Saturday in Omagh

By Ron Bateman

I took the bus to Omagh this morning, eschewing the opportunity to travel with the Gonzaga class to Donegal.  It’s not as grossly anti-social as it may seem at first or second or, even, third glance.  In short, my mom is terminally ill and could pass at any time; I feel it unfair to engage too deeply with these new friends.  Like a dark grey rain cloud, omnipresent here in Northern Ireland (at least in January), the specter of her passing has left me with this awkward and unfamiliar battle plan – to purposefully keep myself at arms length.  These Zags don’t need to feel the obligation to tend to me at this moment in life - that wasn’t on the syllabus, I know for a fact.  This is my cross to bear after all and dialogue be damned.  Right?

I read some on the bus, but mostly just watched the brightly painted sheep graze in the passing, rolling green tapestry.  I arrived in Omagh right at noon.  I thought about pulling out my derelict umbrella – the one I bought at the Europa Bus Centre in Belfast on New Year’s Day – but it just wasn’t needed.  I knew from my research online that the memorial to the victims of the August 1998 bombing was remarkably close to the bus depot, but I exited in the wrong direction and found myself on the opposite side of the Strule River.  No worries – hardly an issue in a town of just 22,000.  I meandered back across a pedestrian bridge, following a series of signs pointing my way.

Beautifully kept and adjacent to an arterial roadway, the memorial is, at first glance, a random collection of posts crowned with a variety of mirrors, oriented in opposing directions.  The majority of the posts are positioned on the north of a small reflecting pond.  They are interspersed among similarly sized trees that make them feel part of a larger aggregate.

I took out my headphones and fumbled with them in the light rain.

I cued U2’s, “Peace on Earth.”  A song released in late 2000 that gained popularity after the 9/11 attacks in the United States.  I read somewhere that Bono or the Edge had been quoted, saying that the song was, “as bitter and as angry a song as they’d ever written.”  Listening to the opening lines – lines I have heard hundreds of times – made the hair on my arms stand on end.  “Heaven on earth / We need it now / I’m sick of all of this / hanging around / Sick of the sorrow / Sick of the pain / Sick of hearing again and again / That there’s going to be / Peace on earth.”

I wandered back across the bridge and immediately spotted the translucent, aquamarine obelisk that marks the site of the bomb blast.  I hadn’t realized that it was going to be so close to the memorial itself.  I recognized, accidentally, that a series of additional mirrors affixed to two or three buildings appeared to direct the light from the memorial around the corner and towards the marker.  I tried to take a picture or two without cars / people / etc. to no avail.  I gave up and decided to cross the street and get a coffee and sandwich. 

I took a seat at the table next to the front window, maybe 35 feet from the site of the monument.  “Where’s the love?” by the Black-Eyed Peas came on the radio in the restaurant.  My daughter, Miranda, would approve.  I sunk into the deep seat and breathed the moment in fully.  It was fleeting.

I sat there for two hours, writing and reflecting – watching people park their vehicles in between me and the marker.  It was hard not to imagine that Saturday afternoon, nearly eighteen years ago, and the people walking up and down these same streets, sitting similarly and enjoying a drink when lives were destroyed in an instant and changed for an eternity.  I couldn’t help but speculate about each driver who parked his or her car in front of me.

I walked up Market Street before catching the bus back to Derry.  I took a few pictures here or there.  I thought about why I came here, but, like so many things about my return to Northern Ireland, I am at a loss to articulate why I am drawn to this place.  The horror of that mid-August day stands in stark contrast to my reality that same week so long ago.  I had a six-week old baby, I had just started my fire service career, and we had begun looking for a house – my life held so much promise and possibility while so many here did not.  My only guess is that I am drawn to understand, as a conduit towards empathy, with people who have suffered so greatly.

My dad texted me while I was waiting for the bus.  He said, “I love you son” and that he was emailing a longer message.  It’s ironic to admit that communication with my dad was never the best, especially when I am here helping out with a communication class.  It was never bad – the stuff of melodramatic nighttime TV; it just wasn’t great.  An inverse relationship, however, has emerged in these past months – as my mom’s health has precipitously declined, the dialogue between my dad and I has improved immeasurably.  And for that I am beyond thankful.

I was nervous on the bus ride back.  The bus was hot and I felt a little nauseous waiting for his email.  I felt guilty being here, nearly 4,000 miles from Chicago, trying to find empathy in the wrong petri dish.  My dad would disagree – he would tell me that he his cross and that I have mine.  He would be resolute.  In the end, I found myself wishing that my mom left today – it felt like a special day, a spiritual day.  There aren’t a lot of those.  More than anything, though, it would have been the perfect day for my dad (to get a wee bit of help with his cross).