‘I remember collecting conkers with my grandad in Kildare like it was yesterday’

I took a notion to revisit the horse chestnut tree close to my grandparents’ old house in Kildare recently. I’d read a news story about the World Conker Championships and regaled my wife with stories of collecting conkers with my grandad in Kilshanroe before bringing them to school tied up with shoelaces.

The World Conker Championship had tightened security in 2025 after a contestant in 2024 was accused of using a steel conker to beat all-comers. When we were young and stashing conkers into our schoolbags, we were versed in the dark arts of varnishing, soaking them in vinegar and baking them to harden them up, but we never quite got around to making steel replicas to bag the schoolyard bragging rights.

Perhaps that’s because I learned everything I know about playing conkers from my grandad Vince Kelly, an entirely honest man, who lived in Clonagh, Kilshanroe, Co Kildare, with my grandmother Eileen for many years. We loved visits to Clonagh as kids; traipsing up the fields with my grandad to replace an old piece of fence, picking spuds and listening to his stories from working in the mines in Australia in the 1970s. He taught us how to tie a fishing line hook in the back shed, and brought us to cast our creations on the Royal Canal with big packed lunches courtesy of my granny’s home baking.

ABOVE: My granny and grandad Kelly - Vince and Eileen - and their old house in Clonagh, Co Kildare

They didn’t live in Clonagh in their latter years, so it had been more than 20 years since I was there. It’s still standing, although new owners have renovated most of it. The old decorative breeze block wall is still intact. I remember pulling up to it most Sundays with my parents, brother and sisters, and reaching through the gaps to pet Brandy the golden Labrador who always rushed to greet us. I pulled up outside again last week, just for old time’s sake, and for a moment I was 10 again. My grandad died in 2010 and was followed by my granny in 2015, and yet they were there briefly that day, if only in my memory.

The house in Clonagh was old-fashioned and cosy. My grandad would have the fire roaring as my granny baked apple tarts and bakewells in the kitchen. We’d get the smells coming down the drive as I distracted the dog from jumping on my mother and sisters who were terrified of her jumpy eagerness to see us. We’d rumble into the kitchen and unfurl coats onto the mahogany arms of the sofas in the living room. The house was always full of family; and that is perhaps the greatest compliment we can pay to our older generations. We loved being there and being with our cousins, aunts and uncles.

This time of year in particular was the season for Kilshanroe and when my grandparents really went all out. Halloween first; my grandad would light a huge bonfire in the field beside the house. We’d see it glowing and spitting sparks into the dark sky as we came down the road, peering out the windows of my Da’s car with excitement. We’d bob for apples and money in a basin, eat all sorts of sweets and candied apples, before gathering around the fire outside. I can still hear it crackling and popping as the flames made their way through the knots in the timber offcuts from grandad’s stash.

PICTURED: Me sweeping the yard in Clonagh and my sister Arlene and I on one of many visits there

Christmas was even better. Our family tradition was visiting granny and grandad’s on Christmas Eve. My siblings are all in their 30s and 40s now, and we’d still count those journeys as some of our fondest childhood memories. You’d see the big multicoloured bulbs on the tree illuminating the net curtains in the window as we jumped out of the car, giddy with excitement. There was a motion-sensor Santy ornament hanging on the wall in the hall as we made our way in; I can hear the ‘ho, ho, ho’ jingle it made as we walked by in my head to this day. My brother and I would walk up and down the hall endlessly, setting it off, before sneaking under the tree and finding our names on presents. We would always bring the presents home to open but we often peeled away pieces of the wrapping paper on granny’s floor to have a ‘peek’. The fire was always on, my grandad would get on the floor to play with us and tell us stories. They really were the quintessential Irish grandparents.

ABOVE: My siblings Arlene, Laura and Barry and I as grandad tells us a story in Clonagh

On bright autumn days, my grandad would lead us - my brother Barry, cousins Brian and Braddan, and I - on a walk up to the old Kilshanroe school yard, beside the cemetery, to gather conkers. I remember each crack and shadow on the road. Many of the hedges and long green fields have been replaced now with beautiful big houses. It seemed a lot more remote back then. ‘Step in, lads,’ my grandad would caution, as the odd car passed and he gave them a friendly wave, our feet slipping where the ditches sloped sharply.

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My grandad was always careful. He drove slowly, walked slowly and told a story slowly. We laughed about how long it would take him to tell a short story at his funeral, the sort of laugh that turns to a tear as memories are passed around the kitchen table like ham sandwiches. The old horse chestnut tree would rear up on the horizon, growing tight to the boundary wall of the old schoolhouse, delivering spiky green conker husks right out onto the roadside as we approached.

PICTURED: The horse chestnut tree at the old Kilshanroe schoolhouse

We brought buckets and bowls from granny’s cupboards to gather them up, scouring the leaf-covered ground for husks or shiny brown conkers already exposed like marbles in the mud. The huge tree cast a dark shadow as it hung over the small garden where once children played during school breaktimes at the dawning of the State. The tiny schoolhouse was built in the early 1800s and closed in 1939. It’s been beautifully restored in recent years; complete with old desks still inside. When we were kids you’d barely notice there was a building there at all as time had hidden it behind shrubs and masses of ivy.

I visited it again with my wife Dearbhla and one-year-old daughter Éabha last week. We gathered up the conkers and I was transported back to my own childhood in fine detail. With each bend down to grab another, it was as if my body and mind were remembering every inch; the good spots low against the back wall where no one else would go digging; the patch of grass outside the boundary. I could hear my grandad’s voice telling us to stay off the road as we’d dart back through the wrought iron gate. I took some pictures with Dearbhla and Éabha and I reminisced as we got back into the car to drive home. In my younger days, we’d make back down the road towards Granny Kelly’s with our haul.

ABOVE: My daughter Éabha and I exploring the old tree and schoolhouse garden in Kilshanroe in 2025

My grandad would then bore tiny holes in them so we could thread an old shoelace through and tie them up ready for battle with the boys in school. He always took the time to show us things; he wouldn’t just take the conkers and do them himself and drop them back in front of us. He’d talk us through everything he was doing like gently jimmying the tiny screwdriver through the top of the conker. He’d explain how to tie the lace in the best knot so it wouldn’t come off easily, and how to wrap the lace around your hand and use two fingers to sling the conker at your opponent’s; no steel cheat codes necessary.

I couldn’t help but feel society has lost some of that magic as I left the horse chestnut tree behind again the other day. It wasn’t long after those days when we moved on as kids to PlayStations and the first mobile phones. Nowadays, smartphones are the source of so much of our children's entertainment and education. My generation crossed that bridge between days you went fishing and had no way of ringing back to tell granny when you’d be back; to now when every aspect of your life is governed by technology. Online banking, games, supermarket vouchers, social media, booking flights, finding out things on Google. Grandad was our Google. We lived through it as kids, teenagers and now as adults; we’ve certainly lost something in the transition - but maybe I’m just overly sentimental.

PICTURED: Me as a child in his granny and grandad's garden in Clonagh, Kilshanroe, Co Kildare

My aunty Una passed away last week. I’d started writing this article just a day earlier. I think there is something meaningful in that coincidence. It made the journey back to Clonagh that day she passed away that bit more poignant. It was the homeplace where she grew up with my dad, who died 12 years ago this month, my aunty Helen and uncle Steve, and of course my grandparents. Though hit with those losses, and some of us dispersed to different parts of the world, even now, our entire family will always be alive for me in Clonagh. They were there last week.

People say, and they’re right, that you can’t live your life through memories alone; but living without them would be too cruel a grief.

PICTURED: The Kelly clan gathered for Vince and Eileen's wedding anniversary in 2009. My dad David is pictured sixth from the left. My aunty Una is pictured second from the left.