Saintly friends are always close to our hearts

WE may be in lockdown but thankfully nature is not, with sweet snowdrops budding everywhere. They invariably bring to mind All Kinds Of Everything, which won the Eurovision Song Contest many moons ago, given ‘snowdrops’ is the first word in the opening lyrics. Which in turn reminds me of Dana — though not the singer (and former presidential candidate) but my friend of the same name.

And today being St Valentine’s Day, I thought I might honour friendship, since this form of love features strongly in most of our lives. Friends are as important as family — indeed sometimes more so — being the people we turn to during tough times, and who invariably are centre stage during the good. So isn’t it strange that there isn’t even an afternoon, let alone a day, dedicated to celebrating them?

After all, you phone a friend when it comes to making your fortune on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?, you steer clear of fair-weather ones, and you get by with a little help from friends too. While they say if you want to find out someone’s flaws, ask their friend; they won’t tell you — but they know.

Speaking of which, those of you who were kind enough to buy the Lay Of The Land compendium know Dana Winder too

— the cover of the book features one of her stunning paintings. I am regularly reminded of it on country walks, the road stretching ahead of me just as it does in her Kerry landscape where Dana has lived for many years. Making her another blow-in, and confirming my theory that most city slickers have rural roots.

This is true in Dana’s case — and that of her family dynasty. Her grandfather, Eamon Bulfin, was instrumental in changing his father’s birthplace of King’s County to its ancient Irish name of Offaly; a feat all the more remarkable for the fact he lived to perform it. He was condemned to death for his part in the Easter Rising, having raised one of the Irish flags over the GPO — and saved by the fortunate irony of being born in Argentina, where his father had emigrated at the age of 20. Bulfin was interned in Frongoch prison, where he befriended Michael Collins, before he was deported to Buenos Aires. He returned to

Ireland after the formation of the Irish Free State.

There’s a sort of synchronicity in Dana’s painting gracing the cover of a collection of newspaper columns, given that greatgrandfather William Bulfin wrote Rambles In Eirinn in 1902, based on a collection of articles he wrote for Irish newspapers.

Both family and friends matter when it comes to love. So let me leave the last word to Jeanne Winder, Dana’s formidable mother, who smiled when the “cailín bán”, as she calls yours truly, mentioned the former Big House on the road where I grew up, which by then was divided into flats.

“I remember visiting my aunt when she lived there,” Jeanne said, referring to Maud Gonne.

For all kinds of everything remind us of love.