13 sisters. for all the stong women i know...

i wanted to write this on the weekend but it just got too crazy and i needed a quiet moment to collect my thoughts...

i don’t know the whole story...just bits and pieces that have been told to me here and there....so if i get any wrong...oh well....it’s a irish story...so it doesn’t matter! hehe

there were 13 lynch sisters ...my grandmother winifred being one of them. one of the younger ones and one boy...thomas...who was killed at the age of 16 by an ira attack (of which he was a supporter) i believe the ambulance he was in was inadvertently bombed on the way to the hospital .... something like that.

anyway that left the 13 sisters ...all crazy lynchs and two parents in somewhere in county cork.

many of them took jobs as beauticians to make ends meet as well help out with the war effort as well (WW1)...my grandmother decided she wanted to help out...lied about her age and said she could drive...when she couldn’t. drove some poor frightened general around backwards. grandma also had a thing about lying about her age. she was ten years or more older (noone knows) than my grandpa. she said her birth certificate got destroyed in he war. i think grandpa found out her age when she died but true to her wishes and not put it on her grave stone...i thought that was kinda romantic...

when the younger lynch women got older...many of them decided to find fame and fortune in london where they wanted to star on the big screen....i guess that must have been the 30’s when motion pictures were just becoming the thing...

mum and grandma were extras in cleopatra in 1934...mum would have been 4..that was the beginning and end of her film carreer...oh well...

i wish i could have known and meet more of the sisters....i only remember grandma, babs, theresa and jerry.

if i remember correctly jerry was the kind of woman that even though older was incredibly beautiful...the kind of women when you meet her you think...wow...if she looks like that now...she must have been unbelievably stunning when young.

theresa. theresa...i have to say...was my personal favourite. sorry grandma....but what a woman. super bubbly and upbeat and funny even in her 90’s after raising two children as a single mother (in those days it wasn’t done)... and out living them both...which was sad. she was a bit of a nutter as well. apparently she use to leave aptments with out paying her rent....not when she was young...but in her 70’s. and joined religious groups mainly for the parties! i remember the last time i saw her...she was in her late 90’s...she was so funny....she said “ i don’t have any tea...but i have gin! “ as she pulls a bottle from under the bed....too funny.

the odd thing was theresa died on my birthday...and tessah was due on my birthday. i named tessah after her...it just seemed right.

babs i didn’t really see eye to eye the few times i met her. she was a little hard to get along with....tough lady. the youngest of 14....couldn’t have been easy i guess. i think we would have gotten on later if had the chance. she died at the age of 99...the last of the lynch women...sad really. we had reunion a party for her on her 100th birthday...it was fun met many cousins i had never or rarely met...and played irish tunes...and end of era...but hopefully there is still a little in us...mum and me...katharina...jooles and eli...

and all the strong women in my life....

:)