Those were the days.......

It’s one of my closest friends birthday’s today. Her birthday is the 12th of January and mine is the 12th of July, so we are 180 degrees polar opposites in the zodiac. She is the sure footed mountain goat and I’m the cautious, careful crab.

I’m suffering from a nostalgia for a time spent in Galway when we lived together and there were birthday parties, often fancy dress with robbers and geishas and superheroes; games of scrabble, where words were coined at a greater rate than by Kavanagh; and trips to supermacs at one in the morning even though we hadn’t been out - just straight to the garlic cheese chips - because that’s where the most excitement happened anyway .

         

                                         

Though like those in olden times eternal, we had the ability to make our own fun at home. Bridgette’s Dad used to send her loaves of brown bread through the post. I had always been securely placed as the baker supreme; but Bridgette’s Dad’s bread was delicious, and also a novelty as he was new on the baking scene. It was beginning to be known far and wide amongst Galway natives – his fame was surpassing mine. He’d do astute things like send the bread to the shop where Bridgette and I worked. The arrival of strangely shaped packages always creates a commotion in the workplace. Bridgette’s Dad was cashing in on that guaranteed stir. Questions would be asked, the bread revealed, his fame secured. I knew his plan.

So I felt I had to once more prove my worth in the kitchen. Bridgette’s Dad wasn’t afraid of the competition, and to goad me on, sent down a bag of chopped up rhubarb for the freezer - no doubt with a ‘do your best’ twinkle in his eye.

So I did, I pulled the rhubarb from the freezer and Bridgette thought best to get out of the way, so ducked into the shower. She always had a bit of a problem with the knobs of butter on the ceiling and flour footprints on the floor after I did a bout of baking. Obviously, her father was more orderly in his kitchen habits, but I’ve always believed genuine creative expression involves a bit of chaos.

So I started. I took out the rhubarb, I lit the stove, threw the match in the bin, I took out my sieve, my flour, the butter, started making my pastry for the rhubarb tart, thinking all the time that pastry would have Bridgette’s Dad quaking in his boots, pastry was a skill, when I turned around to put the butter in the fridge – OMG!

The bin was on fire. I'd forgotten to quench the match. Great flames were licking up along the side of the counter. I did what anybody would have done in the same situation. I screamed for help. I called and called Bridgette. No response. I would have to deal with this catastrophe alone. I picked up the bag of frozen rhubarb and single handed started beating out the flames. Lit papers from the overfull bin fell to the carpet. I started beating them also, chasing each one around the kitchen floor, the open bag sending cubes of ice hard rhubarb flying all around the room. I stomped and I swore and I beat those flames out –every last one of them.

Eventually Bridgette sauntered out, shower fresh with a towel wrapped around her head. I was half out of it in a chair swearing I’d never look at a stick of rhubarb in the same way again – and why had she trusted me with the matches anyway. She hadn’t bothered coming to my rescue, the reliable old goat, as apparently, I only screamed the once so she hadn’t thought it could be that serious. At that, the crab’ claws came out to do a little nipping – I could have died in an inferno and she’d have been safely underwater.

And the song that was playing on her shower radio as it all played out – The Prodigy Firestarter.

Happy Birthday Bridgette!