The conversation went something like this:

“Mummy…?”

“Erm?”

“Mummy?”

“Give me a minute…”

“Mummy! Mum! MUM!”

“Can’t you see I am reading an important letter? What is so urgent?”

“Sinéad is cutting her own hair with the Arts and Crafts scissors!”

“AAAAARGH!”

So on the minus side, my five year old has lopped a huge whack off her beautiful, golden tresses.

On the plus side, I wasn’t paying attention because I was reading a letter from Kildare County Council Arts Service informing me that I have won the 2016 Cecil Day Lewis Emerging Writer Award. Woo hoo!

The bursary will help me finish the research and writing of my novel-in-progress, which was a finalist in the Greenbean Novel Fair 2016 at the Irish Writer’s Centre (and which I, rather amusingly, thought was finished six months ago!) It’s a huge vote of confidence in the novel and I hope I go on to experience one fiftieth of the success of previous winners such as Hazel Gaynor, Martin Malone, Laura Jane Cassidy, Eileen Keane and dozens of others over the years.

So well done to me, and well done to the lovely people at Kildare County Council Arts Service for all their support to local established and emerging artists. Over €50,000 was allocated this year in a plethora of artistic fields. I am proud to be among them. The award will be presented at The Kildare Readers Festival in October; how great to be on stage instead of in the audience as usual!

Now, I gotta ring the hairdresser… (just in case Daniel Day Lewis turns up to congratulate me – not to mention the arts and crafts scissors catastrophe!)