I thought I’d be very lonely when the Helens moved west. That loneliness got diluted with the fear of getting Covid when I was vulnerable.

So, the move happened by default. There was no day appointed. Most of their belongings had gone to Belrose in the preceding weeks. The actual move was getting close.

One evening, David dropped grass seeds to Tim. He called out to me – “We’re not gone yet, we’ll be back.” Those West Cork men are as cute as foxes. They’d say anything to keep the mother-in-law happy.

When all was well, they did come back for a sleep over. Ricky was thrilled, going upstairs next to our room and sleeping away from his parents. He was up early the following morning, wondering what jobs we were going to do.

Blackberry season

Our ditches are full of blackberries and Tim was hankering for a blackberry tart. One evening after tea, I picked the blackberries in the evening time just along our own drive.

Ricky would have loved a dispensation from bed for the event. Grannies are good like that. We’d have had a great chat. I was thinking about him.

The blackberries are particularly good this year with the druplets taut and shiny with juice. They thudded gently into the bowl out of my two hands. After an hour, I definitely had the makings of two tarts.

I like to pile the berries high in the tart. The following morning, I removed the pastry from the fridge that I’d made the day before. Pastry is always better cold from the fridge.

I rolled the pastry. I was thinking about Ricky and how he loves to bake with me. I shovelled in the plump black berries, feeling the lumpy hardness of them as I spread them around. Ricky would have had to do that. Spreading of sugar was definitely his job.

I was just feeling a little lonely for my elder grandchild. I could hear his insistent voice in my head “Granny, I will put in the blackberries on my own.”

Sometimes, the tears have to flow before you can shake yourself and get on with living for yourself

There was a lovely piece on RTE’s Sunday Miscellany called Low First by Colin Regan on the meditative state inspired by travelling in low first gear on a tractor. It didn’t matter what size or how sophisticated a tractor was; there was always low first.

I went along with the story, remembering my first time driving in low first when collecting small square bales of straw in a field many moons ago.

I started to scoop up the blackberries with a large spoon. Low First finished and the music blasted from the radio like a mad anthem, Ricky’s favourite. ‘Hit the diff’ by Marty Mone.

Ricky’s choice of song to sing, “mowing, lifting, sowing, baling…” I could see him in the living room with his toy guitar. His favourite lyric is, “I said goodbye before July to the woman in an awful rush.”

You guessed. I dissolved into tears, missing the little man.

Sometimes, the tears have to flow before you can shake yourself and get on with living for yourself.

So yes, I miss Ricky and his parents. I’m very grateful for the time we had together and proud of all of us that a cross word never passed between any of us four adults in six years.

It didn’t mean we didn’t drive each other crazy, we simply kept the focus on living life and being content.

Back on track

Meanwhile, I’m back on track. My liver had settled down enough to have a slightly reduced dose of chemotherapy.

Dr Deirdre has also pushed my treatment interval to four weeks. It is hoped that both these measures will allow my liver to cope better and for me to stay on chemotherapy every four weeks. I hope that I can progress to my fifth dose on 6 September.

I’m off to west Cork for a sleep over tonight. I’ve promised Ricky that we will make brown scones. We chatted on the phone. “Granny, bring sultanas and we will make white scones too.”

When I hear him speak like that, I realise that he will forever retain all that he learned from us during his time here in Woodside. I don’t know who is more excited about this sleepover, Ricky or me?