Coleman recalls Mullingar trip at start of first lockdown

When did you last shake hands? Do you remember homeschooling, the 2k travel limit, essential shopping?

RTÉ journalist Carole Coleman has documented the changes Covid-19 brought to our lives in ‘News From Under a Coat Stand, a diary March-June 2020’.

“On 16 March, 2020, the first day of home-schooling, I left our two teenage daughters at their books in Carrick-on-Shannon while I drove to Mullingar to pick up my new hybrid from Grange Motors.

“The N4 was completely deserted. When I got to Mullingar, my insurance broker wasn’t answering the phone to switch over my insurance. They’d all been sent home.

"I drove, very carefully, back to Leitrim in my new motor, which then sat idle for months of lockdown!” Carole told the Westmeath Examiner.

“I kept my diary as a record for the future, so our children and grandchildren could understand this strange time. We won’t forget what happened, but we will forget the small details of how our lives turned upside down. The diary tells that story,” Carole said.

In News from Under a Coat Stand, Coleman takes readers along on her reporting and personal journey as Ireland and much of the world shut down and families stayed apart and took extreme measures to protect one another.

The This Week presenter and former RTÉ Washington correspondent records the fear that drove many of us to stockpile food and remain indoors for nearly 12 weeks.

News from Under a Coat Stand details the sad loss of life in Ireland, the US and the UK, but also the tender and sometimes quirky situations experienced by countless Irish families. Illustrations sketched by the author’s teenage daughter Irena help tell the story.

“We quickly forget how it was to home-school children while working our own jobs from bedrooms and kitchens. Then there was banana bread, Joe Wicks workouts and Zoom bingo. We have left all that behind but the effects of that time are very much with us,” Coleman said.

News from Under a Coat Stand is available at Just Books Mullingar, Bastion Gallery, Athlone, Books.ie and gifts.ie.