A slug and a snail went riding on a hurley
one was rather pretty, the other fat and burly.
“Slug” asked Snail, “d’ ye loik hangin’ out wit me,
while dis lad has nuttin’ else to do, and no TV?”
Slug said nothing, just sighed and felt sublime
as he gazed around proudly at his trails of slime.
I tore Eoin away from his dazzling new Christmas iPad Mini with Retina Display so that he could reacquaint himself with his little buddies from County Clare and to see what he thought of the poem I wrote to go with the photo. He laughed after I explained what ‘sublime’ meant and read Snail’s comment with the Dublin accent I was trying to convey. (Although this was a West Clare snail, I settled for an approximation of a Dub accent I’m more familiar with.)
Eoin looked a bit wistful for a moment, remembering how he had amused himself at our cozy cottage in Clare by putting the snail and the slug on his hurley to see if they would race, or fight, or even react to each other. This is the sort of thing a boy does when he is planted in the middle of the bog for two summer months with no TV and no iPad. After a moment Eoin trotted off, returning to the iPad and whatever game he most recently downloaded with his iTunes gift card… as I sat wistfully longing for a cottage in the bog with no television nor iPad in sight.
6 comments
Comments feed for this article
December 31, 2013 at 11:03 am
lifeonthecutoff
I did a happy jig when a message popped into my inbox that there was a posting from the Bog! A great way to end out the year, Janet, with your whimsical poem and your longings to be back in your cottage with that little boy and no outside “connections”. I hope you are able to return to Clare soon. In the meantime, thanks for the poem, the posting, and a very happy New Year.
December 31, 2013 at 11:43 am
bloggingfromthebog
Happy New Year Penny and thank you for always lending your support!
December 31, 2013 at 1:03 pm
Kate
So Happy to see a new post from my Irish-bloggin’ Mom! It makes me hopeful that soon enough you will be back there with a new adventure to share with us every day!
I LOVE your poem. I read it about twenty times (of course in the Dub accent that is absolutely necessary to fully experience its complexity 😉 Poor little Eoin is powerless to the call of the almighty gadget when he has no bog to explore! I’ll bet part of him wishes he was there with just a snail and a hurley too.
I hope you keep writing posts about your journey getting back there this year, and I hope we will all be there soon together experiencing the beauty of Kilkee, and missing our Iphones ever so slightly….. 🙂
December 31, 2013 at 5:16 pm
bloggingfromthebog
Thanks Kate! I ran across the photos… which led to the poem… which led to the blog post! I cannot wait until the day we are all together under that roof – leave iPhones at the door! 🙂
January 5, 2014 at 4:45 pm
afcobb
Mom!! I LOVE your poem! That impressed the heck out of me- didn’t know you had it in you Mom. Your Irish accent came across well enough for me to be able to read it out loud in the best Irish impression I’ve ever done 🙂 poor Eoin’s brain… I guess we’ll have to wait until Apple comes out with an iMagination
January 5, 2014 at 5:08 pm
bloggingfromthebog
Thank you Anton! I’d love to hear your version of Slug’s accent! 🙂
I do worry about what this plugged in generation, and Eoin in particular, is going to be like in 10 or 20 years. I suppose every generation has some concern about the one behind them but I don’t think anything compares to the huge impact of the technology available to children today.