kitchen, onetwothreefourfivesixseven onetwothree and a onetwothree.
She has a good laugh with Bridey.Thats not too bad for your first time.
In a month youll be like a regular Cyril Benson.
I dont want to be Cyril Benson. I want to be Fred Astaire.
They turn hysterical, laughing and squirting tea out of their
mouths, Jesus love him, says Bridey. Doesnt he have a great notion of
himself. Fred Astaire how are you.
Mam says Fred Astaire went to his lessons every Saturday and didnt
go around kicking the toes out of his boots and if I wanted to be like
him Id have to go to Mrs. OConnors every week.
The fourth Saturday morning Billy Campbell knocks at our door.
Mrs. McCourt, can Frankie come out and play? Mam tells him, No,
Billy. Frankie is going to his dancing lesson.
He waits for me at the bottom of Barrack Hill. He wants to know
why Im dancing, that everyone knows dancing is a sissy thing and Ill
wind up like Cyril Benson wearing a kilt and medals and dancing all
over with girls. He says next thing Ill be sitting in the kitchen knitting
socks. He says dancing will destroy me and I wont be fit to play any
kind of football, soccer, rugby or Gaelic football itself because the danc-
ing teaches you to run like a sissy and everyone will laugh.
I tell him Im finished with the dancing, that I have sixpence in my
pocket for Mrs. OConnor thats supposed to go into the black boys
mouth, that Im going to the Lyric Cinema instead. Sixpence will get
the two of us in with tuppence left over for two squares of Cleeves tof-
fee, and we have a great time looking at Riders of the Purple Sage.
Dad is sitting by the fire with Mam and they want to know what
steps I learned today and what theyre called. I already did The Siege
of Ennis and The Walls of Limerick, which are real dances. Now I
have to make up names and dances. Mam says she never heard of a
dance called The Siege of Dinglebut if thats what I learned go ahead,
dance it, and I dance around the kitchen with my hands down by my
sides making my own music, diddley eye di eye di eye diddley eye do
you do you, Dad and Mam clapping in time with my feet. Dad says,
Och, thats a fine dance and youll be a powerful Irish dancer and a
credit to the men who died for their country. Mam says, That wasnt
much for a sixpence.
Next week its a George Raft film and the week after that a cow-
boy film with George OBrien.Then its James Cagney and I cant take
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