Tell Me A Story By Mai Venn Poem by Mai Murphy Venn

We Irish have our own way of coming to terms with death. As a country steeped in history and folklore, each county has its own tale to tell; as I am a Wexford woman, I come from the South and this is my story.

THE OLD HAG
By Mai Murphy Venn


It was around midnight and I had fallen into a deep sleep. The month was August and the year was 1983. I was three months pregnant and I had been feeling ill most of the time. My dread at this stage was dreams. On this, my sixth baby, something strange started to happen to me but it was something that had happened to me before when I was a teenager. It did not seem as frightening to me then as it did at this time. It was something that had featured in my family on my grandmother's side.

Nowadays known as psychic power but in my grandmother's day, it was referred to as "The Old Hag".It is the ability to predict the future through dreams. It had skipped a generation my mother but now, I had the gift... or was it a plague? My grandmother and I were extraordinarily close to each other but she had been dead ten years at this time, which meant that I could not discuss this strange phenomenon with her, these prophecies which had come back to haunt me. My aunts and uncles did not understand much about it because they were mortified of what people might say, for instance, "They are all mad".

To return to my story, on the night of August 19 of the year 1983, I recall my husband asking if I was feeling all right.I went to bed before twelve and fell into a deep slumber. In this profound sleep, a dream formed. It was one of those dreams that had a character from my everyday life such as Aidan Venn my father-in-law, going down the street I live in, turning the corner onto Priory Street,

The scene changed and the old man entered a pub on the Quay, called the Horse Man's Inn. He ordered a short, my dream became more and more frightening as the face of Aidan altered and started to become more and more distorted as if it was no longer his but that of a tormented poor soul reaching out for help. Just then, my observation of everything became important as if they were going to engage in some part of a plot in a play or a book. Then all of a sudden, my eyes stared at the clock on the wall. I watched the hands move slowly but surely towards eleven o'clock and hearing the drum-like ticking sound as that of the death march.

Next, I heard the most pitiful sound. I have never heard anything like it since, nor do I want to. The sound seemed as if a wild beast, screeched out in unbearable pain but no one was there to care or know of its existence. I can still remember this haunting sound lingering on and on, then, as the sound faded, I could see Aidan stumble. He and a tall stool, which was beside him, fell to the ground together just as a barmaid placed his drink before him. I awoke. I was in a cold sweat, my mouth was bone dry, my heart palpitation and I was very confused. I remember asking myself was it a dream or had it really happened? However, deep down, I knew it was the "Old Hag".

The interpretation of the dream was a warning that time was running out. The fact of the clock on the wall was telling me that my father-in-law would die within the next twenty-four hours. The pinpointing of time and the insight of knowing what was to happen to panic me. The fear of the knowledge I had acquired in a dream had puzzled me as to how to deal with preparing the family for the shock.I thought of my grandmother at this time and I remember how it was for her but she had me to confide in.

This was the real thing now fear had set in. I had seen what was to come. I remain awake most of the night. My mind was full of thoughts racing one against another. I could see now how Edgar Alan Poe got his inspiration for those dreadful horror stories he wrote. At last, the dawn broke and a new day arrived on August 20. I got up and got dressed in anticipation of the inevitable. My husband must have thought I had gone and flipped my lid when I asked him to go to his father's house to see if he was still there.

Eventually, but reluctantly he did. His father lived just three doors up from our house; my husband found him singing while shaving himself. The song, which he sang, ironically, was; "Oh Doctor, Oh Doctor, Oh Doctor dear John, your cod liver oil is so pure and so strong".He was fine and healthy and there was not a bit of bothering on him. By now, my husband had his fill of my dreams, but he was still a bit nervous for some reason. I could sense it. I had gone into our front room. I looked out the window and sure enough, I saw my father-in-law turning the corner, wearing the same clothes I had seen him wearing in my dream. I noticed my husband standing beside me but neither of us spoke for several minutes. Bewildered we decided to return to our normal routine, which was the laundry and my husband began to clean out the solid fuel cooker. At about five minutes past eleven, there was a knock at our door; both of us went to find out who was there. Outside was a local barman trying to tell my husband something. My next-door neighbour and a local priest interrupted him. Everyone seemed to be saying the same thing; "Your father is dead" "Your father is dead" Then barman went on to say; "He died in the Horse Man's Inn at around eleven o'clock".