Eolaí x 2 – No worries. I can see the Dublin suburbs of your childhood were no different than real areas. The monied ones – well, I think you’ve hit the shiny metal thing on the end that’s not pointy – with money, folks don’t, or believe they don’t, need neighbours. The one neighbour of ours with a phone never minded being woken at 3am to call a doctor. A coat would be passed to a neighbour’s offspring once grown out of, and then passed on again, and again. Stuff like that wasn’t needed where there was money.

Oh, an igloo would be difficult, but with the weather the way it is an ark is a definite runner.

Sam – Cloudburst is just wrong for a cat. That said, one of lads down the road gives all his bullocks and heifers names. Patch Eye, Blackie, White Leg won’t do for him. They are called Liam, Patrick, Richard, Mary, Niamh, Julie etc.

FMC – Velly rural indeed.

Medbh – Ah, but can you tell which lawnmower is which by the sound?

Our dogs had surnames too!! They needed to as the only two dog names in the Western Isles were Dileas or Sandy for the longest time. Now, with the changing times we have such exotic names as Cloudburst (a cat) and Ranger. Every herd of sheep still has at least one Flossie though. Too much change is too much and all.

Actually I’ve tried to explain over here in the US, where what they call a city looks just like suburbs to you and me, that I knew every single neighbour for many roads around. Granted over here I’m a foreigner so I understand the notion of not knowing my next door neighbour, but the people actually from this city typically don’t know their next door neighbours. That’s just weird.

In my Dublin suburb I lived on a short road with just 21 houses. I would have been in every one, and most of them hundreds of times, some thousands. And I was in most of the houses for several roads around. There was 83 kids on our road and I wouldn’t have a problem naming them now, nor most of the kids house by house of the surrounding streets. Different times.

As far as I can tell, and it’s largely invisible to outsiders, many suburbs of Dublin functioned socially very similar to rural villages. Our house was by a lane – we would have recognised just the sound of every car driving up there and many of the walks even.

That was very typical of much of Dublin that I knew, but not all of it. When I grew up and out I made friends with Dublin people from other areas who lived in houses just like mine, and had lived there all their lives, but they couldn’t tell me who lived in that house directly across the road, or two doors down. These were more monied areas than my area but long before any new folks. They weren’t integrated with themselves even, so new folks – what are the chances?

For you, I suggest building an igloo. Trust me. If you build it they will come.

Did the dogs in your village have surnames, FMC? Here they all did. Even when there weren’t two with the same first name. Ha! Yeah cars were recognisable sometimes too. You’d have to tippy-tyre past a house if you were avoiding them (if you’d defaulted on a loan of a pint of milk or something).