Rory Fitzgerald
Life changes so fast for growing kids
Five seems like a very big number when you’re nearly five. For weeks in the run-up to the actual metamorphosis, Seán would tell strangers on the street: “It’s nearly my birthday. I’m nearly FIVE!”
Seán walks the streets like a real boy-about-town these days. As we pass families completely unfamiliar to me, he calls out: “Hi Charlie and Charlie’s dad!” They call back: “Hey Seánie, see you in school tomorrow.”
I just nod and smile agreeably.
Passing a kid on his bike, Sean will routinely shout out something like: “Hi Christopher, see you at hurling later.”
To pack in all his friends, we had to rent our local GAA hall for the big day. Birthday invites were passed to children in the yard before school and all his pals’ parents were identified through detective work, involving conversations with strangers, along the lines of “Are you Isobel’s mum, by any chance? Well it seems she and Seán are great friends and he’d love her to come to his party”.
I never thought that my principal source of introductions to our neighbours would be our kids. It amazes me to see them out in the world, going it alone during the school day, making friends and forming real relationships of their own accord.
As his birthday falls near Halloween, the party was to be Halloween-themed. This involved me doing more arts and crafts than I had done since I was in primary school.
I was in charge of the Halloween-themed props. This proved tremendous fun and involved the kids and I spending the whole day making giant monsters out of cardboard boxes, carving pumpkins and generally painting things green and making a mess.
Quiet time
The night before Seán’s birthday, I made sure to take him on an extra-long cycle through the park, just the two of us. It served the purpose of getting him tired so that he would be able to sleep, despite the excitement, but it also gave us a little bit of quiet time to talk.
His world is changing so fast. Just last month, he had started school, the month before a new sister arrived and now he was becoming a big boy of five. I sometimes worried he’d find it all disorientating but, speaking to him, it was clear he found all these changes exciting and joyful.
The morning of his birthday was like a trial run for Christmas morning. Presents were set out in the sitting room, and he charged downstairs at dawn, duly ripping them open before a special breakfast treat of Coco Pops, just this once.
So began a helter skelter day, decorating the hall, preparing food and keeping small people happy. It was quite an operation! As the kids arrived, happy mayhem ensued.
It was as much a party for the parents as the kids, with many of the local parents staying to help out with the games, crafts and waiting upon the grand banqueting table, where over 20 children sat happily munching, with one special little boy at the head of the table, surrounded by his pals and overjoyed at his big special day.
Overjoyed to be, after weeks of keen anticipation – finally and indisputably – FIVE!
