"There is a holy well situated not far from my house in Timothy Kelleher's field at the junction of three townlands, Magoola, Agharinagh and Dromgownagh. Formerly it was a place of great interest to the old people but, nowadays, like everything else, veneration for it is dying out. It is neglected now its sides are falling in, but still it is loved by a few old people (Timothy Murphy's account, a student from Magoola, Dripsey for the School Folklore Collection, 1938)".

Explorations at Sunday's Well, Agharinagh, Lower Dripsey (Picture: Kieran McCarthy, autumn 2007) .

It was 6.30a.m. at Cork Airport. Sitting by the gate waiting for the plane didn't require effort. The fact the flight was early in the morning meant my senses were not fully awake. I can remember certain things, aspects that have stayed in my mind. Everyone seemed to move slowly at that time. Noises seemed exaggerated. My stream of consciousness was not clear but hazy. I was just too tired to make myself fully aware of my surroundings. Looking out on the runway, the darkness before sunset meant that somehow beyond the glass was a black void of the unknown. But as the minutes rolled on, the blackness turned to purple and eventually half-light. The void in minutes became full of shapes and new colours, planes and staff on the runway. Time was called to board as my own senses began to waken, as did those of my fellow passengers.

I always feel that remembering and forgetting is like that hazy world of consciousness I felt at the airport. All of us choose to remember certain things that happen to us. Over time, these stories become fragmented as we remember the key points and when we pass on the story to a willing listener, the listener can dilute the story if it is passed on. One can also choose to forget entirely a life narrative. Hence, the researcher in that case has nothing to research as the years pass on.

There have been times in my journey down the Lee where I would love to find out more about a certain person or a place. However, there has been many an occasion where there has been a limit to discovering the historical data. Data could be lost or in many cases never researched and / or compiled. Oral histories are great to fill in some of the line of memory. Memory is living history. A memory can be forgotten about as time marches on but the event becomes history if it is written down.

With the all the above in mind, on the current ordnance survey map, two holy wells are marked on the northern valleyside of the Inniscarra Reservoir, half a mile from the main road. At the juncture of looking for archaeological monuments off the main road or what I deem two or three fields in from the main road, it's better to have a guide. It cuts down on searching through briars, even though climbing ditches still has to be done as well as avoiding electric fences. With a guide, one can negotiate the latter health and safety issues. In addition, you get to chat to your guide about the monument and its relevance in their lives- how it has informed their cultural beliefs and their education of their world. The series has already met Pat Carroll of Lower Dripsey. With the help of Pat and another local resident Martin McCarthy, we explored the local holy well of Sunday's Well.

Crossing a number of fields that had seen their autumnal cut, we headed into a narrow stream valley. In the midst of the overgrowth, there was the well but it did not have a 2007 feel to it. In fact, the artifacts it held were of the 1940s and 1950s. The holy well had remained intact and untouched for over fifty years. It was like being in a timewarp. I felt that hazy consciousness that I was at the border between real world and the world of the well, the borders of remembering and forgetting or at the borders of memory and history.