Lifestyle
May: a month that had its own complications
Country Living with Francis Farragher
May is slipping in quite gently and as the days elongate with great gusto, it’s hard to imagine that just over three months ago, we were all struggling with storms and floods, some more so than others.
On a recent day trip to Inishmore, the closure of the coast road – part of which was just washed away by the sea – was a stark reminder of the power of the wind and the sea.
The change of seasons and a benign spell of weather can make us all wonder what the fuss was all about, because during our dry days through the month of April, there was surely no more relaxing place on this planet to be, than the little roads and fields of Aran.
However the difficulty for the island dwellers, coastal communities and those in low lying areas prone to flooding, is that the political impetus can be lost when the weather improves and the sun shines.
The time to strike is when the iron is hot and at least a package of measures was put in place for remedial works to be carried out – the summer months always present the best opportunity to prepare for the darker days.
For all that, May has still come around with an almost indecent haste, with the parades and frolics of St. Patrick’s Day just seeming like a few days ago, and for many, the fifth month of the year is the first of the summer season.
Met. Eireann, and most of the meteorological professionals in our neck of the woods, would disagree, categorising our summer months as June, July and August, but the arrival of May 1st, just seven weeks short of our longest day of the year, still represents for many people, the traditional start to the summer season.
Summer’s official arrival on May Day was often marked by a bush decorated with coloured cloth or balloons and even in pre-Christian times, this was a time of year that was marked out for various festivals and celebrations.
When eventually the Church ‘got the better of’ the pagans, they took over most of the feast days cum celebrations and now the month is one of special devotion and dedication to the Blessed Virgin, a theme apparently fostered by the Jesuits in the late 1700s.
Many of us ‘boys’ born back in the 1950s and ‘60s during the month of May have a special reason to remember the significant nature of this devotion, with the name Mary tacked onto our birth certificates . . . an appalling and utter humiliation for any self-respecting eight year old. Oh God, we all did have our childhood crosses to bear!
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.