The Wuff with the Smooth: Whoosing my life away

BACK in 2020 the Devlins were eagerly looking forward to a holiday in Portugal. They were vibrating with anticipation – two weeks away from school and work and humdrum life – it was going to be the best holiday in the history of the world! And then Covid arrived with its fetid breath and that was the end of that.

By way of making amends however, someone (me) had the bright idea of using the recouped holiday money and spending it on something else. I fancied some new beer brewing equipment and a sound system for the living room but what I really wanted was a new guitar. It is perhaps indicative of my standing within the household that the resulting recouped money was instead re-purposed to buy a dog, a new Dyson hoover and a climbing frame and swing set for the back garden.

Fast-forward a few years and while the Dyson has long been consigned to the dump (in fairness, it had a hard aul station in our house), the dog and the climbing frame are still going strong.

“We should look about getting rid of that aul thing,” I said to Herself on Sunday morning, referring not at all to the hound. “The climbing frame,” I clarified, “blocks the view wile and anyway, the girls don’t use it anymore.”

“They do so use it,” Herself qualified. “And Waffle uses it too.”

“He does, my back end. What does he do, pull himself up onto a swing and sing ‘Ring a Ring o’ Roses’ and he’s swishing back and forwards?”

“OK,” Herself replied, seemingly content with the knowledge that I was still sore about the dearth of brewing equipment, guitars and new sound systems.

Back in 2022 and again in 2024, the Devlins spent two blissful vacations on the Algarve – two of the best holidays in the history of the world! However, as there was no money to be recouped from the holidays which weren’t cancelled, the abject lack of brewing, listening and musical paraphernalia remains.

“I’m not sore at all,” I said, answering a question I hadn’t been asked. “But still, the climbing frame really does block the view and the kind of wood it’s made from, it would keep our fire burning until after Christmas.”

“You’re not cutting down the climbing frame. The girls do use it when the weather it good.”

“You’re right, of course,” I said. “And most importantly, I should make allowances for when Waffle feels the need to use the swings and the slide too.”

“You don’t have to believe me, but he does use it.”

“My back end.”

It turns out, me and my back end were wrong. First time for everything, I suppose.

There’s an old Chinese proverb that says, “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.”

So there I was the following evening, on my hands and knees filling pots with soil, sticking acorns in and covering them over with more soil. I had gathered the embryonic oaks from under an ancient tree the previous week and, Monday not being 20 years ago, I reckoned I’d better get started.

At first, so absorbed was I with Chinese proverbs and acorns, I paid no heed when I heard the sudden whoosh. However I looked up in time to see Waffle run around the climbing frame and immediately begin clambering up its wooden steps. As I stared, the Waff continued clambering and then, wasting no time, he flung himself down the slide with another big whoosh.

I glanced around to see who might be egging him on but apart from me and the acorns, the garden was empty.

Turns out, Herself was right after all (first time for everything, I suppose) and Waffle really does use the climbing frame. Whooshing down the slide with his ears flapping and his tongue lolling, he looked like he’d been doing it all his life. How had I never noticed this before?

Maybe the best time to cut down the climbing frame was years ago. The second-best time is never – not with Waffle and his hairy back end whooshing.