Free Party Dresses
Friday, February 3rd, 2012Life in Ireland is no different to life in England except really in two different ways. The casual immigrant, as I class myself as being, one who never did his homework before coming here, one who classed Ireland as his or her’s spiritual home and had to get here come what may, all of a sudden runs up against matters that do not seem to make sense. Take for example the Health Service here. If you step outside your door intent on a visit to the doctors, the euros start to clock up. If the doctor is at his surgery and you nod in his direction he charges you €40 if you are lucky, then there is another €20 for a blood test and when you go to the chemists with a prescription you can be charged anything. I remember being asked for €193 for some pills for my wife. There is also 50 cent government levy on each type of medication you walk away with. I did not of course pay the €193 but handed same back to the pharmacist explaining how my wife has decided to take the old fashioned remedy and chosen to ignore her complaint because in most cases complaints fade away unless they are very serious and then the doctor or pharmacist cannot really help. All pharmaceutical products and doctors work on the fear factor to cower you in to partaking. Why cannot they set up a National Health Service here. A think tank of doctors and health professional spent a year recently looking into this ideal and came to the conclusion that the transition could be done smoothly and at no real cost if the motivation was there but it isn’t and the consultants and medical practitoners continue to make hay without any real discipline as they have always done so.
So with these kind of costs clicking up like a till register in a superstore, the potential patient has to be quick on his feet to avoid bankruptcy and like most problems Irish there is of course a way round the problem but you need to take a combined 3rd level course in computers and psychology to prevail. Either that or take a lesson off the simple man in the street who at all times and in every country has found out a way round every barrier known to man. So within weeks after taking some very intense lessons on life and how to live it, stood at the various bars around town, I passed my examination with flying colours and now the mazuma stays in my pocket and does not grace the doctors. This medium is not the place to relate the secrets in which I matriculated but if you, like me, will stand at the bar or better still sit on a high stool at your favourite watering hole and invest in copious quantities of Arthur’s finest cordials, your investment will be well rewarded.
Another happening yesterday made me stop and ponder on the conundrums of Irish life as opposed to the puritan English. Mary Lou McDonald, the Sinn Fein TD and Deputy Leader of her party, and champion of all that is foolish about her party, stood up in the Dail and roundly criticized the Coalition’s minister for Social Services, Joan Burton, for once again attacking the very poor in this country. The reason for this broadside was the fact that under the present rigourous belt tightening that the Fine Gael/Labour Coalition Government is imposing on the inhabitants of this fair isle, Joan was looking seriously at the social service payments paid to thousands of parents throughout the country for Communion and Confirmation dresses hopefully intended for their little cherubic daughters to go lightly tripping up the aisle of their parish church on those two annual sacramental days ordained by Holy Mother the Church.
Now I do not know how the lads fare out in this fashion parade and I hope they are not left with their arse hanging out of a scraggy pair of trousers they have worn every day for the last two years, but yesterday in the Dail only Communion dresses were mentioned. It might be a case of the Government giving early lessons in cross-dressing which would ease their financial problems no end with the thought of the word gender being thrown out of the window and the lack of need for distinguishing the sexes.
However the thought that these little Catholic children of Christ are getting free party dresses while the poor Church of Ireland, Methodist, Presbyterian and all the other myriad of religious and non-religious parents do not get even a sock fills me with distaste. Is it a fact and so I was told since being knee high to a grasshopper, that the Catholic religion is God’s chosen course and that all the rest of them and now me included, are damned or is the Catholic Church in Ireland after years and years of abusing these little children getting more than its fair share of the financial cake?
Now it is obvious to the casual observer that because of this clerical abuse of the little children of Christ and their abuse of so many things, in so many walks of life, that the attendances at mass are dwindling and that the congregations at Catholic churches now seem to be limited to people over 70 years old who stopped thinking about their redemption 40 years ago. So why should it be that the thrusting and vital young parents of today, who only see the inside of a church at Baptisms, Communions, weddings and funerals find the need to equip their loved ones in the finest couture the government can buy. The answer is obvious, because it is there. Once you see an apple on a tree it is nature’s course to want to pluck it. The communion dress serves a variety of purposes and if the mother is wise she will design the dress that it fits the child for every social occasion for the next seven years and after puberty is passed, can be cut down by the able and made into very decent curtains for the back bedroom.
Last year the average payout per child was €242 and Joan said yesterday, whilst under constant attack from that party who value family life above everthing else, she might have to limit the payment to €120. Tell me why in this day of total financial insecurity, where handicapped children are being denied their basic rights, where every government penny is counted, is it even thinking of giving parents, who never dream of going to church, unless there is a party afterwards, €120 towards a new frock. I am not annoyed, I am slightly shocked but I am also completely dumfounded.