TO THE LIGHTHOUSE WITH THE FINZI-CONTINIS

I don't know why Enid Blyton didn't ever write 'The Lighthouse of Adventure'. She managed a Circus, a Ship, an Island and several others, but not a Lighthouse. Missed a trick there, Enid. She also did a lot of Five Go To Smuggler's Cove sort of thing, and although in these enlightened times we're supposed to avert our eyes from her pedestrian prose and suspect attitudes, I have to say I owe her a great debt of gratitude for removing me, so regularly, from the real and often terrifying world. And so did countless other children.

Years ago, when I was a school librarian in newly-independent Zimbabwe, Enid Blyton was in just as much demand among rural, Black pupils as she'd been in my all-White South African girls' school, which just goes to show that a good adventure story has universal appeal. (I did once have two Form 1 boys who read every Barbara Cartland on the shelves - the books had been donated by an elderly benefactor with romantic tastes - and I'm still trying to work that one out. Possibly they just fell about laughing.) Anyway, I'm grateful for all the hours I spent in the company of her plucky children as they stiffened their spines and their upper lips, and easily outwitted hordes of villains. And I've retained a nostalgic yearning for her picnics. I can't think why: they were mostly potted meat, ginger beer and fruit cake, all of which I can easily live without, but at the time they sounded wonderful. (This could have had something to do with my own mother thinking that a hard-boiled egg and a flask of tea were the height of picnic luxury.)

So, ever since we went one Heritage Day to view the Irish Landmark Trust's Blackhead Lightkeeper's Houses (confusingly located above Whitehead) I have nursed a secret desire to go back and indulge in a proper Enid Blyton adventure, with lots of picnics. And last weekend that's exactly what we did. Professor Gloom, Councillor Kate, Fearless Fergal and myself, accompanied by hampers of food and bags of bottles, set off on our grand adventure. 'Four On A Jolly Jaunt' - and every meal a picnic. Only this time there wasn't a potted meat sandwich or a hard-boiled egg in sight.

There were sticky ribs, pizzas and oven-ready chips, washed down with gin and tonic; there were cold meats, salads, cheese and fruit; tarts and crumbles, pancakes, chocolate and hot cross buns. We drank Prosecco on the sunny, windswept terrace and played backgammon in front of the open fire. We drank far too much wine and managed not to fall off the cliffs. And at night we fell asleep to the sound of the sea.

Blackhead is a working lighthouse. All night long the beams revolve: if you stand on the walkway below, it's like being on a carousel, spools of light swirling by like the ribbons of a Maypole. The rooms are lovely: lived-in, slightly shabby, full of books and character, with little bunches of fresh flowers dotted around. It was altogether enchanting.

And what did I read? Giorgio Bassani's 'The Garden of the Finzi-Continis' which I'd always meant to read but somehow hadn't. A beautiful, poignant, haunting novel that skims above the surface of the unbearable, touching down just often enough to let the waiting darkness of theHolocaust brush against the characters who will so soon be swallowed up. You know where this is going to end, but for now the beam of the narrator's memory lights up the loves and lives of this small, doomed community in Ferrara, and enriches your own life in the process. A lighthouse of a book.

A WEDDING IN CLONES

On Saturday 3 March Kate married Fergal in a little church in Clones, and even the unbelievers, the unobservant, and the deeply unsentimental (disproportionately present on the bride's side) were reduced to a quivering mush. Outside the snow (which had prevented quite a lot of people, including one of the two bridesmaids, from getting there at all) lay thick and white; inside, the congregation let out a collective sigh as the bride, attended by the one original bridesmaid, plus a heavily-pregnant sister (co-opted at the last minute) and a tiny, exquisite flower-girl, drifted down the aisle towards the groom. There was a fiddle, a flute, and a girl with one of those Irish singing voices that floats you up to the ceiling.

Which is probably enough of the wedding fervour. But what I will say is that I was never at a happier wedding, and the reception that followed at the Lough Erne resort was the best of all possible parties. Put any of our Irish, South African, Greek and Indian families in one room - not to mention the several other nationalities present - and you're bound to end up having a party, but this one was brilliant. Professor Gloom and I faded away before the dancing got properly going, but at a certain age there comes a point when a warm bed and a long sleep in the deep silence of the snowbound countryside trumps every other prospect.

Now it's 5 weeks since the wedding, and 4 since the last of the guests flew back home - after which Gloom and I lay down for 2 days with cold compresses on our heads. When we got up again, the house was eerily quiet. Apart from small hand-prints on the windows and a few plastic toys carefully buried in the houseplants, it was as though they'd never been here...

It's a good thing there was Kelly McCaughrain's book launch to cheer us up: I defy anyone not to be cheered by the Belfast Ukulele Jam - out in force to support one of their own -  and if you haven't read 'Flying Tips for Flightless Birds' yet, go and buy it NOW. You don't have to be a Young Adult to enjoy it; you can be a grumpy old person and still be seduced.

There was also lots of work waiting to distract us: scientific papers, novels at various stages of composition (or possibly decomposition) never mind the disordered house, disgruntled cat and neglected garden. And sadly, the endless, inescapable and polarising coverage of a local trial. Too many people have talked and written about this already, but I'm starting to think that hurling abuse via social media is the modern equivalent of putting people in the stocks. And that maybe actually throwing rotten vegetables and the contents of your chamber-pot is a bit braver than flinging dirt from the safety of your laptop.

So, what with one thing and another, we decided we needed another holiday, which is why we went back to Lough Erne. And what a good decision that was: the snow had gone, but the days were still sharp and bright as knives, and all that peace and space restored us.


We ate, drank, walked, slept, explored the countryside and were wonderfully well looked after by the hotel staff. And we had plenty of time to read. I finished the - to me - surprisingly enjoyable 'Essex Serpent' then started on Tea Obreht's 'The Tiger's Wife' - which I'd been meaning to read for years and am glad that I finally did. The tiger of the title assumes strange supernatural powers, in the minds of the locals; Sarah Perry's novel features an ancient winged serpent supposedly lurking in the marshes. Which might be why, very early one morning, I was almost certain I saw a long, dark, coiling shape breaking the surface of Lough Erne...

I also packed the most recent edition of Slightly Foxed. I love Slightly Foxed. It bills itself as the 'independent quarterly that introduces its readers to books that are no longer new and fashionable but have lasting appeal. A bit like myself, really.

Unfortunately, there's been a shameless amount of eating and drinking since Christmas, and in my case the wages of over-indulgence are gastritis, so I'm currently living on green tea and rice cakes, which is much the same as eating lightly-salted polystyrene. I even had to shun the Easter eggs. Still, the honeymooners came home on Easter Monday - Gloom was torn between joy at their return and disappointment that his vicarious travels had come to an end: he much prefers getting endless photos of foreign lands to all the bother of going there himself - and in May there'll be a new grandchild to look forward to. Plus, the days are getting longer, and I think I might have found a way forward, at long last, with the book that's been haunting me for months.

And one last reason to be cheerful: this weekend it's Greek Easter! I think I might treat myself to a little bit of chocolate, and  a glass or two of champagne. Not exactly what the doctor ordered, but what the hell: it's not how long you live that matters, but how well you live.

Καλο Πασχα everyone!