Stand by your Man
by Des Holden
In a rocky pool
Waves of distant promises
Call a hopeful song
*
After supper my father says there's entertainment in the village hall in Duncannon and if I want to
go he will take me. He thinks there might be a film. The television at the farm is in the parlour
where it is hardly ever turned on, except for the occasional hurling or Gaelic football match that
features Wexford.
The hall is at the near end of the mile long strand. It sits in the elbow of a small river reaching the
sea, by a stone bridge that might easily have had a troll, though it would have to be a small one. It
has a corrugated iron roof and wooden plank walls and I hope it won't fall down until after the film
ends. The rutted ground also has two dirty caravans, doors closed, one with a broken window
through which a curtain hangs. It's not nearly dark yet but a string of coloured light bulbs crown the
hall door.
"Here's a pound to get in and fifty p for sweets. Go on in now."
He gives me a little push towards the door. Our family understands inertia and momentum, my
brothers and I push the Vauxhall almost every morning and he teaches underachieving approved
school children.
"It ends at 9. I'll be right here," he says, not to reassure but to make sure I make no plans for after.
Inside it's cold and about 20 children from much younger to much older than me are sitting close
together on benches near the other end of the hall. I sit at the end and a man comes from behind a
side curtain and goes along the row collecting entrance fees. He gives each of us a sheet of paper.
My sheet has three grids of numbers on it which I know are bingo cards though I've never played.
He's wearing a black suit and there's wax on his cuffs.
I recognise him as one of the men who take the collection at mass on Sundays. He's older than my
dad and much smaller and white haired. Without speaking he disappears back behind the curtain
with his money.
We don't see him again until the evening ends three hours later. A much younger woman calls the
bingo numbers and while it's exciting I don't win. She presents paperweights to three children. I can
see orange and blue plastic flowers encased in the glass and I wish I had won. She is wearing a
black leotard covered at the front with black beads, black tights and shiny black shoes. She has long
curly blonde hair and she sits just to the side of the screen when the cartoons and the film Bedknobs
and Broomsticks play. Her back is straight and she doesn't watch the films or us.
At the end of the film she turns the lights back up and puts a cassette recorder on a small table next
to her seat. After a loud hissing, music fills the hall and she sings Stand by your man to her silent
child audience. I wonder if there is any chance she might be singing it to me. When the music
finishes she presses the buttons again and sings the whole song through a second time. As the
echoes fade the older man returns. He stands next to her, coughs and with no musical
accompaniment starts to chant The Soldier's Song. Every child hurries to their feet, conversation
dropped and gum pulled out of mouths in respect and the better to sing along. She also joins in, in a
higher key, her voice again soaring into the night and even I am ready to do battle against the
craven greedy English.
Dad is waiting outside as we file out. He leads me across the sand towards the rocky cliffs that
border this near end of beach. Nearer, I can see his jumper folded on the rocks. He shines a torch
into the shallow pool and at first I can't see what he wants to show me. He points and I see a shadow
on the sandy bottom. A large fish has been stranded when the tide went out.
"It's a sea trout. We used to net the stream when I was your age and catch them and eat them.”
We watch the fish, mostly still but occasionally checking it can't get out, then kick our way back up
to the car. The next day the general store hasn't got Stand by Your Man and says I will need to go to
Wexford town. I buy Crazy Horses by the Osmonds, or by a group trying to sound like them. By the
evening I am bored with it and will never play it again.