Morning email from Alan Massie, an expatriate American musician who lives in Greece.
In between writing thoroughly splendid music such as A Wave Of The Sea, he likes to yank my chain with progressive propaganda.
This morning's communication recalled the days of protest against the Vietnam War, the days of the Civil Rights marches, the days of the great voter registration drives in the Deep South, the days of the anti segregation campaigns, all that jazz.
He finished by telling me President Obama was the fulfilment of the bright promise of those days.
I felt sick.
To take my mind off the general rejoicing around the world, I decided to go for a haircut.
The Dad had told me about a new hairdresser that he's recently discovered in the town.
"She's a bit rough and ready," he'd said, "but she only charges a tenner."
That seemed about right to me.
I can put up with a lot of rough and ready if it's two quid cheaper than my regular rough and ready.
I mean haircut.
So having read Mr Massie's missive, I betook myself to barberville.
The girl who owned the business was there on her own.
She greeted me.
Her voice rang with the classic gentle cadences of a true Kilcullen accent.
Rough as a badger's arse.
You should know about the accent of my home town gentle readers.
The women sound like men.
Men with particularly gutteral accents.
Men who cannot pronounce the letters "t" and "h" if those letters appear together.
Men who've just slaughtered a caribou with their teeth and are now ready to slaughter something else.
I kid you not.
You'd think they were talking German, their voices are so gutteral.
In fact German would be easier to understand than the gibberish most of my compatriots talk.
I gotta tell you bold readers.
I have this accent myself.
Some of you are accustomed to bathing in the mellow tones of my transatlantic Oxbridge meets Beau Gest accent.
I'm faking it.
It takes a supreme act of will.
If I relax for a second I'm talking like: "Howza goin, dis, dat, dese, and dose, kill deh caribou, yarghhhhhh!"
But I digress.
The new hairdresser sat me down with some rough but warm words of welcome, and began her work.
Snip, snip, snip.
Presently she enquired as to what I thought of President Obama.
"It's an awful job," I said. "Terrible pressures for one man. I hope he'll be okay."
The hairdresser agreed.
"As for the other fellow," she said. "I hated him."
The noble Heelers took a deep breath.
Presumably she meant President Bush.
I don't know how I knew.
I just had a feeling.
"Why?" I probed gently.
My question opened a flood gate of rough hewn oratory.
"Did you see the way he behaved when the lads bombed New York? Sitting there with those kids. He just kept reading out of the book. He should have jumped up and started doing something straight away. That's what he's paid for. And then that war in the other place. You know the second war. He said there were things there, the weapons, and there were none. And you know what? I've heard he might have planned that New York thing. You know. Planned it, or he knew about it in advance."
She fell silent.
There was a pulse in the universe.
The last knight of Europe took arms from off the wall.
Ireland's greatest living poet stared at himself in the mirror.
I had visions that this was the last time I might see my hair.
There was a distinct possibility that when I said what I had to say she'd scalp me.
But when I spoke, it was mildly enough.
At least it began mildly enough.
"Ah no," I murmured. "That's a bit hard. The reading the book thing. That's just Michael Moore talk. You know a President isn't going to fly into a panic. He's going to take his time. Not scare the children. To be honest that business about the book is a real red herring from people who were going to oppose anything President Bush did anyway. It's a sneer. Nothing more. As for Iraq and the weapons of mass destruction. I remember being challenged about that by a group of Secondary School teachers in Athy. This was before the Americans went in. They asked did I really think any weapons would be found. I told em I didn't care. All I cared about was that Saddam Hussein's murder regime was about to be ended as it should have been ended by the UN years ago. I gotta tell you as well that there are certain indicators which suggest the Syrians and the Iranians hid the weapons of mass destruction for Saddam. A jounalist called Kenneth Timmerman claims the weapons were moved mainly to Syria with Russian assistance. I don't trust Timmerman but I find the theory has some merit. There are elements within Russia, not the Russian people, but elements in their ruling class, who would do anything to damage America. I think they may indeed have hidden Saddam's weapons for him. But I don't care. Saddam was a mass murderer. America did the world a favour getting rid of him. Oh. And you said you'd heard President Bush planned Nine Eleven. That's just lousy. It's just lousy. Lousy talk. Lousy thinking. It's a typical Arab Muslim insult. They kill three thousand of our people and then say we did it ourselves. Arabs think that sort of thing is terribly clever. But it's just lousy."
The haircut was over.
As was my Mirrorside Panegyric.
And lo!
I still had hair.
Bits.
Here and there.
Result!
I stood up.
"How much do I owe you?" quoth me.
"Fifteen Euro," shot back the President Obama loving hairdresser.
I left her premises a wiser weaker man.
Back at the Chateau, the Dad was in the kitchen having a cup of tea with my sister's husband Farmer Edward.
I told em my defence of President Bush to the hairdresser, and what I'd ended up paying for the haircut.
"That's incredible," said the Dad. "She only ever charges me ten. Maybe the price she gives me is a special charge for ould fellows."
Edward shook his head.
"No," sez he. "That's all she charges me as well. You should have agreed with her and maybe she'd have charged you less."
They both seemed moderately amused at my vicissitudes.
I repaired to the front room to be alone.
All this and President Obama too.
Bloody hell, as my Uncle Peter used to say.
From somewhere not too far away the ghost of the techno musician Mobie began to croon his most poignant song.
He sang:
"Oooh Lordy.
My troubles so difficult,
Oooh Lordy,
My troubles so difficult.
Don't nobody know about my troubles with Liberals.
Don't nobody know about my troubles with Liberals.
Went down the hairdressers.
T'other day.
Went down the hairdressers.
But did I pay.
Stuck up for the Prez who saved the world.
Paid an extra fiver.
Now that's absurd.
Oooh Lordy,
My troubles with Liberals.
Oooh Lordy,
My troubles with Liberals.
Don't nobody know my troubles with Liberals.
Don't nobody know my troubles with Liberals."
I for one knew exactly what he meant.
This is Hannah, nine months ago, just after she arrived at the orphanage...
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