It’s been a lovely lockdown so far. The sun has shone kindly over our pleasantly shrunken world. Life is simpler and there’s no longer any rush to school, to clubs or birthday parties. There are no weekend breaks or daytrips. There’s something pleasant about not having to decide what to do, for the only thing…
We decided to triple my wife’s potential exposure to the coronavirus. It seemed like the sensible thing to do. This decision saw my wife go from working one to three shifts per week in the emergency department of our local hospital. This is on top of her normal GP work. As a doctor, she can…
It was a moment of madness. Just as Storm Jorge charged towards the Irish coast, I spontaneously booked a holiday cottage perched just yards from the West Cork coastline. I felt the whole family needed a getaway, after a remarkably busy few weeks, and since our Christmas holidays were marred by one of the kids…
My wife and I were test-driving an electric car the other day, when my 10-year-old son announced from the back seat, “This might be the car I learn to drive in!” He was right, too. He turns 11 this autumn, and we could easily keep the car for another six years. In six years’ time,…
A child’s first words are a huge milestone. At first, amongst the babble that emerges from a baby, something resembling a word occasionally emerges, like “da” or “yeah”. Yet, you cannot be quite sure if was merely accidental. Perhaps, you think, she is also inadvertently saying the occasional coherent word of Swahili or Russian, as…
A deep frost had carpeted the garden with diamonds. A white mist rose from the stream in the woods, cut through with shafts of golden sunlight. The branches of the naked trees stretched their frosted limbs to the blue sky, where a half moon loitered. From the warmth of the kitchen, where last night’s fire still…
I was working at home when the call came. A shake in the teacher’s voice told me that this was no ordinary playground fall. She said my son had fallen badly while playing football and that “he couldn’t see afterwards” and was complaining of headaches, as well as cuts to his arms and legs. I drove…
I pulled in to the airport drop-off zone with some trepidation. My wife was travelling overseas for an important course. This meant that our breastfed baby had to travel with her too. For nine whole days, I would be alone at home with the three bigger kids. The oldest two would be fine. They would…
Christmas looms large in children’s minds. It is for them a time when the mundane is transformed into the glittering and magical. The Christmas lights strewn across the land are a collective rebellion against the darkness in these, the very darkest days of the year. Since the end of November, during every night-time car journey,…
I am entering the ‘taxi driver’ stage of parenthood. My little customers have busy schedules and must be ferried at the appointed time to brownies, gymnastics, rugby training, soccer training, GAA training, Irish dancing classes, flute lessons, singing lessons, tin whistle lessons, swimming and weekends away, together with sundry playdates, birthday parties and so forth.…