Keep Knocking..........
From watching Arsenal in Clonmel on Saturday morning through the third lap of homecoming celebrations on Wednesday night in Liam Sheedy’s Portroe, Seamus Kennedy’s All-Ireland diary takes us inside an exhilarating and emotional week in Tipperary. And tells the story of his own resilience in the face of disappointment and setback. A story of going back to the well.
Friday
I ease myself down on the stone wall and let my ankles dangle in the cool water, same as a million times before. Paddy’s Well, as we call it, has been part of my hurling and football life since I was 11. Recovery and preparation. Or just clearing the head.
I’ve sat here after matches and training. I’ve sat here injured. With club mates, shooting the breeze. Or I’ve turned up to see lads from other clubs and rivalry melts into slagging. I sat here alongside Seamie Callanan once, while he looked for healing in the minerals from the spring.
The water shoots up through a bed of limestone. Purified. It’s meant to cure skin problems and stomach complaints. David Flannery from the St Patrick’s Day Society, the man who always seems to be here, tells me that thousands gathered here once. They came to heal, to buy and sell, to socialise, to wash, to make matches. Druids, traders, musicians, storytellers.
Then St Patrick baptised here and it became a place of devotion. The cross dates to the fifth century. The Cistercians built the church and Cromwell destroyed it when he besieged Clonmel.
This place has seen it all. Now you come for peace. A minute from the chaos on the roundabouts that feed the town, you can step down into this sheltered valley and just listen to the water. A hideaway. An oasis.
It’s actually in Marlfield, sealing its place in Tipp hurling legend. Theo English, who has five All-Ireland medals, lives up the road, and still comes to the well. Dad meets Theo at Mass. He’s fresh out. The water has done him no harm. David Flannery says:
