The Museum of Lost Moments

Passengers have started adding their own exhibits to the display cases in the excellent small museum situated in one of the waiting rooms of Dundalk Clarke Station. Everything that can be slipped past the lids is in there: flyers and postcards from the Visit Ireland display stand in the corner of the room now lie among the old timetables and anniversary editions of McArdle’s beer, but also more personal items like photographs — as if the people passing through the station were aiming to add more importance and longevity to these artefacts and associated moments, deliberately creating exhibits of their lives and those of their loved ones.

Scattered across train signal sheets and timetables from 1904 are: a used ticket for the train to Belfast; the passport photograph of a young man, about twelve years old, with dimples and hair dyed silver-grey; another photograph of a couple in 1980s clothing leaning against the railing of a ship with the deep blue sea behind them, the edges of the image frayed and a bleached-out line obscuring the exact middle, as if it had been carried around in a wallet for a long time; and the in memoriam note of Wayne Mackin on the first anniversary of his death, carefully ripped from the newspaper it appeared in. Maybe adding the thin and cheap piece of paper to the exhibition will make it last longer. The notice ends with: but even in our darkest grief you’re with us from your deepest sleep — Wayne forever in our hearts.