AS I WAS SAYING......

Sunday next the Galway hurlers will step on to Croke Park in search of the first leg of an unthinkable 'Double'. Irrespective of the eventual outcome, the first year of the new Millennium will always special for Galway. I hope young people attend in great numbers, because they will have memories to sustain them for a lifetime.

I attended my first All-Ireland Hurling final in 1963. My memories of that day are still crystal clear. Princess Grace of Monaco (a down-market version of today's Victoria Beckham) was sitting in the Hogan Stand beside Eamon de Valera. Eddie Keher established a new scoring record for a 60 minute final. And, to the best of my knowledge, it was the last hurling final at which the Archbishop of Cashel and Emly threw in the ball!

1963 was a 'watershed' in many fields. In retrospect, an old world died that year. A new, vibrant American had replaced an old 'War Horse' in the White House. He travelled widely, visiting Berlin, London, Dublin, New Ross and even Galway(!), spreading energy and optimism wherever he went.

In the same field, but in down-trodden corner of it, an oppressed people were find a voice they thought they had lost forever. On August 28th Martin Luther King, delivered the most inspirational speech of the 20th century: "I have a dream that the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will sit together at the table of brotherhood." That dream would reach it fulfilment when his own four little children would be judged 'not by the colour of their skin but by the strength of their character.'

On June 21, Giovanni Montini was elected successor to John XXIII, the most extraordinary and best loved Pope of the century. Upon his election, Pope Paul VI pledged himself to the completion of the work of his revered predecessor, speaking of 'the world's need for God's medicine of mercy'.

And of course four nonentities from Liverpool burst upon the scene with their first LP, "Please, Please Me!" The English poet, Philip Larkin, dubbed 1963 an Annus Mirabilis:

Then all at once the quarrel sank:
Everyone felt the same,
And every life became
A brilliant breaking of the bank,
A quite unlosable game.

Nevertheless, a few ironic, sinister clouds converged to dilute the optimism: on November 22nd, the personification of energy and youthful optimism, was shot dead on a Dallas street at 46. On that very same day the death of another famous man went unreported. Aldous Huxley, the author of "Brave New World" died of natural causes in his own bed. The embodiment of optimism was snuffed out early. The father of an antiseptic 'scientific cynicism' stayed the course.

However, on a personal level, Kennedy, King, Montini, Larkin, Huxley, and even John XXIII are mere footnotes. In the mind's eye, the 1963 headlines belong to Keher, Clear, Ollie Walsh, Tom Walsh, Murphy, Clohessy, Heaslip, Dwyer, and the McCarthy Cup! "These fragments I have shored against my ruin!" For God sake, but especially for your own, go to the match! -Dick Lyng