Hello everyone! Greetings where ever you are from a bright and autumnal cottage in County Cork
How are you? Well I hope and managing to stay balanced, grounded and semi-sane (at least) in these strange times.
This week has been one of reactions here on the Emerald Isle. The dreaded Covid numbers are climbing and so further restrictions are put in place, it’s all very disheartening I must say. So we’re all teetering on the brink of level 3 and rapidly looking down the barrel of level 4 restrictions. They have to do it I suppose but…sigh.
I’m writing away, so Covid life and my writer life are not a million miles apart to be honest, but it’s the feeling of not being able to do things you probably wouldn’t have done anyway gets to you doesn’t it?
Life goes on, albeit so differently from our previous lives it’s hard to know how to be sometimes.
For example, my son recently attended the First Holy Communion of his partner’s little boy and the priest told this story. I liked it so much I thought I’d share it with you. A little lighthearted Irish humour in these strained times.
So the communion is normally a big day for Irish Catholic families, the children are all dressed up, and they receive the sacrament in the church, generally the preparation goes on for weeks prior, and it’s an important day in the life of the little boy or girl, but in these times things had to be done differently.
No sense of occasion, or class photos, or bouncing castles. No family or friends around to the house to celebrate. All that stuff was off the table so it was a socially distanced affair, without any party afterwards. Bit of a raw deal for the little ones.
So my son and his little family are sitting in the church, having arrived at the appointed time so they would not run into any other families, and the priest comes out on the altar. The kids are all dotted around the church, away from each other. It must have all felt very tense and strange.
So the priest says, ‘I want to tell you all a story about a little boy who was about to make his Communion and he really wanted a red bike from his Mammy as a present.’
The families are not expecting this so they perk up and a few smiles ensue. It was nice to have a human touch to the whole thing.
The priest went on.
‘But this little boy was quite bold (Hiberno-English for naughty) and his Mammy said that there was no way he was getting a red bike, or any other colour bike for that matter, because his behaviour was so bad, being cheeky to the teacher, not tidying his room, and so on.
Well, this lad went on and on about the bike until eventually his mother in a fit of frustrated weariness sent him upstairs to write a letter to Jesus, asking for the bike.
The boy did as she suggested and began the letter,
Dear Jesus,
I’ve been a very good boy and… but he knew that was a lie so he scrunched up the paper and threw it in the bin. He began again.
Dear Jesus,
I haven’t been that good but I promise I’ll try to be better in the future.
He paused, realised that too was a lie, he had no such plans to reform his character, and decided he’d better not send that one either, so he scrunched it up and threw it away.
Getting an idea, he ran downstairs where his Mammy had a statue of the Virgin Mary in the living room. Before his mother has time to ask him where he’s going with the statue, he dashed back upstairs. He placed the statue on the desk in front of him and began to write,
Dear Jesus,
I have your Mammy, hand over the red bike and nobody gets hurt.’
I hope that gave you a chuckle today. 🙂
My son said everyone was laughing and relaxed after that and the children had a nice Communion day despite everything. All it takes is a little humanity sometimes. We all have our own struggles with this virus, so recognising each other as ordinary people just trying to do our best, is so important.
So, have a great week, take care of you and yours and keep washing those hands!
PS If you’d like to check out any of my books, and support me by buying one you haven’r read yet, please pop along to my page on Amazon – just click this link:
Le grá agus buiochas,
Jean x