Not wanting to be outdone by the Beckhams, I decided we should mark our anniversary
And it's often triggered by life's milestones and challenges: children's birthdays, school summer holidays and the end of another
academic year
; a child finishing school altogether; a
Leaving Cert
holiday and the tortured helplessness felt at home while himself is living his best life – and even remembering to wear factor 50 sunscreen, after all; watching the price of chocolate increase; the inability to find a pair of decent-fitting jeans in this post-skinny jeans era.
Who am I? What am I doing with my life? How the hell did I get here?
These are life's big questions that I ask of myself more frequently than I care to admit.
READ MORE
Anyway, the latest thing to trigger me was my 25th
wedding
anniversary. How can that possibly have come around already? I still feel 25, never mind 25 years married, though my right hip begs to differ. But silver wedding anniversaries? Well they're for old people, surely. And I refuse to get old. And how can it really be 25 years anyway, when I can still clearly smell the orange and lemons of Sorrento.
We've never really been ones for marking wedding anniversaries. We were already parents by the time the first anniversary happened, so that trumped the – at the time, seemingly self-indulgent – idea of celebrations. After all, there was sleep deprivation to endure.
And so beyond, on our 20th anniversary, mentioning in The Irish Times that he forgot our first one – because, you know, a wife with an axe to grind and a newspaper column is not for faint-hearted husbands – we've never really made a thing of it.
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Jen Hogan: It's our 20th wedding anniversary. I wonder will he remember
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But this time, I decided I wanted to make a thing of it. After all, the Beckhams, who share a wedding anniversary with us, never miss an opportunity to get the wedding album out on social media. So, not wanting to be outdone by someone who used to play for Manchester United, I decided we should buy some purple suits and head back to Rome and show the children where we got married, for the occasion.
Alas, they appeared to be all out of matching purple suits that day I went to Dundrum Shopping Centre. And, it turned out we couldn't afford to go to Rome either, on account of having a ridiculous number of children. So we settled on Galway, which is more or less the same thing anyway, if you squint a little.
I am not averse to using a bit of emotional blackmail when I need to.
Judge me all you like, I'll probably just use it in a future column. And so, taking no chances in the quest to get all my children together to celebrate this momentous occasion, I lead with a 'more than anything I can possibly think of, for our 25th wedding anniversary, your dad and I would love to get a night away with the nine of us. All of us together again. Are you free next weekend?' text to the one who had the cheek to grow up, move out and leave me with all these boys.
She said she was.
Discussions ensued, between the siblings, over which child would bunk in with which child, largely determined by who was deemed to fart the most (or the least, depending on your perspective).
The van was packed and the Hogans were off to Galway. All nine of us. Together again. Order was restored to my galaxy.
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The summer juggle: How to work while the kids are off
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We were staying at the Connacht, a family-friendly hotel whose claims of which are put to the test by my supersized brood (it passes, with flying colours). A swim was first on the agenda. 'You're coming too, aren't you Mum?,' the youngest asked, giving me no out. Ten minutes after everyone else had got into the pool, I joined them. Because that's how I roll. A woman smiled at me, and I smiled back, thinking to myself how friendly the natives were. Then she gave a gentle wave as I walked past. And I waved back, thinking again 'super friendly people'.
'You didn't know it was me, did you?,' the friendly woman said laughing, as the familiar dread of meeting someone out of context and not recognising them began to set in. I was going to have to come clean. Turns out it was just the curse of shortsightedness, and a world viewed stubbornly in soft focus. To the point I hadn't recognised my own daughter.
The eyesight, at least, is consistent with 25 years ago. We swam, ate, played and laughed, and I even forgot this anniversary made me sound middle-aged.
Because we were all together again, and everything made sense.
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Irish Independent
27 minutes ago
- Irish Independent
World famous singer Anthony Kearns to open Fleadh – ‘It's great to be able to stand up in front of your own people and fly the flag for Wexford'
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Irish Times
2 hours ago
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Why bobs, perms and beehive hairstyles reveal the stories of women's lives
Human hair is imbued with meaning. It is not uncommon to keep a lock of hair belonging to a deceased loved one or from a child's first haircut. Changing one's hair marks rites of passage such as reaching adulthood, ending a significant relationship or becoming a parent . Hair, as part of our physical bodies, is highly personal and intimate. Yet at the same time, hairstyles are visible to others and therefore highly public. The way we shape, arrange, and decorate our hair signifies status, political and religious beliefs and is a central part of our identities. On top of this, hair is closely linked to gender, and for women it is particularly associated with ideas around femininity and female sexuality. Women's hairstyles change with fashion and the 20th century has seen an explosion of styles, with each decade having different signature looks. READ MORE Observing how international hair fashions were adopted by women in Ireland between 1900-1960 and scrutinising the wider commentary about them, is an excellent way of examining women's everyday lives in the past. Hairstyles are of interest of historians because they can tell us about politics, economics, gender, social norms and the overarching cultural attitudes of a time and place. At the beginning of the 20th century, long hair was very much in vogue for women. Hairstyles immediately communicated where you stood on the social ladder. The upper classes wore their hair in elaborate updos adorned with jewels, shells, ribbons and feathers. These styles were time-consuming, impractical and expensive to create. They signalled wealth as only the rich could afford the time, money and domestic staff required to produce them. A Dublin-based magazine for women, Lady of the House, featured tips on achieving these styles, advising: 'We are forced to rely on art to a certain extent when nature fails'. A portrait of Irish nationalist activist Maud Gonne McBride in the 1890s. Photograph: Keystone/ Getty Images It recommended using postiches, which were extra hairpieces such as fringes, pompadour rolls and hair pads that added volume and length, much like hair extensions today. Postiches were made by a specialist hairdresser called a posticheur. They used combings (the hair that falls out when brushing) that women saved up and collected, sometimes for years, in a vessel called a hair receiver. The very rich could also buy hair. Lady of the House explains how a 'really fine suit of hair of the purest blonde type will sell for ... (between) 1,000 and 2,500 francs.' That was a lot of money in 1900. It was the traders, as opposed to the original owners of the hair, who made big profits from the hair industry. Making postiches was meticulous work that involved shaking out dust and debris from the hair combings, teasing out the individual strands and disentangling them using a hackle or a wire brush. Any nits, which were common, would be squashed and picked out. The hair was then woven into the desired form ready to adorn the heads of wealthy female customer. [ Why nineties hair is making a comeback Opens in new window ] Into the 1910s, the overall look became slightly looser, and the added hairpieces and embellishments were discarded. Women of marriageable age wore their hair up in a bun or a coiled plait either on top of the head or towards the back, with a pompadour puffed-out style at the front. These popular styles had names such as the Psyche Knot, the New Récamier and the Gibson Girl. During their campaign for the right to vote, suffragettes wore these elegant hairstyles as part of their tactics. Their opponents regularly accused them of being unwomanly, perverted, old hags. To counteract such accusations, suffragettes instituted a uniform to ensure they appeared ladylike, respectable and beyond reproach. The 1920s brought huge change to Ireland with the establishment of the Free State in 1922. Machines and technology such as cars, electricity and telephones were becoming commonplace. Fashions loosened, skirts got shorter and the bob, a radical new hairstyle became the height of fashion. Antoine, a Parisian hairdresser and an early adaptor of the style said modern women with careers and busy lives required 'small, neat heads, not enormous masses of hair'. Irish-born architect and furniture designer Eileen Gray in 1914. Photograph: George C. Beresford/ Hulton Archive/ Getty Images The bob was short, it was all about angles and straight, clean lines representing the ideas of modernism. Androgynous and boyish, it played with strict gendered identities. Coming after the horrors of the , it celebrated youth, life and hedonism and it went hand in hand with the phenomenon of the flapper. As well as their signature short haircuts, flappers were young women who smoked cigarettes, rode bicycles, went dancing, and wore make-up. In Ireland, as elsewhere, the flapper was derided as a foreign import, representing immorality, disobedience and vice. Historian Louise Ryan has charted attitudes to flappers and 'modern girls' in the Irish press. There was certainly criticism from the pulpits and reports of dismay at young women attending Ceilís organised by the Gaelic League but dressed in the latest Parisian fashions. Yet the advertisements and the women's pages of the same newspapers often celebrated the independence, vitality and purchasing power of the flapper, demonstrating the different viewpoints at play in 1920s Ireland. [ Six forgotten Irish women who achieved the extraordinary Opens in new window ] From the 1930s – 1950s short, curly hair was fashionable in Ireland. This look could be achieved in various ways. The Marcel wave in which the hair was curled by heated tongs was available in hairdressers, or pincurls, in which damp hair was wound around the finger and pinned close to the scalp and combed out once dry. However, both methods were laborious and needed constant upkeep. The invention of the permanent wave was a game-changer, meaning even those with naturally straight hair could have it curled, lasting for two or three months at a time. There were various experimental formula for chemical perms throughout the early 1900s, among them the Eugene system, which was heavily advertised in Ireland. It was expensive and time-consuming taking anywhere between three and ten hours. The smell was unpleasant, and it involved a terrifying looking machine called a chandelier, which used electric rollers to cookthe hair attached with wires to an overhead device. A model having her hair permed by a permanent wave machine in London, 1928. Photograph: Henry Miller News Picture Service/ Archive Photos/ Getty Images Electric shocks, burns and damaged hair were too often the result. In 1935 a Dublin woman, Kathleen Crean, sued Neville Ryan, trading as the Grafton Hairdressing Co. for injuries she sustained while getting a perm. The newspaper report stated that she had several burns on her scalp and the backs of her ears, and she was suffering from nervousness. She was awarded £100 (€114) compensation – the monetary award signifying the cultural value placed on a women's hair. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, the Free State Government passed a series of laws that restricted women's citizenship by limiting their employment opportunities, excluding them from jury service and banning contraception. Women's sexuality was tightly controlled and deviance was punished – often through incarceration in religious-run institutions. Where the cutting of hair in the 1920s was act of freedom and rebellion, there are many instances of forced hair cutting which served to humiliate women and control their behaviour. During the War of Independence there are numerous reports of both the IRA and the British army violently cutting off women's hair as punishment – either for fraternising with British soldiers, or for being associated with the republican side. The 2021 report of the Mother and Baby Homes commission of investigation documents how nuns cut off the hair of many womenon arrival at the home. They were required to keep it short thereafter. [ How Irish women failed to persuade Éamon de Valera to treat them as equal citizens Opens in new window ] With long flowing hair a potent symbol of female sexuality, nuns themselves covered their hair and usually wore it short. The custom of willingly cutting or shaving hair is an act of religious devotion in many cultures. Before taking their vows, nuns commonly cut off their hair in a symbolic act that renounced vanity and the display of the body. Vocations were one option for Irish women at a time when emigration was high, employment prospects were low, the marriage bar in effect and motherhood alongside domesticity were championed as the pinnacle of womanhood. The numbers of women in religious orders grew steadily in the first half of the 20th century, peaking in the 1960s. Dublin-born movie star Maureen O'Hara pictured in 1954. Photograph: Bettmann Archive/ Getty Images Until the Second Vatican Council in the early 1960s, women had to cover their hair with a hat or a mantilla in a Catholic church or in court. More generally, married women covered their heads to show their marital status. But equally, there was a practical consideration to this, as headscarves were used by all women to cover hair that was being set into the fashionable curly hairstyles. Historian Caitríona Clear has written that professional women in the 1940s – 1960s wore an unofficial uniform consisting of tailored suits and 'lacquered, helmet-like hair'. She contends that this was a form of armour which contained and protected women's bodies while in public. At this time women's rights in Ireland were in short supply, demonstrating how social conditions affect fashion choices. In the early 1950s young people dressed quite formally, in much the same way as their parents did, but by the later years of that decade, international youth styles were appearing on the streets of Dublin. [ Thirty years retrieving the history of Irish women Opens in new window ] The cinema was hugely popular in Ireland and films from Hollywood brought international starlets and the most up-to-date fashions to Irish eyes. For Irish teenagers, hairstyles seen on screen were a relatively quick, cheap and easy way of identifying with new youth culture trends. Young Irish women adopted the beehiveand ponytail hairstyles. The beehive was a tall hairstyle achieved through big rollers and backcombing until the hair stood vertically. It then was patted into place and secured with lacquer and hairspray. Mentions of the beehive hairstyle first appeared in Irish newspapers and magazines in the very late 1950s. By 1961, it seems to have fallen out of favour and when mentioned, it was in disparaging terms. Teenage girls enthusiastically adopted the style, but it was considered highly impractical. It required dedication and upkeep and wearers were known to sleep with their heads upright so as not to ruin their hairdo. A bouffant hairstyle pictured in 1963. Photograph: Getty Images The beehive and other bouffant styles that were popular in the 1960s were linked to an optimism internationally towards technology, progress and the future. But just like in the early part of the century, these big elaborate hair styles were followed by a dramatic change with the reintroduction of short, angular, bobbed styles once more. Colouring hair became more acceptable and commonplace from the 1960s onwards. In the 1970s, longer, looser styles followed at a time when women's right were back on the agenda. The marriage bar was finally lifted and there were hard-fought campaigns for equal pay and access to contraception. Beauty practices such as hairdressing and styling are a common feature of women's culture that is often trivialised. But cutting, styling, colouring and removing hair is not just inconsequential frivolity. It can be an act of sacrifice or submission, of self-preservation, of celebration, rebellion or defiance. Through knowledge of the history of women's hairstyles, we can more easily imagine the everyday lives and connect to the emotional and bodily experiences of women in the past. Katie Blackwood is Historian in Residence at Dublin City Council
Irish Independent
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