Falling in love again with an old favourite
Francis FarragherCountry Living
Country Living with Francis Farragher
The weather might have taken a turn for the worse but there’s always something very special about the first day of February. At last, our sunrises have slipped back to the pre-8.30 mark and by the time the month ends, we’ll have morning sunshine by 7.26 and a whisper of daylight nearly an hour before that.
January for many reasons – and sometimes for no reason at all – always seems to be the bleakest and longest of months although this year we couldn’t complain about the benign face it presented to the world in terms of low rainfall and friendly breezes.
Meteorologically, the first day of Spring now seems to be taken as March 1, but my generation was always taught to take the first day of the season of growth as February 1, when the crows started to build their nests high up in the trees and thoughts started to turn to Lent and the approach of Easter.
The movable feast of Easter has a late arrival this year – the middle of April – and all because the first full moon after the Spring Equinox (March 21) doesn’t arrive this year until April 11. So the first Sunday after the first full moon that follows the Equinox is on April 16, when the time will have changed and we’ll be into the world again of the long days.
With soil temperatures slightly up through December and January, there have been little hints of growth and some friends of mine – slightly over-eager to kick-start the change of seasons – have already started to take a little shave off their lawns.
Out the country though, I’d have grave fears of being ‘institutionalised’ if I was spotted on ‘the ride-on’ before January ran its course, although in fairness, the country fields – now bereft of cattle during winter months – do have a nice greeny hue to them already, and that’s not bad for St. Brigid’s Day.
At primary school, the Franciscans always had a special grá for St. Brigid with a few of her distinctive crosses decorating our humble enough looking classroom, while if the feast fell on a school day, we would be assiduously reminded of her charitable works and kindness to animals.
I always felt that there was a ‘dig’ being delivered there to us young urchins who cared little about other humans and who hated cows with bad tempers who could send half-buckets of milk flying with one fast kick, in the process nullifying 10 minutes of ‘hard pulling’.
There really was a whole ‘blast’ of religious fervour at the beginning of February with Candlemas Day arriving on the 2nd when a bag of candles would be donated to the local church while Mass couldn’t be missed on St. Blaise’s Day (Feb. 3) when the two candles crossed every throat to protect it from all ailments for the coming year.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.