The manner in which society measures the intellectually disabled has altered radically

THIS evening as the light dies we’ll go looking for the reindeer in the Phoenix Park with our kids, writes Victoria White.

We know they’re not the reindeer who pull Santa’s sleigh because those reindeer are already bringing presents to children on the other side of the earth, where the night is dark. The Phoenix Park reindeer are the ones left behind but it’s as if they know that some of their brothers and sisters are on a mission of magic. We feed them carrots as consolation prizes.

Later, having worked the chill off with hot chocolates and hot toddies, we’ll sit around the fire and take out the old copy of Clement C Moore’s The Night Before Christmas which still bears the marks of the house fire we all survived over a decade ago.