I glanced again at the old man on the balcony; but he had disappeared. It felt like he had vanished

I’ve never seen as much gorse as this year. It’s been blooming all through May with such generosity that I can’t see the green branches; just clumps of golden yellow wobbling in the breeze across the hills. They have even invaded the garden, coming in from a neighbour’s field to the north.

A field where donkeys once hung out, ascending the hill each morning when they were released from their stable. The male would come up first, braying to indicate that the coast was clear, or perhaps to assert that he was the patriarch of all patriarchs. Thereafter the mother and young donkey joined him, sheltering under the gorse bushes when it rained.

The old patriarch had a favourite spot where he sat, much as human males long ago had special armchairs at the fire which they never shared with children or women. Male donkeys are no different. The patriarch would screech with rage if he saw his companion dare to intrude on his particular space.

However, their owner assured me that the female was also capable of delivering a massive kick with her hind leg if the patriarch ever came close enough to her feeding bucket as to constitute a threat to her dinner.

My camera notices details I miss. I’ve never had this experience with my iPhone

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Michael Harding: To me, Bundoran streets were once as glamorous as those of Las Vegas

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Michael Harding: Did I ever tell you the story of the two cats?

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Michael Harding: I’m ashamed to say that I love my Toyota; it’s my pride and joy

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The donkeys are gone now and the gorse has taken over. It’s not a field any longer; it’s a sea of yellow for the month of May. And I can see why the golden gorse was associated with Lugh, the god of light, and the hope of a good harvest. Gorse was once a feed for animals. It also nourished the bees in May and the spiders made their webs on the bushes in September. It was a shelter for wild birds and there was no better way to dry clothes than to hang them on the prickled branches.

In good weather I often sit for ages with the bushes behind me and the lake before me because there is no better place in all of Leitrim from where to view Lough Allen.

When I was young I often dreamed of a balcony where I might rest in old age; to feel the breeze and hear the sound of the traffic in the distance. A balcony is an oasis of rest in any city, and I thought there could be nothing more satisfying than sitting with the hum of the streets below as I dozed my way to senility between one glass of wine and another.

For years I plodded through various Mediterranean towns and observed how serene life could be for the elderly, as they leaned over the banisters above street level to view the throng below.

I remember seeing an old man on a balcony in Subiaco, Italy in 1985; a white linen jacket around his shoulders, sunglasses masking his soul and the smoke of a thin cigarette wafting in the air above his head. I sat across the street with a beer, perspiring after a long walk in the midday sun.

The prospect of a balcony in old age was always attractive to me. A place to rest and reflect on all that is here and now, before commencing the great journey into a metaphysical realm

I glanced at my beer and then again up at him on the balcony; but he had disappeared. Perhaps he just went inside for a glass of water, but it felt like he had vanished; as if the balcony was his portal to an invisible realm; a place from where he might view his entire life, or from where he might step onwards into heaven.

A woman in Arigna once told me of a deer that behaved like that in her front garden. The majestic stag, she said, was watching her. She moved her eye away to check that her daughter was safe and when her eye returned to the stag, it was gone. “He just disappeared,” she whispered.

It’s an endearing myth that a stag can appear and disappear, just as St Patrick could change himself into a deer in order to disappear from his enemies.

The prospect of a balcony in old age was always attractive to me, much like the gorse may have been to the patriarchal donkey. A place to rest and reflect on all that is here and now, before commencing the great journey into a metaphysical realm.

But I always imagined it would be an urban balcony with restaurants and coffee houses on the streets below and the honking of car horns in the wind. I never thought it would be a remote hill of rushes and gorse, with a view of a lake, and only the bees around me and the sound of a lonely tractor in the distant fields.