The Life of Mrs Finnegan PART I The FLAMING RED Years….Being the TRUE ACCOUNT of the Brighton Housekeeper’s rise to prominence in the 1830s

A request has flooded in asking about my EARLY life. How did I acquire such a RICH UNDERSTANDING of human nature? Why do witty quips pullulate so readily from my plume? Who else could retain their dignity and HUMBLE modesty when drenched in accolades?
In short, what makes MRS FINNEGAN THE WOMAN she is today? Come with me, dear reader, and I shall answer all these questions and more in this TWO PART supplement…

My father was a handsome Celt from the south of Ireland and my mother a beautiful Saxon (from an old Hackney family. Often would she regale me with tales of horse paddling races across the marshes.)

My parents were VERY MUCH in love. They were forced to elope because of some MINOR accountancy ERRORS my father was experiencing.

I was born in the MIDDLE of the Irish Sea on a round-the-harbour boat trip THAT set sail from Dublin. It has left me with a PREDILECTION for maritime matters. Ah, how I love the sea at Brighton. I feel an AFFINITY with all the small boats that sail on it. (Not the fishing boats, you understand, I know nothing of them, but the smell. I’m thinking more of the pleasure crafts I can spy from the basement window if I STAND on tiptoe on the table and crank my head sideways.)

 With my rich cultural inheritance, I am fortunate to have a remarkable breathe of vision that has often been remarked upon. I can’t count the number of times growing up someone said fancy you knowing that.

I count myself a Kerry woman, as my father hailed from that DEAR, SWEET county, the most westerly in Ireland and the wettest. While I cannot recall a DRY DAY whilst growing up, I can assure you that my childhood was the happiest.

Omnivorous reading was my education. I was a glutton for books in a way that I have never been for food or wine. My learning was a legend in my own home until tragedy struck.

Disaster upon disaster on my poor family fell. My father endured more accountancy errors and then, alas, my mother left for a BETTER PLACE. Mullingar I think it was…Eventually the maintenance of our home was beyond his SLENDER MEANS. In a word, we lost it.

And in the fullness of time I was mourning for both parents. I dyed MY CLOTHES black using iron filings and the bark of the elder tree (Not to be recommended as the black quickly fades to an unbecoming rust colour that clashes with auburn hair.)

Thus I entered the world equipped only with my erudition, innate good sense and a PLENTHORA of flame coloured hair.

Return tomorrow faithful reader, and I shall tell of the stepping stones that led me to THE REGENCY TOWN HOUSE`