December is about to descend upon us. Like a cold, wintry breath over the land. It's the final month, among some of the bleakest months ever experienced in Ireland.
It has been the year of living dangerously. Trying to avoid the elusive enemy in coronavirus. A year too, when windows took on a new importance.
Being able to see parents through the glass, outside houses or nursing homes, never meant as much before. This virus has changed us in ways we can not yet fully imagine.
And there are still many months ahead to get through, before there might be a return to some normality. Over the last six weeks of lockdown, most people have committed to what was required, in the hope and expectation that there can be a reasonably good Christmas.