'I MUST INSIST THIS IS NOT A STALKING'

It started with a knock at the door. A journalist from one of the tabloids looked crestfallen when my husband answered. “Oh,” he said, “A kid out on the main road told me Colin Farrell lived here.”

Being relatively new to Irishtown ourselves, we were no help to the celebrity seeker, but his quest left me curious. I too had heard Colin Farrell had a house in the area. He’d been telling Hollywood reporters, with an almost boasting tone that suggested this was the place to buy and live in Dublin. Having bought there ourselves, I suddenly wanted to compare my lot to Colin’s. Sad, but true, and the sizing up only got worse.

Before this goes any further, I must insist this is not stalking. To be a stalker, you have to at least laid eyes on the person. At least once. I, on the other hand, have never so much as caught a glimpse of Colin Farrell. In fact, it’s through the other Farrell family members that I really keep apace of how things are going for him.

Soon after the knock at the door, I spotted something at the newsagents. It was a small piece on the front page, a photo of a sports car outside a familiar-looking bungalow. The newsagent and I swapped information and he told me this cottage, Colin’s cottage, was only a short detour on my way home. I took the time out and did a walk-by. Only the sports car set the house apart from the others on the street and it wasn’t there for long. Well, he hardly wanted a landmark parked outside for rubberneckers. Yes, like me.

Then, someone else told me Colin’s brother, Eamon, lived only up the road. I wasn’t even seeking this information, by the way, there’s plenty of Colin chat around here without me going looking for it. Initially, I was a bit disappointed with the brother’s set-up. You see, he wasn’t in Irishtown, but across the invisible border into rather more upmarket Sandymount. Worse, a friend lives on that self-same road and, worse again, her teenage daughter spotted Colin one night. And she wasn’t even watching out for him.

Once I’d taken stock of the brother’s set up, however, I noticed myself shifting focus. The fact is, it wasn’t out of any burning admiration or hopeless lust that I wanted to set eyes on Colin.

By no stretch of the imagination do I fancy the man, for reasons ranging from Cuban heels to wonky woolly hats, but I wanted to see what a film star looked like in a habitat I inhabit myself.

Would he stand out as special; would his clothes and car and basic carry-on set him apart from the rest of us? The word around Irishtown was that he fits right in. Drinkers in Clarke’s pub said he is always very friendly and even bought a round– again unsolicited chat, in the chemist of all places– and there was the rumour that when a local girl was celebrating her Special Olympics victory, Colin joined in.

All news was good news, but what I began to enjoy even more than word of Colin was keeping up with how the family was getting on.

I’m particularly attached to Colin’s mother, it has to be said. Obviously, I recognised Catherine Farrell from premiere photos with her famous son. Obviously, she doesn’t know me from Adam. Which also means she has no idea the delight I felt when she got a new sports car, proof, I decided, that Colin wasn’t all talk, he really loves and looks after his mammy.

I experienced absolutely sad gratification when I noticed her at my gym one day; I was chuffed to see her enjoying champagne and Dublin Bay Prawns (the kitchen don’t shell them for everyone) with Eamon at a local restaurant and don’t like to see her lugging too-heavy groceries at the supermarket. In the interests of avoiding stalker territory, be assured I refrain from peeping in the basket.

Recently, a newspaper ran photos of Colin Farrell in Dublin with a load of laundry. According to the caption, this was proof even movie stars bring their washing home to mammy. I nodded knowingly, aware that this was Eamon’s house he was entering and oddly unperturbed I had missed a chance to see the man himself.

It dawned that I didn’t really want to see him anymore, that I prefer observing the peripheries, the family of fame rather than fame itself. Where my nosiness once wished to root Farrell in my neighbourhood, he now seems as out of this world as Julia Roberts or George Clooney. People not like us. People who would never live in Irishtown. And as far as I can discern, he can keep Hollywood, the real fun is being had by the Farrells at home, fair play to them.