Free Angels in My Hair by Lorna Byrne

too
much about this now: just put it to the back of your mind, you
will recognise it the day it happens.'
    Then Elijah was gone and, of course, the vision did happen
one day, some years later. In the process of writing this book,
I asked my angels for more information about Elijah, and I was
told that Elijah was an Old Testament prophet – a man with
the soul of an angel.
    My family was on the housing list with Dublin Council to get
a house. It was a real fight but, eventually, after a long, long
wait, we were given a rented council house in Edenmore. It
was a lovely house in a brand new estate of several hundred
houses. All the homes were more or less the same: three
bedrooms, semi-detached, with small front and back gardens.
There was another estate next to ours, but the area wasn't
completely built up and there were fields and open spaces
around us. Everyone there was new; most people were in their
own house for the first time – having perhaps lived with their
parents or in old tenements in Dublin city centre. It was a
friendly place, and I liked it immediately.
    So at last we had a house – even if we didn't own it. Things
were improving, but it was still tough for my parents. Da was
working as a deliveryman for a big petrol company, which was
hard, physical work that had him out long hours, and Mum
went out to work the night shift in the local chocolate factory.
Every evening after school Mum would give us our dinner and
then leave the older children to mind the younger ones until
Da came home – which was often quite late.
    Edenmore was a long way from Ballymun, so the change
meant new schools and new friends for all of us. There was no
school nearby so we had a long walk every morning: through
the housing estate, down into the old village, then past the
church to the main road. The school was directly across this
busy road. My class was in a prefab which was very crowded,
with the desks packed tightly together. In the morning it was
a hard squeeze to get to your desk – you practically had to
crawl over your classmates.
    I was very happy in Edenmore; I didn't have any particular
close friends, but there was one family of neighbours, the
O'Brien's, with whom I spent a lot of time. My real favourite in
the O'Brien family was their wonderful Alsatian dog, Shane. I
used to take Shane for a walk three times a week and it was on
one of these walks that I met another special angel.
    I call this angel 'the tree angel' because she always appears in
a tree. I have seen her many times since and still do to this day.
She's all the shades of emerald green, emerald gold and
emerald orange that you could imagine – the colours are
magnificent. She seems to be alive in every part of the tree, and
yet I can see her so clearly. Her hair is curly and full of waves,
and when she moves, every part of her moves and her eyes
sparkle like gold dust. She stretches out her arms and holds
her hand out towards me and as she does so, the tree moves
with her. I have often spoken to her and her voice, when she
speaks back to me, is like a whistle; it is as if her voice rustles
amongst the leaves of the trees.
    I remember one day I was out walking with Shane. We had
crossed the field and were about to go back in towards the
estate when Shane stopped and started to bark at this big tree
on the left. I looked at the tree and saw nothing; I laughed at
Shane, asking, 'What are you barking about?'
    Then I saw her. There was the tree angel – Shane had seen
her before me. I laugh at that when I think of it. It amazes me,
animals see angels so easily.
    Sometimes, on the way home from school, I played in the
quarry with the other children. One day, instead of playing
with them, I tried the gate of the monastery next to the quarry.
It was a place we weren't allowed to go in to, but I lifted the
latch and peeped in. I saw gardens full of vegetables and fruit;
it felt so peaceful that I wasn't afraid. I walked round watching
the monks in their brown