Now it’s here. The drawing of silage grass has halted for one evening. Tractors parked and as the sun is going down, the countryside is aglow. The Kerry mountains, our constant companions, have a purple glow; our Brandon, Slieve Mish, Stacks and Macgillicuddy reeks stand proud before us, a backdrop to what is the most beautiful evening of the year.

And for what at times can be such a cruel stage, our home here in Hearthill, is radiant tonight. Suspended is the memory of storm, the bitter showers of March, the turbulence of October. Our cows are out at night now and their calves have just tasted the delight of the first prance in green grass. And how the grass is green, and how it smells when it is bursting out of the ground, in answer to the fruitful sunshine and showers of April and May.

A mommy is typing wistfully as her little boys sleep keeping an eye to the clock on contractions that come to nothing while a Daddy paces a garden with the lawnmower waiting for news of anything that might be stirring. No news tonight. We enjoy the same calm that Hearthill bestows on us at the end of the day as at the end of a season. Toys that have been fought over in the day are tossed aside, echos of roars to the table have quietened, cows bellowing for milking are muted for one evening and I wish I could live for longer in the calm that reigns at just this moment.  But our baby will have to arrive soon, another voice, if God is good to us, again.  One that will compete for attention in the chaotic family life of this farm in North Kerry, learning, we hope, to love it as we do.