Middle Child

Summer – At Last

7 September, 2024
Posted in: Dublin, Ireland, Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Twins, Youngest Child

Today was a beautiful day and instead of doing lots of domestic admin (which I’m not doing now either, you will note), I seized the day, hopped on my bike and took the commuter train out to the seaside.

I stopped in town to have a look at the Liffey swim. At least they had nice weather but, mmm, is that water clean?

I must say, the seaside was looking lovely.

As we frequently (rather inaccurately) say on a fine day here, “You could be in the South of France”.

I had a lovely swim. Poor Michael was in a college clubs and socs meeting all day (he is on the committee of a society) where they told them how not to embezzle money. Herself had gone back to London for a party where it was raining. Daniel opted to stay at home and play on the x-box. I can tell you, I was winning here. Though Mr. Waffle, who was in the hammock in the back garden, may have been giving me a run for my money.

It would be too much to hope that I could also take a flattering picture; doubtless some kind of karma as I took it to post smugly in the family group chat and now I am posting it smugly here. As I took the picture, I did reflect that all my life I have been leaving bags full of valuable possessions on beaches and they have never been stolen. A happy thought. The cover the bag with a towel trick really works, I guess.

Mmm, is that water clean? Probably not very, I fear. Never mind, I am testing my immune system.

I then joined the very long queue for an ice cream.

Worth it.

In fact, all was well until I got back to the station nearest home. Alas. Three flights.

And, after a day filled with excitement, I’m going to the cinema tonight. Thrills. It’s the new “Beetlejuice”. I re-watched the 1988 one last night in preparation. I will report back. I know you’re on the edges of your seats out there.

I feel I have got excellent value for this year’s summer.

Re-entry

1 September, 2024
Posted in: Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Siblings, Twins, Work, Youngest Child

We came back last weekend and then I put in a full week in work Monday to Friday. The longest week I have ever put in. It is scarcely believable that I have to go back tomorrow. A former colleague once advised me to never start work after holidays on a Monday. Advice which I frankly would have done very well to follow.

At mass last weekend I met the granny of one of Michael’s school mates who informed me that Michael was a charming child and that she had a lovely chat with him at the bus stop. She is originally from Bere Island so we have our Cork identity in common and my sister’s partner’s parents have a house on Bere island only up the road from her family home so, you know, small world and all that. I came home and told Michael I had met his former school mate’s granny and that she had said how much she had enjoyed chatting to him at the bus stop. “Ah,” said he, “was that who she was? I thought she was just a random old lady.”

Since our return home, many of our spare moments have been spent wrestling with the garden which was almost entirely out of control and still teeters on the brink. It is apple jelly season with a vengeance, however, Falling Fruit who have come and stripped my apple trees in the past have promised that they will come in late September. That could be too late, I could be buried in apple jelly by then.

Myself and Daniel went to see the film “Kneecap“. It’s about a rap band from Belfast. I thought it was funny but probably not ideal for parent child viewing. I read some reviews afterwards and I quite enjoyed the Guardian one where it referred to one of the characters – known as mo chara – as “Chara” throughout as though it’s some kind of surname. Mo chara is the Irish for my friend and cara is the root word which only takes a “h” because of the mo/my. Look, we Irish speakers have to get our kicks where we can.

No sooner had she arrived home than herself went to Wales for a 21st. Sooner her than me. Coincidentally, my sister and her partner are in Wales also for a family wedding on his side. If there are any disasters in Wales, we are extremely exposed this weekend.

Mr. Waffle and I went on a tour of the former military school in the Phoenix Park this morning (now a geriatric hospital). Good chapel work (one of each obviously, though the Protestant one converted to Catholic at some point which seems slight overkill and now both are closed to the public and one surrounded by slightly menacing deer) but overall a bit dull.

They had an old phone booth which the guide told us they had had to lock as tourists kept going in to take selfies. I am surprised by this as it is a bit off the beaten track and seems a relatively harmless use of outdated infrastructure in any event, but there you are. As I peered in, I was reminded of how when someone picked up the phone you had to press button B so that the money would go in or else you would be cut off. I remember a girl in school said that she enjoyed ringing Australian numbers and hearing confused Australians pick up (in the middle of the night, I assume) before they were cut off as, obviously, she never pressed button B. What a time to be alive. As I say to the children, when I was young we had to make our own fun.

Full details on our Baltic holiday odyssey to follow. Something for you to look forward to.

Things

21 July, 2024
Posted in: Family, Middle Child, Princess, Siblings, Twins, Youngest Child

My sister has been cleaning out the attic of my parents’ house. A vast undertaking. My experience in the house where I grew up has made me very wary of acquiring too many things in my own. My mother always said that she was not part of the throwaway generation (note the old implied insult there, I loved my mother but she was still my mother, if you know what I mean). She meant it. They kept everything, the useful mixed in with the emphatically useless: carpet cut offs; boxes of paperbacks; silverware; children’s toys; old photos; my grandmothers’ hats and kid gloves; pots and pans; broken furniture; old correspondence; copybooks from the 30s, and 40s; you name it, it was there. To be fair to my parents, they did grow up at a time when Ireland was poor and people did keep things which we would not today. But even allowing for this, I think they were big keepers. I suppose they weren’t helped either by moving from a very large house to an Edwardian semi-D.

I feel my sister is so much more cheerful now that she has sorted through this mountain of things and – epic achievement – emptied the attic. I, unlike my parents, am always giving things away and encouraging my children to do likewise. I have discovered through Olio, that there appears to be someone who wants everything, although the effort required to get it to them can be considerable. Daniel and Michael spent a weekend in Cork helping their aunt with the attic clearance and I was gratified to hear Daniel say that I was quite right to be constantly disposing of stuff. He was horrified by the volume of things.

The most impressive thing that I ever encountered was an English woman I met in Brussels who was moving home to London. Her flat in Brussels had been large and her flat in London was much smaller. Instead of trying to repurpose her Belgian furniture and possessions, she sold or gave them all away (I still have two of her prints framed on my landing) and just kept a couple of souvenir items. “It’s a different place, it needs different things,” she explained. While I don’t know that I could ever do that, I think it is an admirable attitude. I gave my daughter some of my mother’s rings. Seeing the Princess wear them and remembering my mother wearing them makes me very happy and brings me more joy than all of the contents of the attic. I suppose I must caveat this by saying I have no idea what all the contents of the attic are.

The older I get the more I think people can be weighed down by things. My sister says that she heard an older woman say to a young woman in a shop once that there is a time for acquiring and a time for disposing and perhaps this is also true. I like to think that I was always restrained in my acquiring and by nature a disposer but how then to explain my posters of Venice from the 90s which my sister found in the attic?

P.S. Happy Belgian National Day

Sharper than a Serpent’s Tooth etc.

19 July, 2024
Posted in: Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Twins

Mr. Waffle is a great fact checker on the internet. He’s probably one of the only people who uses it properly.

One night Daniel and I were at home alone together and we watched a film. “Who’s that?” I said pointing to a vaguely familiar actor. Daniel didn’t know. “What else has he been in, can you look it up?” I asked him, missing Mr. Waffle’s instant response time.

From his perch lying on the sofa, Daniel said “I’m not your Wikipedia lapdog.”

An earlier photo of the same group on the sofa

Late June/Early July Round Up – Bringing you Right Up to Date – Thrills

6 July, 2024
Posted in: Cork, Ireland, Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Reading etc., Siblings, Twins, Youngest Child

Friday, June 28, 2024

I was travelling to Cork for the the weekend and began receiving increasingly apocalyptic messages from the train people about how busy it was going to be. There were matches on, and festivals and concerts. As Mr. Waffle put it, “Overcrowding Taylor’s Version”. Honestly possibly followed by “I’m the problem it’s me”. It turns out everyone in the country is a Taylor Swift fan. Anyway, the trains were grand, you will be relieved to hear.

Saturday, June 29, 2024

The reason for my trip to Cork was to visit an old school friend. She has moved to the US and has an American husband and four American children but she bought a house in Kinsale years ago and they come to Ireland for a fortnight every summer. Genius.

I took the bus from Cork to Kinsale to see her. I haven’t been on the bus to Kinsale in years. The last time I took the bus, it was ancient, drafty, irregular and the journey took about an hour. Well, well, well things have changed I can tell you. It was a private operator (yeah, I know, they hoover up the profitable routes etc.) and the bus was convenient, punctual, clean, comfortable and speedy. It only took 25 minutes to get to Kinsale which is faster than I would do it in the car. God I was delighted.

My friend met me in the car park in town. She and her husband had had terrible food poisoning during the week and they were both still feeling a little delicate but definitely on the mend. She and I went out for a walk to the Bulman – a classic adventure – and had lunch. She couldn’t face the mussels – and who could blame her? – but I can confirm that they were very satisfactory.

Then we went back to her house so that I could inspect her children. They get bigger all the time don’t they? Her eldest son has just finished first year in college and her only daughter is starting in the autumn. All three boys still look more of less the same but her daughter has really grown up. She is a very pretty young woman and she made me feel about 102 through no fault of her own; it’s just I remember her aged 3.

While I was there, this super yacht passed by and apparently it belongs to some very rich American family who spent €80 million on it. My friends tell me the super rich Americans have bought the lovely house where my great uncle and aunt lived in the ’50s. I can tell you, the more I hear about this house, the greater my regret that my great aunt decided to sell it and move back to the city after my great uncle died. Oh well. I’m not super rich, but I’m happy.

My friend and I went back into town, explored the shops and had a cup of tea. The rain had held off for our walk in the morning but it made up for it in the afternoon. Still all grand; Kinsale is well supplied with shops worth exploring.

I was really glad I made the trip; my friend has made such an effort to stay in contact with her Irish friends and family and I am always impressed by her dedication. We met in New York last year when I was having my delightful break from work. Possibly there will be more of this kind of thing in our future.

I was staying in my brother’s house as my sister had visitors (she is in my parents’ house and my brother is in my aunt’s house which is next door, I am not sure how any of us feels about this) but I dropped in to see her in the evening. All very pleasant.

My brother had gone up to Dublin that afternoon (it’s like Lannigan’s Ball) so I had the house to myself for the evening.

Sunday, June 30, 2024

While I still bitterly lament the demise of the Crawford Gallery cafe (they have a new tenant, not at all as good), I am becoming very fond of the Good Day Deli which has an strong rus in urbe vibe and very good food.

After a quick breakfast and a farewell to my sister, I hightailed it back to Dublin. Not though before my sister had shown me a big picture of my mother and two of her classmates on the front page of the Irish Times. I can only speculate that the sight of a woman getting a master’s in science snagged the editor’s interest in the 1950s. I would say that was probably the last time a UCC conferring has featured on the front page of the Irish Times as they don’t like to include content from beyond the Pale, if at all possible. I have to say, not a great photo of my mother but there you are, exciting all the same.

Also, at the opposite end of the academic journey, my sister had found my father’s progression card from kindergarten to first grade. Goodness, gracious me, that card has had quite the journey.

Monday, July 1, 2024

Mr. Waffle and I went to see “Inside out”. It’s the kind of film that’s better if you have a young child to hand who can be persuaded to go with you. We did not.

Tuesday, July 2, 2024

Herself returned home. Let joy be unconfined etc. It is nice to have all five of us together.

Friday, July 5, 2024

I worked from home and so was in a position to see two of my three children go out for a morning run around the park. Michael a boy after my own heart, stayed in bed (he was up all night talking to his friends and following the UK general election). Where will it all end?

The Princess, Daniel and I went out for lunch together locally (Mr. Waffle was at a conference and Michael has no interest in food – how can he be my child?) and very pleasant it was too.

We spent the evening with all five of us hunched over the dining room table booking our summer holiday. Not everyone is available at the same time. The logistical challenge has left us all in an enfeebled state.

Saturday, July 6, 2024

I went to the Women Impressionists exhibition in the National Gallery. It was fine and I might go back and have another look but I was not overwhelmed. It had only four women impressionists – are there more? Don’t look at me. Berthe Morisot, Mary Cassat and Eva Gonzalès I had heard of but Marie Bracquemond was new to me. I am scheduled to go to a lecture on the exhibition next week and perhaps I will be in a better position to appreciate it thereafter. It’s one thrill after another here, right?

Mid June Round Up

30 June, 2024
Posted in: Family, Ireland, Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Travel, Twins, Youngest Child

Friday, 14 June, 2024

Our next door neighbour turned 60 – honestly looks absolutely amazing, an inspiration to us all -and invited us to a party in Donegal where her mother was from. We decided to proceed slowly (it’s a long way from Dublin) and set off Friday evening after work. We stayed in Monaghan at Castle Leslie about which I have heard plenty. The Castle was full for a wedding so we stayed in the lodge. I guess I must have been through Monaghan before but I’ve never stayed there. It feels very northern (though in the Republic). Castle Leslie is only 20kms from Armagh and it was obviously cut off from it’s natural hinterland by the Border. There used to be a train line but it was shut down, in the 20s I think, following partition. Odd spot.

The lodge was quite pleasant in a Victorian gothic kind of way (it reminded me a bit of UCC) but the rooms, though nice were a bit bland – an interior designer’s country house. But fine and the food was good at breakfast and reasonable at dinner.

We went for a walk up to view the castle. Holy mother of God, it is so ugly. Scottish baronial (not a style I am partial to, I must confess) but an insult to that name. It is the ancestor of a million McMansions. I regret to say that I have no photos but doubtless the website will give you an idea. The older church in the grounds is a much nicer building.

I was a bit confused by the Protestant church, as the guide to the peerage in the main house had the young Leslies attending Downshire and Ampleforth (Catholic boarding schools in England), but apparently one of the baronets married an American (sister to Winston Churchill’s mother) and her son either converted or was always Catholic. Apparently he was a big supporter of independence and while his father (a staunch unionist) was parading the Ulster volunteers at the front of the house, he was sneaking out the back to join the rebels. I think it is to the staunch unionist, or possibly his father, that we owe the insult to Scottish baronial style as the architect (I looked him up) seems otherwise to have produced inoffensive enough buildings albeit in the heavy style of the time. I can imagine him getting directions. There is a loggia round the back. Honestly, not awful but not consistent with the style elsewhere. Inside there is a portrait gallery filled with, I’m sorry, terrible paintings by this 19th century baronet. There are also frescoes, the less said of these the better.

However, overall, it’s actually grand inside with lovely views and the interior is much less bland than the lodge.

I wouldn’t mind staying in the main house some time, if it didn’t beggar us.

The grounds are massive and lovely to stroll around provided you keep your back to the castle (“where every prospect pleases and only man is vile” or words to that effect as someone or other said).

In the car on the way up there, I was congratulating myself on currently having no injuries. Hubris. Alas, I gave my toe an almighty wallop on a hidden step in the very fancy bathroom attached to our room and was convinced I had broken it. However, it was fine in a couple of days so possibly I exaggerated the pain.

Saturday, June 15, 2024

It has been a long held ambition of mine to visit the Ulster American folk park. My children will tell you that I love a folk park. Mr. Waffle said to me, “When will we be this close again?” so rather than go immediately to Donegal as we had originally intended we stopped off. Well, what a treat for folk park lovers. Firstly, it’s pretty empty and secondly, it’s excellent. It’s built around the old Mellon homestead. When Mr. Mellon went to America he became one half of Carnegie Mellon and his descendants bought the house and provided seed funding for the park and possibly still provide money for all I know. My friend from Belfast remembers it opening in 1976 and he says it was such a grim time in the North, its opening was a positively thrilling event. I was thrilled, I can tell you.

There is a slightly dull exhibition which tells you about the lives of three emigrants whose houses you will see in the park; one is, no surprises, young Mellon; another is a Catholic young man whose mother wanted him to be a priest and who ended up as bishop of New York (dream big young man) and is buried under the altar of the cathedral there; and the third is a relatively rich man who went trapping and ended up with a house in the American South (where you ask? You might well ask but I have forgotten. Alas.)

We pushed fairly quickly through this and started in the park proper. You start off in Ulster. They’ve moved buildings into the park from other parts of the North which was something I thought only Americans did. They had people dressed up in old fashioned clothes to tell you about the history of the houses. They also have turf fires going in the houses (very bad for the bogs, I know, but so pleasant) and somehow the smoke coming up from the chimneys made it all seem so authentic (though the spotless nature of everything slightly detracted from that, surely, even in Ulster, labourers’ cottages were never so clean and tidy?). God, I was delighted. When people ask whether I would prefer to have the power to fly or be invisible (more frequent than you might think), I always pick invisible as I just want to see into other people’s houses, so the visit to the park is basically a superhero adventure.

Then having seen old Ulster, you’re brought to a town to get on a ship to the new world. The town is fantastic: shops and pubs brought from all over the place. We were chatting to the man in the draper’s and he told us that it originally came from Derry. This was my favourite part.

I was amused to see this sign which the authorities have obviously not yet removed in their post-Brexit cull.

Then you go into a big shed and you’re on the quays with a ship awaiting your departure and a ticket office on the quayside.

You get on the ship, you come out the far side and, hey presto, you’re in the new world. I thought it was really cleverly done.

Once you clear the town, you’re into all sorts of American homesteads many of them (possibly all of them) brought from America. How extraordinary. One of the guides said that the house brought from Tennessee ran into some difficulties as it was set up in a bog in Northern Ireland but they seem to have addressed this.

After our successful tour of Ulster and the US, we pushed on to Donegal. Although it was alternately overcast and lashing rain in the Ulster American folk park, the sun was splitting the stones in Donegal and we had the most beautiful drive into Falcarragh.

Our hosts had laid on all kinds of trips during the day – a walk up Mount Errigal, a boat ride to Inishbofin – but none of these things would be much fun in the rain. How great was my FOMO when I discovered that the weather had been beautiful all day on the Donegal coast? Very great, I have to tell you. Many of our neighbours were there and if another one told me about the amazing swim they had on Inishbofin, I was not going to be responsible for my actions. You can’t have it all, I suppose.

The party was great, however, with music and dancing and food and cake. I took these, not great, photos from the balcony of the hotel at 22.33 and 00.38. What a glorious day.

Overall, a good day. It was my mother’s anniversary – she died five years ago and I think she would have been delighted to think of me having such an enjoyable day.

Sunday, June 16, 2024

We checked out in the morning and heard the hotel staff speaking fluent Irish to each other; it was so nice to hear Irish being used in that way. Utterly incomprehensible, mind you. Mr. Waffle chatted away as Gaeilge but I could only watch and admire.

We went for a walk on the beach and a bite of lunch before heading back to Dublin. Honestly the weather was much more what I expect from Donegal in June.

The house was empty when we got home which was a bit weird. The guys were in Cork for the weekend helping their aunt empty out the attic before the roofers came. Augean stables spring to mind.

Monday, 17 June 2024

I was up with the lark to get the ferry to Wales.

Then I drove to Oxford – about four and a half hours solid – went into town and helped herself pack up her things. I thought she might be sad about saying goodbye but she was quite cheerful. When we had finished the epic packing task we went out for dinner with her young man. I retired to my bed exhausted about 10.

Tuesday, 18 June 2024

I insisted on us setting off at the crack of dawn as I am always worried something terrible will happen near Birmingham and I am terrified by the prospect of having to overnight in Holyhead due to having missed the ferry.

We had breakfast in Oxford and set off before 10 (ok, technically, possibly not the crack of dawn). Despite the best of intentions to travel along the M6 (tolled) motorway, we failed to find it. The main M6 is exhaustingly busy in my view. Nevertheless, as herself confidently predicted we made good time so I was merciful and we stopped in Conwy (which I find a charming town though a little down on its luck) for lunch.

We made the ferry no problem and were safely home by 7.30 or so. Still and all I was extremely grateful to all the gods that I did not after all have to travel for work the next day.

Herself came home with me but then promptly left two days later to fly to France for a post-college holiday (isn’t it well for them etc.). She will be restored to us on Tuesday, I am pleased to report.