My Nana died today from #COVID19. This is me and her on my 21st birthday. She died alone in hospital and had seen none of us in 12 days. My sister said tonight now it feels real, now we’re a part of the pandemic. A strange thing to lose someone now and harder still because..

There will be no wake, no funeral that we can all attend. No chance to grieve together as a family. So instead we have to find small ways to celebrate her long life that was absolutely full of love. So here’s my celebration of her: tea and toast. With just a drop of milk and...

Strong as hell. Car boot sales. Knitting. Cowboy movies. Reciting prayers in Latin to make us grandkids giggle. Stew and soup and homemade bread. Market stalls and how she told me of all the men who would ask her to dance. How I always told her I’d be a priest and she seemed to..

Believe me. (She did have dementia!) How whenever she’d want a cup of tea she’d announce “Oh god I’m dry” or even better: “God there’s a drought on me.” The fiver she’d slip you when she thought no one was looking & the hard boiled sweets she kept in a big jar beside her chair...

And on a FaceTime at Easter how the last thing she ever said to me was she’d kill for a big bottle of whiskey. I don’t think she ever drank whiskey in her life but here’s to you, Nana. I hope you get your big bottle of whiskey wherever you are. #COVID19 #Ireland