| A Fond Farewell Comment
The things that often prove difficult when planning farewells and other
forms of tribute is to try and make sure that they are somewhat appropriate
for the occasion.
A funeral service, for instance, that is staid, dark and overly mournful
may not always perhaps be looked upon as the ideal form of farewell.
This is especially true if the service is, for instance, in memory of a
person who in life may have been regarded as the life and soul of the party.
Or who might have been taken before their time was due, before they had
reached their full potential.
The star-studded tribute to the late Northern Secretary Mo Mowlam at the
Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in London on Sunday night really hit the spot.
It featured the wild, the very funny and also the very sincere.
Mo Mowlam was somebody very special. She brought communities and people
together — and not just in the North of Ireland — because she
was different from other politicians that had held the role previously.
She was forthright and direct. While others may have got bogged down in
diplomatic-speak, Mo Mowlam told it how it was.
While many politicians in the North of Ireland used hyperbole to cover
over the cracks and to mask the real issues, Mo Mowlam kicked off her
shoes, cast aside the wig she wore to cover the fact that she had lost
her hair to illness and told it straight.
She cajoled and played with her fellow male politicians and referred to
them as “Babe” — displaying a style that had not been
heard before in the North or indeed since.
Sometimes to come to a job from a different angle is to bring to it a breath
of fresh air.
Mo Mowlam was not born in Ireland and, besides, she was not bogged down
by any form of religious baggage.
She was able to bring to the job a fresh way of thinking, a fresh way of
doing the job at a time when the political climate and landscape was changing
in Ireland, something that had to be reflected in whoever was carrying out
the role.
Mo Mowlam did not always get it right, of course. And in the end, she probably
got it too right.
The course that she was attempting to navigate through the political situation
in the North of Ireland at the time meant perhaps that she was moving too
fast for those too set in their ways to really catch up.
Mo Mowlam was attempting to appeal to the young as well as the old in her
job.
She wanted to move on and drag those kicking and screaming with her into
a new modern form of Irishness.
Unfortunately the opportunity was taken away from her — all too soon. |
