Cabra History.Com

Now, this is a long way off to how we grew up on Killala Road years ago. None of us lads ever wore Bijarmers, we kept our shirts on and that was all, not even a pair of underpants to keep our little pieces warm. The bed was always freezing and I remember trying to cuddle into the brother for his heat and he roaring at me to move away, ‘And get your knees outta me back as well’. The Ma’ always gave the sisters Hot Water Bottles for their beds, they were Lemonade bottles with a drop of hot water in them. No such luxury for the boys. And we never had a bedside lamp either, we’d no bulb in our room and we used to pull the curtain back so the light from the street lamp would shine in through our bedroom window. If you were lucky enough to get a Torch from Santy you’d be doing well reading your comic under the covers. And none of us boys ever had a Teddy Bear, they were only for babies. Sometimes we used to wear our socks on us in bed but we were always afraid of getting “Wah Wah Feet“, well that’s what the Da’ used to say to us if he saw us wearing them. It was all very well for him, he had the Ma’ to cuddle into for the heat. Up to the time I was eighteen I was still sharing a bed with two of my brothers and then the Ma’ got a set of Bunk Beds on the Never-Never from Sloans. The brother got married thinking he’d have a bed all to himself, little did he know…’