Elaine Garvey

This street was basically one long sugar supply chain.

We sailed through the 70s on a balanced diet of sherbets, blackjacks, fruit pastilles, love hearts and of course Coca-Cola bottles.

Stay away from the till, my mother would warn, while really turning a blind eye to our shenanigans as we stealthily swiped a few pence.

Then there was Justin Stack's and McGillicuddy's magical toy shops where you could get lost for hours.

A girl I know who got a job in the bank in our town in the 70s was blown away by the fine style she deduced that people bought their good outfit for the races which did them the whole year.

O'Sullivan's, the man's shop on the street, a business which lasted 100 years, ensured that Dad was kept in sartorial elegance.

My friends and I could dress with panache thanks to Mrs. Sexton's high-end shop.

She was one of the first stockists of Levi's in Ireland.

Mother to Irish international Willie Sexton and grandmother to Johnny Sexton, she was a woman ahead of her time.

She sold burly bras and sexy one-pieces, which she proudly displayed in her window.

At around the age of 10, we all coveted her Jean Le Bourget jeans, check trousers with smart matching wool jumpers.

In collusion with Mrs. Sexton, I frequently walked up William Street, laden down with several outfits on April, which I tried on for my exasperated parents.

Us townies had our own natural concrete playground at the back of William Street.

About 70 children lived on the street and played for hours on end, unsupervised and utterly free.

In contrast to the controlled, curated lives we live now,

My parents and their friends were trailblazers, symbolic of a new, more carefree Ireland.

They lived with a sort of bohemian abandon.

Every night my dad would walk downstairs and woo my mother and buy seven or eight pints of Smittix from her.

He knew how to win her heart.

Meanwhile, I snuck out from my bedroom to the sitting room and secretly watched Dallas.