An Irishman's Diary

I'M PUZZLED by a highlighted quotation about Neil Young in our Arts review of the year yesterday, viz: "His O2 show was a powerful reminder that, [for Young], rust never seems to get tired, never mind sleep." Yes I get the reference to his fine 1979 album, Rust Never Sleeps : a title that – by the way – originated as the advertising slogan for a protective paint product called Rust-oleum. Oxidisation is a key metaphor in Young's music, in fact. And clearly, our reviewer was alluding to this as a compliment to the show's energy levels.

But wait. Isn’t the metaphor’s whole point that the singer identifies himself with the metal – under constant risk of corrosion, unless preservative measures are taken – rather than the rust? So by seeming to praise the relentlessness of the latter, is the reviewer not making a coded criticism of Young’s artistic viability? What was the “powerful reminder”? That he needed to slap on another coat of Rust-oleum, quick, or risk becoming a candidate for the scrappage scheme? I only ask because, also yesterday, I received an e-mail from the president-elect of the European Union Geriatric Medical Society, Prof Des O’Neill, which set me thinking (perhaps too much) about media representations of “older people”, as they’re now known.

Among other things, Prof O’Neill drew attention to the fact that the term “ageism” has itself just turned 40, having been first used in the US in 1969.

This means that Ageism and Neil Young began their solo careers around the same time. And the fact that both are still going strong may not be a coincidence. Life expectancy was much lower in 1969 than now, especially in the rock music sector. But advances in medical care, and higher awareness about health generally, means there are more people living longer in every walk of life.

Today, the term “rocker” can be used in the same sentence as “older person”, without necessarily referring to an item of furniture. And even surviving members of the Who can expect to sing lyrics like “Hope I die before I get old” well into their 70s, and beyond.

But back to Prof O'Neill, whose main point was to draw attention to research he and his colleagues at TCD's Centre for Ageing, Science, and the Humanities, have just published in the British Medical Journal. Subtitled "apocalyptic demography for opinion formers", their study involved a trawl through the past decade's archives of the Economist, to find out how often ageing populations are referred to in terms of financial burden rather than scientific advance.

The results are just as dismal, it seems, as the Economist’s guiding science. Negative sentiments outnumber positive ones five-to-one, the researchers found. “Time-bomb” – as in “pensions time-bomb”, is a recurring theme; as are references to “wrinklies” and “crumblies”. The idea of older people being a resource – of wisdom, inspiration, low-cost babysitting, etc – rarely features.

So, never mind the Economist, I'm doing my bit here to reverse such propaganda. Whatever else he is, Neil Young is not a pension time-bomb. He turns 65 next year, but I'm sure his money is safely stashed away. In rust funds, probably. Meanwhile, speaking of explosive pensioners, Tom Jones was 69 this year and is still performing Sex Bomblive, long after you might think he had been safely defused.

ON A NOTcompletely unrelated theme, a book called Tales of the Permanent Waylanded on my desk recently. The title sounds vaguely religious, suggesting a collection of Buddhist parables, perhaps. But as rail enthusiasts will know, "permanent way" is the term given to the tracks trains run on: including the sleepers, rails, fish plates, points, and all the other paraphernalia that goes to make up the iron road.

Michael Barry’s handsome volume is in part a history of Ireland’s railway system – now 175 years old – but it focuses in particular on the infrastructure and the people who maintain it. These include the men who daily walk the line, like Johnny Cash: inspecting it for everything from rust to suspect packages.

Such work is largely invisible to the train-using public. But its absence would be noted quickly enough: a point made by David Hare’s 2004 play, The Permanent Way, inspired by the string of train crashes that followed privatisation of British Rail.

In any case, Michael Barry’s book gives Ireland’s rail gangers, engineers, and inspectors their overdue due.

Ireland’s first railway, in 1834, ran from Dublin to Kingstown. The fact that 2009 marked the 25th anniversary of another service along the same line – the Dart – might suggest rail travel is still thriving in Ireland. But of course, the permanent way’s reach is much reduced from its prime, as I know from a nugget of personal experience.

On the farm where I grew up, we had a shed built from sleepers of the old Dundalk-Carrickmacross railway line, dismantled in the 1950s. There were many such sheds in the area – the decline of the rail travel was a boon for local shed construction.

And ours at least is still standing.

It seems ironic that the most perishable parts of the permanent way – the wooden beams on which the tracks sat – are now the only parts of it still serving a purpose in the north-east. But then again, as Neil Young might say, sleepers never rust.