Tractor run a hair’s breadth from raising €10,000

GRATEFUL ‘The Palliative Care team were so good to Maureen’

As Sean O’Reilly started off on his Route 66 tractor run the wind swept through his flowing locks and luxurious beard. It was a last hurrah for the magnificent mane that adorned the Lisduff man since 2019.

Sean organised the tractor run as a precursor to the head shave fundraiser in memory of Maureen, his beautiful wife who sadly passed away in 2019. The aforementioned locks were steadily growing since then. “I was overdue a haircut and I had to do something,” he said of his trimming. Over the course of Maureen’s fight she was under the care of the wonderful service provided by Cavan-Monaghan Palliative Care.

The family’s desire to give something back for all the support they received was the motivation behind the initiative.

“We wanted to do something because the Palliative Care team were so good to Maureen. I decided to grow the beard. With the Covid and everything the beard kept growing. A mate of mine in Bailieborough, Enda Healey, suggested we should do a bit of a tractor run before the head shave. We thought there would be three tractors doing the run, but it ended up with 60 tractors taking part on the day.”

Unbelievable

Sean said the gathering for the run was very heartening: “The turnout was unbelievable, we didn’t expect it. People kept coming and donating. Young fellows came in and the first thing they said was ‘Where do we donate?’ People give out about the youth of the country, but this shows what they are really like. They were brilliant young lads,” he told.

Sean undertook the run in his Fordson Major tractor, a vehicle he restored himself. He was a bit surprised by the response: “We didn’t advertise, we didn’t rattle buckets. Yet at the end of the day we raised €9,500.” That money goes to a very worthy cause: “Dr Wilhelm von Hornstein and Sinead Hoey the Clinical Nurse Specialist took great care of Maureen. They treated her like one of the family. You have to give some little thing back in life. When good people get together good things can get done.”

Sean said there was good fun when the moment of shearing came: “It was very funny, on the day I did the ‘shave and cut’, a man called to the house and asked if someone had been murdered, because there was hair everywhere,” Sean laughs.

The family presented the cheque for €9,500 to Cavan Monaghan Palliative Care Team recently.