Galway'de Hallowe'en

[By Róisín Curé in Galway] Every year since they were old enough for me to indulge my desire to dress my kids up (ie. under 1), my children have taken part in some kind of Halloween festivity. I swaddled them in every costume I could think of, some of them elaborate creations hot off my sewing machine (a purple velvet frock coat for a Louisiana voodoo witch the year The Princess And The Frog was in the cinema stands out) and some less swanky (a threadbare nightdress I hacked with less-than-sharp scissors to make an “angel” comes to mind). When the kids were very small I took them around the houses of my area of south Co. Galway trick-or-treating; as they got older, they went by themselves with their friends. One year we went on holiday to France over the Halloween break, and all three kids kicked up an almighty fuss. They simply loved all the dressing up and edginess.

But that’s all over now, and they are making the transition to “nothing” happening on Halloween. If they’re lucky, they’ll organise something with a pal, and watch horrible creepy movies and eat disgusting sweets in the shapes of ghouls and severed limbs. If they’re unlucky, they won’t have anything organised, and if they’re really unlucky, their friend will cancel at the last minute. This is what happened with my youngest, Olivia, on Wednesday morning, hours before she was due to go to said friend’s house for horrible movies etc. I felt sorry for her, and took her to town with me. Her brother Paddy came too. They were happy to wander around town and look at clothes, and I wanted to get some sketches done for my book (An Urban Sketcher’s Galway) which has to be complete and handed in by the end of February.

I wandered down the main street scanning shops for a creative Halloween shop display. Pickings were poor. There were a few flimsy skeletons (I suppose sturdy skeletons are even thinner on the ground) and a few well-done ghosts in the window of McDonald’s, but Micky D’s were never going to suggest “Galway” in the way I wanted, so I passed. A well-known puppetry and theatre company had commandeered many shop windows with their own paintings, but they were splashed with their company name and were painted in non-traditional colours (blue, red and white – what?). They weren’t going to pass muster either. Then, just as I was feeling desperate, I noticed a man on a cherry picker on Eglington Street…putting up Christmas decorations! On Halloween itself! Ah for God’s sake…Paddy commented that they could have done it the day before, or the day after, but on Halloween? Come one, the lads at the council!

I was ready to give up when I saw a really groovy poster outside Neachtain’s. It was for a fancy dress competition. I loved the vintage style…so I drew it.

Then I turned the corner onto the other side of the pub…and there were some less flimsy skeletons – ie. skulls. I drew those too. Then I got a human in…my sketching outing t was improving by the minute.

He wasn’t hugely impressed with me drawing him – well, he didn’t see what I was doing but I suspected he didn’t want to be scrutinised – so I kept my sketchbook subtly hidden and crossed to the other side of the street to get on with painting it.

The children and I went home, Olivia and Paddy watched a truly unpleasant film called The Witch (I mean, why put yourself through it?) so I indulged myself painting a nice autumnal scene at the kitchen table instead.

Until next time – happy start of winter, I guess!

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