubs sprung up and billiard clubs and even sewing clubs that were a meeting place or venue for many of the residents to go out and talk . In those days company was the important thing that people enjoyed .

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