Is it back to school time yet...?

Me head is melted. This summer there were times I’ve said to myself I’d rather be in the bog footin turf with the midges than refereeing the wrangling and bickering between my three. Mentally exhausting, no? You know the score, it starts off all jovial. They master the act of seducing us into thinking that they’re getting on, then all hell breaks loose and it inevitably ends in tears.  I never get it right, I ‘always listen to her’ and I ‘never blame him’ and ‘you’re just the worst mother in the world, d’ya know that’. Cue stomp up the stairs. Cue door slam. And then the kids follow suit. The Small Man is sportin’ a tude like no other. I know, I know,  all part and parcel of behaviour as he sourly kills time queuing to get into the Adolescent Club. The girls are sick to the back teeth of each other. I am ready to go to bed before they are most nights. I envy their inestimable energy. This all very normal sibling grating is however coupled with the wish-we-never-moved-back remarks thrown into the mix. You’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t, and I’m damned if we had a choice. Consequently, my retort is when you’re 18 you can live where you like. To top it all there has been the weather, and only the one type at that. The less said on meteorological matters the better. You would think that being born and raised in the West of Ireland that I am now immune to rain in all its guises. The slanty rain, straight down rain, the big drops rain and the misty betwixt n between rain. However, getting out for a run with the wind and the rain lashing against my face, tunes in my ears is my lifeline to sanity and until they go back to school those have been rare as hen’s teeth so the lifeline was spread thin. Bad weather and boredom can foster creative endeavours or breed tetchy underbellies or both. Shenanigans in the kitchen included the three deciding to make pizza from Jamie Oliver’s 30 Minute Meals but in reality and without the aid of a fandangled food processor or a crew to abet it’s a good thirty minutes to take everything out of the presses and two hours to clean up more like. After seeing the fantastic Super 8 they decided to make their own videos and house subsequently trashed to make sets with sheets and cardboard and my one and only good lipstick was decimated. There was fun had and no one lost an eye, that’s always a bonus. The pizza didn’t taste half bad either. Roll on Thursday, I'll be whooshing them out the door, back to school and back to some shape of a routine. 

Where were the Swans hangin?

We pass our removal truck at the ferry terminal, the lads’ cab curtains closed as they snooze awaiting the ferry after ours. The crossing was so calm, the sea like a mirror. On our boat there were tired parents carrying shattered children, ready like us for the last part of their journey once they disembarked in Dublin. Irish and second generation Irish heading home to see parents, friends, relatives, endeavouring to keep their connections. We arrive home, the birds getting ready to start the day shift, dawn not yet broken. There was bread in the press (the press, not the cupboard), milk and beer in the fridge and a welcome bunch of flowers. The folks had been out to give the house the once over, what a treat. After our 4 hours kip the removal truck squeezed up the laneway,  the driver and his helper  like long lost members of the family. One of them said he didn’t mind the trips to England and France, said it gets him away from the wife and kids for a while. It's mayhem. The boxes just keep coming. The kids decide to get stuck in, utter bedlam. Dejá vú. Paper, bubble wrap, boxes. In the midst of all of that the Tesco man rings looking for the house and I try to give him directions. He arrives, scratchin his head. ‘Where would you like the groceries, Mrs?’, ‘Anywhere you can find a spot’, I replied. I was delighted with meself, that being the foresight to order the groceries online from England and have them delivered at home in Galway (isn’t the web a mighty yoke) but bewildered at the same time as to why in all that’s good and holy did I order 5 tins of kidneys beans? I also now have enough Flahavans and rice to last the year. Poor Mr Tesco Man struggled to inform me about what was out of stock and replaced over the noise of smashing crockery as the kids did Greek wedding practise. I may never move again. Order needs to be restored.

Outside our back door now resembles a Smurfit packaging warehouse.  All we’re missing are a couple of forklifts and a few clipboards. It’s amazing after you have been away for a while that you see all the things you didn’t see when you lived in a place. I guess it’s selective, you choose what to ignore. Five years ago we laid a patio at the back of the house, all by our ownselves, nothin fancy. It remained unfinished, don’t know why. I think we ran out of something, patience perhaps, that and lack of some class of a tool or another. The slabs had been stacked and remained there in situ for the next 5 years. David Attenborough would have had a field day with all the creepy crawlie squatters. So, with the help of our entomological visitors,  we finally almost finished it. This time we ran out of slabs. Himself asked me why we didn’t complete the project then. That’s us, half a job. Wouldn’t happen in Thame, God no. Meanwhile the curation of the empty walls with the ghostly outlines of our old photos may have to be outsourced. ‘Where were the swans hangin’? Himself asks.  It’s like a jigsaw puzzle and I was never any good at those. Another job left unfinished, for the moment.

It goes without sayin we didn’t return for the weather. The summers are certainly hard work here compared to where we lived in Thame in terms of entertaining the kids. With camps and activities more competitively priced, coupled with sunnier weather, it makes for a less arduous summer for those looking after the ‘I’m-bored’ brigade. Be bored, that’s what I say. It’s your summer holidays, you’re supposed to be and should be bored most of the time. Ironically though, we didn’t have the luxury of popping in for a dip in the sea when most needed. We couldn’t have been more inland. Here, the wonderful grey Atlantic is on our doorstep and the kids for the first time this year (in between showers) braved it, sans wetsuits out in Blackrock. They lasted about 20 mins. I was well impressed with them. I baulked, just too damn cold. Next time I will be braver, treat it like penance.