Liberally quoting what they say on those cooking programmes… Here is a piece I wrote earlier.

I always liked Janis Joplin’s song Me and my Bobby McGee. It couldn’t get much better than Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to loose. Freedom meant just getting rid of ‘stuff’ that was nothing but a burden. Freedom also meant being totally and completely and utterly independent. The idea was to follow your feelings (as opposed to anybody else’s), anything else made you a prisoner of circumstances spiralling out of control, tying you in to a straightjacket.

I didn’t really look at getting married, getting a house and having children – like in Pete Seeger’s Little Boxes song – as a step closer towards freedom. How could I decide where to go if that decision was no longer really mine? If everything had to be decided together and was dependent on a myriad of factors completely beyond my control?

When I did get married, had children, bought a house, even got a full-time permanent job, practically selling my soul to the company store, so to speak, life certainly changed. There were certainly fewer options. At times it felt as if there were none.

But as our family grew and as I realised that I was now ‘on the road’ together with some other people (!), that we were going to be on this journey together for the next while and that we all really needed, wanted, and loved each other – I did not miss this freedom anymore that is defined by ‘nothing left to loose’. In fact, freedom is not at all defined by what you haven’t got, but by what you have, by the people who are travelling with you on this voyage – no maps, riding out the storms, sitting out the doldrums, working together, learning to cope. Life is an ocean, love is a boat. The Dreamboat.

Pádraig (and us) are getting back to the normal routine after the Christmas and the New Year. Getting up early, going through the stretches, the exercises, going our for a walk, visitors, carers coming and going, structuring his day. We’re all tired tonight and it will take a few days before we’ll get used again to the ‘routine’.

But we have tons of stuff to luck forward to: from a walk down Santiago Way, to the start of the An Saol Project (fingers crossed), from brilliant concerts to good company, from mad adventures to insane fun!

Come with us!

PS: Life is a struggle, as well as a voyage. And at times it feels like I’m not winning. Like tonight. Though I know, it’ll be a different day tomorrow.