To John Homely

thank you for the free honey

County Kildare

To someone who mattered

The barista at this cafe remembered my order and made my whole morning. Thank you!

Trinity College Dublin

To To the pharmacist who explained it twice

The doctor's office was rushed and I left more confused than I arrived. You took the box back out of the bag, drew the times on the label in biro, and explained it again slower without a flicker of impatience. Half the country's healthcare runs on people like you doing that quietly at a counter.

Castleknock

To To the woman who minded my shopping and my dignity

I fainted at the till — new tablets, long story — and came around to find you'd sent someone for water, moved my shopping aside, and were telling the queue "give her air, it's warm in here" like it was the most normal thing in the world. You made an ambulance-sized embarrassment feel like a warm afternoon. I never got to say it: thank you.

Tesco

To the librarian who indulged my odd question

Asked an odd question about eighteenth-century medical texts, expecting a shrug. Got forty-five minutes of someone's genuine delight and three books I didn't know existed.

Marsh's Library

To the 46A driver

Held the 46A for ninety extra seconds at the lights so I could run for it in the rain, work shoes and all. Small mercy. Made a long shift feel survivable.

O'Connell Street

To The staff

Thank you very much

Myo’s

To the Green's groundskeeper

Sat on the same bench every lunchtime for a month after I was let go, pretending I still had somewhere to be. The groundskeeper never asked why, just started saying good morning like I mattered.

St Stephen's Green

To the Tuesday morning barista

Three years of ordering the same coffee on the way to work, and she still asks after my dog before I've said good morning. Some mornings that's the only kind thing that happens to me all day.

Bewley's Café

To the Tara Street crew

Our chip pan fire was over in minutes and mostly just embarrassing, but the crew who came out treated it like the most important call of their night and made sure we actually felt safe again.

Tara Street

To the midwife on nights

Our daughter arrived at four in the morning, six weeks early and furious about it. The midwife who caught her never once let us see her worry, only her steadiness.

Rotunda Hospital

To To the referee at the under-14s match

A parent was roaring at you from the sideline and you stopped the game, walked over to the boy he was roaring at, and told him he was having a great match. Then you played on. Every child on that pitch learned something about adults that day, and it was your version they learned.

Porterstown

To To the barista who remembered

Second visit ever, and you had the flat white going before I reached the till. It's a small thing. It's not a small thing.

Insomnia

To the woman who stayed for the whole song

Busking in the rain to five people and a pigeon, and one of them stopped, listened to the whole song, and told me it got her through a bad week. That's the whole reason I keep doing this.

Grafton Street

To To the Irish Rail man at the gate who broke the rules by about ten percent

Wrong ticket, wrong train, a funeral to get to. You looked at the ticket, looked at me, and said "go on, platform 6, walk fast." I know what that small yes might have cost you. It cost me nothing and gave me the chance to say goodbye.

Dublin Heuston

To To the lad who gave up his seat without looking up from his phone

You stood for forty minutes and never once made it a gesture. She noticed. So did the whole carriage.

Maynooth

To whoever keeps this garden so quiet

Nobody tells you grief needs somewhere quiet to go. This walled garden, empty on a Tuesday morning, was the only place that let me cry without an audience or a question.

Iveagh Gardens

To a stranger near the Papal Cross

My dog slipped his lead near the Papal Cross and a stranger chased him half a mile through the rain. Wouldn't take so much as a coffee for it -- just said to pass it on.

Phoenix Park

To a gardener who noticed

Brought my grandfather here on what turned out to be his last good day. A gardener stopped trimming the hedges to help him down the steps without being asked, like it was nothing. It wasn't nothing to us.

Garden Of Remembrance