People can surprise you.

On Saturday my Partner in Crimes, daughters do, Buddy, ran away. And he nearly took my Winter with him. They had found their way out of the back garden, and decided on a romantic puppy promenade through the bustling Metropolis of Leixlip. I like to think that they thought of themselves as a modern-day, non-animated Lady and Tramp.

I did catch up to them, and detain Winter. She’s pretty well-behaved, and more importantly recognises the hand that both feeds, and pets her. But Buddy did a runner.

Now Buddy is a Bichon Frise, (but we will here after refer to him as a cottonball with legs, it’s easier to remember how to spell that.). So he has very short little legs. It turns out that cottonball with legs is just another way of saying “greyhound that doesn’t in any way look like a greyhound.”. Because frikkin’ hell is he a fast runner when he gets going.

Anyway after about an hour of running me around the town he vanished. One second he was in sight, the next “poof” he was gone, like some kind of fluffy, white furry ninja.

That was when we started to become stunned by how friendly people around here can be. To begin with a guy named I think Enda got in his car (after running with me for about half a mile), and started to search some of the side streets, and side roads around the area where Buddy vanished. A woman had earlier gone running off with her own dog in an attempt to catch Buddy, while I tried to control, and calm down Winter.

My PiC, and myself would  later, after informing his tearful mommy that he’d done a Houdini, spend a large amount of time going from house to house on the Dublin side of Leixlip. Nowhere were we met with anything but friendliness, and concern. Everywhere took a number, and gave the promise to contact us if they saw the little wretch. In fact the following morning we actually were called on the phone to find out if he had been found.

And everywhere we went, when people found out where we had just moved into, we were welcomed to the town. This while people were showing how concerned they were for the welfare of the little furry shit.

It just went to show both myself, and my PiC that there stills exists that sense of local community which used to characterise life in small Irish towns in pervious years. It just sometimes needs a little catalyst to reveal itself to the new people in town. There is definitely a more liberal mind-set to modern Ireland where gender, and sexuality are concerned. But contrary to what some commentators would have us believe that opening up of minds, has not in any way eroded the intrinsic Irishness of people.

As an Irish person myself, I was pleasantly surprised to find that actually, the Ireland I remember from my childhood still exists. At least in Leixlip anyway.

Oh, and as for Buddy? Tune in on Saturday to find out how that story ended.