A Paltry Output, But!

I was not ‘devastated’ by this ‘blow’. My prayers had been answered in this miracle. I was absolutely elated. The obvious question is, ‘if you disliked the work, why didn’t you quit?’

Six weeks ago, I was dealt what my boss called a ‘devastating blow’. I had been an apprentice at a joinery on the outskirts of Cork for about two months, and, as my boss would say on more than one occasion, ‘bluffed it away’ for as long as it lasted. I actually really liked my boss, and I think he liked me too. But his refrain in our fateful conversation about 6:55am on the morning of Wednesday the 13th of November was, “it’s up to you to decide now if you really want to be in this game or not”. Suffice to say that I’m not sure that he thought I was cut out for a career in joinery!

I had resolved to survive until - at the very least - Christmas before quitting, with the intention then being to either i) finding other carpentry work that I thought would be more interesting and satisfying or ii) do the work that I would love to do, but had never quite had the cajones - or, put another way, I was never in the the ‘right circumstances’ - to make happen. The main reason not to choose option ii), both in the past and now, was that I had developed a reputation as someone that dips in and out of things, but doesn’t stay the course. I did always propose to myself - but feared that I might be codding myself - that I could stick at something; it just had to be something that I enjoyed. But this is risky business. As the jibe says, “what do you call an artist without a girlfriend? Homeless”.

I don’t know that the interviews I’ve done in the past quite qualifies as art, but the work is in at least some senses creative. It is also the most enjoyable work I’ve ever done, and it hasn’t felt like work. Over the last two years, I’ve indulged in another creative activity that is playing music, even daring to start writing some original material. I do all this bashfully, but less so as time goes on. As my mum said when I was about to leave Memphis to go to California, ‘you’re running out of road’. As the road runs out, and I cross more things off the list of potential occupations, and as I get older, I become more willing to throw the kitchen sink at the whole operation.

I have not yet outlined the exact nature of the ‘devastating blow’ dealt by my boss a few weeks ago, although you may have it roughly figured out by now. I was not fired, although maybe I would have been in time… I was laid off, and this due to the genuinely devastating fact for my boss that his warehouse’s landlord was seeking to double the rent, and he would have to close down the workshop before long. I was the least necessary of the three workers under my boss, and he said he was letting me go at that point so that, by Christmas, I ‘could decide if I really wanted to be in this game or not.’

I was not ‘devastated’ by this ‘blow’. My prayers had been answered in this miracle. I was absolutely elated. The obvious question is, ‘if you disliked the work, why didn’t you quit?’ If I hadn’t done so much moving around over the last few years, I would probably have had no problem quitting, but then again, if I hadn’t moved around a lot, I probably wouldn’t have ended up in this situation to begin with. Moving around had started to get old, and I was sticking it out to prove that I could, as much as anything else.

But my boss delivered the best early Christmas present I’d ever been given. My pay had been €336 per week (Phase 1 apprentices get paid less than the minimum wage), but on the day of my retirement, he gave me €400 cash in an envelope (after doing only two days of work that week). It was more money than I was expecting, and it wasn’t necessary, but it was most gratefully received. It was only a few hours before I’d spent the lot of it, and spent another €660 on the American credit card, to buy a trolley full of equipment for to begin my ‘career in music,’ busking to start off. Indeed, one of the reasons I moved to Cork was that I wanted to live in a place where I could busk freely, not wanting to start something so audacious in my home city of Dublin, but after about two months here in Cork, exhausted by the bluffing at the carpentry and joinery, I hadn’t started doing it yet. Now that I had been laid off, there was not only nothing stopping me from doing it, but there was what I saw as an almost explicit invitation to just do it.

I first bought just the keyboard, hoping that its built-in speakers might be sufficient to be at least somewhat audible. If I had any success, I said, I could buy a microphone and amp later. But after about fifteen minutes of utter ignoration by the good people of the Real Capital in the quieter wing of the English Market, I knew that playing the keyboard on its own would lead nowhere. By the time evening came, I had bought the AA batteries, the stool, the keyboard, the pedal, the amp, the microphone, the mic stand, and the aux cord. Now it was time to start playing.

The first night went extremely well. My expectations were non existent, but the reception was quite good, and I made more money than I would have accepted happily. I think it came to about €90, in about two and a half hours. Worth more than the money was the fact that I had survived and enjoyed the experience, not just without being embarrassed as would be the fear if doing it in Dublin. The good people of the Real Capital had been most gracious in their encouraging comments.

Although I’ve busked about a dozen times since then, I don’t think anything can recreate the magic of that night. People can probably sense when you’ve done a particular song more times than anyone would like to hear, and on that first night, there was a freshness that I think people enjoyed. I suppose the response to this is that I should keep ‘updating’ and ‘expanding’ the repertoire, extending beyond the useful-but-already-getting-jaded renditions of Folsom Prison Blues, Everyday I Have the Blues, and Joseph Plunkett’s Grace. On that note, the most money I received during any song was the other day when I sang ‘Ride On’ for the first time. The song is a bit cliche, and it’s very simple, but it was maybe its plainness that people actually liked, and maybe I sang it with some sliver of authenticity given that it was my first time. I know this likely goes against what people say about excellent singers becoming one with a song, but such is what I’m settling for at this stage.

In addition to the busking, I’ve been working part time teaching music at a very small secondary school in Cork city, and I’ve been coaching tennis one day a week in Kinsale. Expenses aren’t very high due to a generous rental arrangement facilitated by the Dominicans in Cork. All that to say that, despite not really having a job, I’m getting by. This situation, the likes of which I haven’t come close to having before, has enabled a resurrection of my YouTube channel and Substack account; hence your receipt of this email. If you look at the output over the last year, it is miserly enough, but if you just look at the last month, it’s pretty substantial.

It has been nearly a year since my last email to you. I wish to produce considerably more content in the near future. I will have said this innumerable times in the past, but this time is different. I think it might actually happen this time around.

I hope you get some enjoyment out of the content linked below.

The Jesuit Who Found the Lost Caravaggio (Excerpt from an interview conducted with Fr Noel Barber SJ)

How did a masterpiece by Caravaggio end up in a Dublin dining room?
Link to article on National Gallery Website

Gerard Manley Hopkins and the Spiritual Exercises - Fr Noel Barber SJ

Nancy Spain Cover

Why and How Young People Are Abandoning Politics (from September)

Irish Christmas Carols on Piano

Picture: Workstation
Location: Yellowhammer Coffee, Cottage Hill Road, Mobile, Alabama
Date: 27th December 2024

Happy Christmas.

Support Fergus O’Rourke’s YouTube Channel (January-March 2025)

Go raibh míle maith agat,
Fergus