Coping with the recession is hard enough without listening to it all day

The three-year old wasn’t so much draped over his mother’s shoulder as collapsed over it, head heavy against her neck, one arm caught in the hood of her anorak, the other hanging loosely.

Her husband met her in the hall and the toddler was gently transferred to him. He climbed the line staircase like a man under water. Slowly. Silently. If the little one stayed asleep for an hour or so, the two parents would be able to sit at the kitchen table and share their lives. It’s the only uninterrupted time they have together. No television. No radio. No texts or tweets or phone calls taken or returned. Just them, in the picture-perfect kitchen in their negative equity home.

Starting from that home, five days a week, she drives east and south, starting before dawn, dropping off their son at the crèche on her way to where she works, 63km away. He drives west to his job in Limerick. If you do the inhalation of breath indicating this must be tough, both automatically shake their heads.