Escaping the decay of rural Ireland: Getting busy living in and reviving the community of Asdee

This week the dwindling community of Asdee in North Kerry unveiled a detailed and ambitious plan outlining how the parish tucked along the banks of the River Shannon can escape the sentence of decline and decay which has been served on so much of rural Ireland. Getting busy… Colm O’Connor reports.

Karol Kissane, Mary Mulvihill, and John Kennedy of the Asdee Community Development Association.

In all matter of life and existential ambition, we look to Andy Dufresne. Inside Shawshank, he tells ‘Red’ of his hopes for a brighter future far from the soul-destroying misery of the Maine penitentiary.

The sage Morgan Freeman fillets the plan describing it as a “shitty pipe dream”, resigning himself to living out his life behind bars. There would be no Shawshank Redemption. Dufresne will not be trapped forever though. "It comes down to a simple choice, Get busy living or get busy dying."