Conway, Richie
August 27, 2013When Richie (62) died earlier this year, we were all taken aback by his sudden departure. He was due to fly out to Lanzarote that morning. When friends called to pick him up and take him to Knock Airport, they found him lying on the floor following a stroke. He never made it through.
Though we both came from a few miles either side of Claremorris town, I first met Richie when we were both assigned to work in that grand and historic town of Abbeyleix, a few miles from the Kilkenny border. It is deep in hurling country and the roots of the GAA are as strong in those parts as they are across the border in Castlecomer and Ballyragget and Urlingford.
Richie was working with the Department of Lands while I was with the Bank of Ireland. Mayo people were few in those parts so we tended to show solidarity when we heard of connections with the home region.
Both of us joined the Abbeyleix branch of Macra na Feirme, a great way to get to know many of the people in the rural hinterlands back them. They were grand times and the world was young. The soft midlands accents of south Laois still dance in the winds of memory.
We undertook some trips to Thurles for the big hurling games, just 30 miles away. You fall into hurling ways, the people, the passion, the honour and glory that seeps into every sinew. You long for the summer days when pulse hurling takes you to new highs. It never fails to lift the gaelic soul.
To the east lay the football lands of Ballyroan and Stradbally and heading over towards the Kildare and Carlow and Offaly borders. But in Abbeyleix and Raheen and Durrow and Shanahoe, like South Galway, the compass always points south to the hurling heartlands.
Before coming to Abbeyleix for a few short years, Richie spent some time in Ballybofey. He had a great love for that region of Donegal and the strong amateur drama tradition. He often spoke with great fondness of those days in Donegal and I know he was especially thrilled when they won the Sam Maguire Cup for the first time in 1992. And while he was disappointed that Mayo lost out to them in last year's final, the fact that it was Donegal who took home Sam cushioned the regret and disappointment of the day.
For many people in his native Mayo, Richie became more synonymous with the game of bridge than anything else over the last two decades. He absolutely loved the game and the social circle associated with bridge. He was an accomplished exponent of the game, representing the province at the highest level.
He organised numerous trips for bridge clubs to Lanzarote, an island he loved in such a special way, and was one of the best known faces at the various Congress gatherings organised by bridge enthusiasts all over Ireland.
Richie retired from the Farm Development Service in Claremorris just two years ago. He served the farming community throughout the region for over 30 years. He had an encyclopaedic knowledge of the rural areas around Claremorris and developed a great rapport with the farming families.
He was in, many ways, forever young. His colleague in the Farm Development Office, Jackie Duggan, speaking at the funeral mass, said Richie was their 'man around town' at weekends who was so much in tune with all the generations.
It is hard to believe that Richie is not with us on this championship trail. He would love to be on the road to Dublin this weekend to join the 'tribe' one more time. Richie was proud to be a Carramore and Mayo man. Still waving old glory to the very end before the chariot swung low to take him home.
Friends came from far and near to pay their respects to a special friend. After requiem mass celebrated by Fr Gabriel Murphy (Kiltimagh) in Claremorris Church, interment took place Taugheen Cemetery.
Richie is survived by his brothers Johnny (Taugheen) and Frank (Scotland), sister Pauline Mahon (Tibohine, Ballaghaderreen), nephews and nieces, Brian, Linda and Carol Anne Conway and Tomas and Frances Mahon, in-laws, relatives, neighbours and many friends.
The Mayo News, August 27th 2013 Tweet
