Flew to Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic, the other day to see a former student and his family who relocated here this past summer.
I have slept well and eaten even better. Longer post soon, but for now, enjoy some Mikulas action!
An Angel and a Devil riding the Prague Metro.
Prague’s awesome Astronomical Clock. I want one.
Christmas markets in Prague.
Eatin’ some Trdelnik. You can really taste the cylindricalness!
Nothing says Christmas like some good old medieval torture!
When I first arrived in Dublin, I had nothing. Just a suitcase of clothes, a handful of books, and a laptop connecting me to back everything back in the states.
I had just moved out of my house of seven years. Packed everything up, sold some old bookcases and a decent couch, had a farewell party, and mentally started from scratch.
Needless to say, I was a bit emotional and discombobulated. I was in a foreign country, and needed a home.
For the first couple of weeks I lived in Dublin, Jack and Paddie gave me that home.
I had been inside “316” once before, after a wedding for Donal and Issy back in 2010. We ate and drank and sang songs late into the night. It was one of the best nights of my life, and I secretly hoped I would have the chance to experience something like it again.
Jack and Paddie are both retired educators, and had a spare room, and graciously offered to put me up until I found an apartment I liked. For nine nights or so, I ate with them, talked teaching with them, and stayed up very late drinking French wine and Guinness with them.
(Delicious AND affordable!)
Paddie offered up ideas about helping out in area schools, and Jack and I made vague plans to catch a Hurling match sometime in 2013. When I wasn’t apartment-hunting, or sometimes sleeping past breakfast (ahem…it uh…took me a while to adjust to the new time zone), I helped organize a garage and silently took notes while Jack prepared delicious dinners night after night.
Eventually I found a place near the university and moved in, but it was a bit of a disaster. I rushed into renting a place, and later discovered it was horribly damp. (It was a basement flat.)
Passports shouldn’t do this.
A month later I found a new place, so all’s well that ends well on that story.
But back to 316.
(That was what everyone called Jack and Paddie’s place. Homes often get names over here, I’ve noticed. One of the little things I love.)
I had wanted to take Jack and Paddie out for dinner some evening, as a thank you for everything they had done for me during my stay at 316. But they were busy, as it turned out they were in the process of selling their home of 31 years. It was time to pick up sticks and live in the country a bit.
And so I headed back to 316 for one more night of singing and farewells.
I’m not going to give you a blow-by-blow account of the evening, but it was quite wonderful, and I felt very lucky to have been there for the final gathering in their home. 316 had a long history of hosting extended visitors, and I was one in a long list of people who temporarily called it their home. Kind of like Sam Gamgee getting Ring-bearer status even though he had barely carried the thing.
Paddie gave me a big hug when I walked through the door, and soon I had a glass of wine in my hand. Many familiar faces from the last party were there, telling stories and laughing about the long history they had with 316. Jack worked his magic in the kitchen and piled food onto our plates.
And as the sky grew dark, everyone gathered in the front room for one more round of songs. I got to join in on the chorus of “Wild Mountain Thyme”, one of my favorites, and dug out John Prine’s “Paradise” again, at Donal’s urging. Guitar in hand, smiling and saying “I got your back on this.”
Lots of sweet, sad songs, and a meaningful goodbye to an important piece of many peoples’ lives.
I’ve started to think a lot about “what I learned” while I was over here. Sure, I learned the difference between semiotics and phenomenology, and read the complete works of Anton Chekhov, and I can now navigate the Dublin bus system like a pro. But really, I think, the most important thing I’ll take away from here is that there need to be places like 316 in peoples’ lives. A warm, inviting home that welcomes you with a big hug and leaves you with a full belly and an even fuller heart.
I used to love having parties, and hosting people in my home. But the place I have now is small and cramped and after a while I stopped inviting people over, and I also stopped wanting to invite people over.
My time spent in 316 woke something up in me. When it comes down to it, I think this whole trip has really been about me finally growing up and getting serious about life, and I would like nothing more than to one day have a place like Jack and Paddie’s. A home full of song and life and good friends and family sharing a few moments together. The light in the window for weary travelers. That would be a good life.
Farewell, 316. You belong to the ages now, but I won’t forget what I learned while I was there. And I’ll be back for that hurling match, Jack.
(Most of these photos were taken by my good friend, and very talented photographer, Elisa, and are used with her permission. Thanks, ‘Lis.)
A Prairie Home Companion, 1987
Sometime close to when I graduated high school, my Uncle Doug played me a tape of the final performance of Garrison Keillor’s public radio show A Prairie Home Companion, which currently broadcasts new episodes most Saturday evenings on WBEZ radio in Chicago.
Yep, you read that right. The final performance. And the show is still going strong.
How can a show that is still on the radio have a last show? And wait: wasn’t there also a movie about the “last” broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion?
Yep. I’ll explain all of that “last show” business in a minute. First, I need to tell yet another story about how much of a nerd I am.
While most of my friends were listening to Bon Jovi, Guns ‘n Roses, or the more alternative stuff like The Pixies (and eventually Nirvana and Pearl Jam), I went through a phase where I listened to that last show almost constantly. Filled with old folk and gospel tunes and goofy radio bits and Stevie Beck, the Queen of the Autoharp, and I couldn’t get enough of it. Like I said: I’m a real nerd like that.
There were other reasons I fell in love with that last show. I started listening to it less than two years after I had returned to Illinois, after living down in Florida for a few years. It was filled with this warm celebration of everything I loved about the Midwest. The dry humor, the lack of pretension, the simple directness and honesty of it. This is the last show, Keillor said, and we’re gonna spend the next two hours singing sweet sad songs about endings and goodbyes and no one can do anything about it. Heck, we’ll even go over the two hour time limit if we want!
Keillor likes endings. As do I. Endings are important, goodbyes are important. They put a proper punctuation mark onto an event. My folks got divorced around that time, and during my grief at the ending of what I knew of as family I romanticized small towns and Lutherans and tried so very, very hard to find meaning and comfort in my tape-of-a-tape copy of that last show.
Keillor delivering the News from Lake Wobegon in 2012.
I lost that copy of Uncle Doug’s tape of that final show a long time ago. but thanks to the miracle of the internet, found it on iTunes. And hearing “Brownie and Pete” after so many years just about wrecked me. (Yes, it’s sweet and sentimental, but it’s also got Chet Atkins and Leo Kottke playing on it, for crying out loud.) It’s so good to hear those songs again, and it takes me right back to the last time I was away from home, living in a foreign city, spending my days in class and my nights watching old black and white films by John Ford and Wim Wenders, wondering what I was going to do with my life.
Out you two pixies go, through the door or out the window!
It’s been a quiet week here in Dublin…
It got down below freezing for the first time last night here in Dublin. The roads were slick, and Linus took a bad tumble off his bike. On our last day of class, people were talking about Christmas, and our upcoming trip to London. I’ll be leaving a week from today for Prague, to see an old student and his family, and then I’ll wind my way through Europe and its many Christmas markets for one last tour until I join everyone on the Embankment sometime on the 13th.
Limelight’s getting ready to put on their yearly radio production of It’s a Wonderful Life, a show I directed and even performed in for a number of years. I’ve started listening to Vince Guaraldi and The Chieftains and The Waitresses, and that brutal version of “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” by Judy Garland, with the original lyric “someday soon, we’ll all be together/ if the Fates allow/ Until then, we’ll have to muddle through somehow…”.
I’m eating yet another meal made from packaged pasta, thanks to a refrigerator that died last Saturday. I’m looking over the last of my assignments, and hoping I have the drive to write a decent research paper, when all I want to do is tell stories on this thing.
I’m looking at an empty corner of my apartment and picturing a small tree that could have gone there. And I’m starting to think about home, and the Midwest, and my family and my friends. And I’m realizing that I miss it a great deal. When I got here, I tried to not think about home too much, lest I get too homesick. And I put it out of mind, in a sense. I lived my life here, and I tried not to look back.
Like Keillor, I ended my show, and I moved far away, looking for something different and exciting. And I have seen many things and enjoyed moments I couldn’t have if I was back in Oswego. And I know those will continue, in the years to come, as I return to visit and explore and catch up with dear friends. But now it’s time to head home, and get back to doing what I do best.
Keillor ended his show in his mid-40s, when he married a former exchange student from his high school and moved to Denmark to start a new life. He lived there for three years before returning home, divorced, but back on the air with a new, New York-based radio show called “The American Radio Company of the Air.”
Three years later he renamed it “A Prairie Home Companion” and moved it back to St. Paul, Minnesota. He knew what he did best.
Or, The Forgotten Penny
There’s this old Christopher Reeve film called Somewhere in Time. Overly-romantic thing about a playwright who travels back in time and falls in love with Jane Seymour. I watched it on cable a couple of times in the early 80s, because duh, it had Superman in it, and hey, time travel!
There’s no magic machine that gets him back to turn-of-the-century Mackinac Island, just positive thinking. He dresses himself in an old-timey suit, removes all traces of modern day from his hotel room, and wills himself back to the same hotel room in the year 1912. It’s a bit flimsy, in terms of science fiction, but really, how many time travel films are there that feel “realistic?”
So he falls in love with the beautiful lady, and despite a few dramatic obstacles, things are going pretty well for him. Towards the end, Jane Seymour playfully teases him for his “old-fashioned” suit (he didn’t get the fashion quite right, you see), and he’s bragging about how awesome it is, with all these cool pockets, and then BAM: he pulls out a 1979 penny, stares at it in horror and disbelief, and he’s immediately shocked back to the present. And as hard as he tries, he’s never able to will himself back to 1912. Game over.
Why am I talking about this decades-old time travel film, when I actually spent Friday watching a far superior (but no less romantic) time travel film?
Well, no matter how hard I try and ignore it, I have to acknowledge my own forgotten penny.
When I started putting this whole journey together, I knew it would be very expensive, and would require certain financial arrangements to be put into place, otherwise I would be drowning in student loan debt for the next ten years. So I took a gamble, hoping that I would get my mortgage refinanced, my car paid off, and I would have a decent raise waiting for me once I completed the new degree.
Even when I arrived here in July, I was already worried that I wouldn’t be able to pull this off. No one wanted to refi my mortgage, since it was so underwater. I had to rent my place out for significantly less than what I pay per month, and therefore had to sell my car in order to have enough money to make up for the difference. I thought about pulling the plug, but people urged me to stay, saying the usual business of “Live your dream!” “It’s ONLY money!” ‘You’ll regret it forever if you don’t do it!!!”
So I put that metaphorical penny in a side pocket, and I forgot about it, and I got on with my life over here. And I’m glad I did. The past five months have been an amazing, unforgettable experience, and I am glad that I went ahead and stayed.
But. The penny is still there, folks. And after crunching the numbers, and looking at what’s coming down the road, I am simply not going to have enough money to afford living over here for another semester. The “back home” account is vanishing fast, and the cost of paying for the whole degree is going to destroy me, financially. The first two segments in the repayment plan, the refi and the no-car-payment, are gone, and its looking like I’m going to have a significantly reduced raise. (I can’t really get into that, because it involves contract negotiations with my school board and my union, and this is not the place to discuss that.)
I don’t like talking about the specifics of the whole money thing, but whenever I talk about this with people, they go back to those default statements of “It’s only money, Brian, live the dream!!!” And I really don’t appreciate hearing that. I don’t think people quite realize the cost of this project, so let me put it to you like this: because I had to sell my car last summer, once I come home I’ll have to buy a new car. Obviously. So I’ll have a new monthly car payment for the next five years.
Now: to pay for this student loan, I’ll have to pay, per month, the equivalent of three more cars. For the next ten years. Let that sink in a bit. Three more car payments, for the next ten years, on a single teacher’s salary that isn’t going to be going up much over the next few years.
Now do you understand the seriousness of this a bit more?
The next reaction may be, “But Brian, what about the degree? Won’t this all be for nothing if you don’t get the degree?”
And this is where it gets interesting. Because the answer is No.
I already have a Master’s Degree. In terms of salary schedules and raises, that’s the main hurdle you need. After that, it’s just about credit hours. And regarding getting certified for teaching theatre, after this semester I’ll have enough credit hours to get my theatre endorsement. I don’t need any more classes after this.
Actually, what I need are additional certification classes that I need to take back home. At this point, spending the other two thirds of the student loan is just gravy. And here’s another thing: I took four courses this fall, and all that’s left are two more classes (Rehearsal Techniques, which I think I’ve got down, and another theory class that I can live without), and the big thesis (which I have absolutely no desire to write, to be perfectly honest.) And there’s no guarantee that the state of Illinois, or my school district is even going to accept all of these credit hours. They get funny when it comes to foreign credits.
This is starting to get complicated, and I’m sure some of you are skimming through some of this. So let me summarize by saying this: there are no real downsides to finishing after this semester, except for one that’s probably pretty obvious: I would be coming home early, and leaving the life I’ve been living over here behind. And I would have to say a very difficult good-bye to a wonderful group of friends.
But in the end, that was going to happen anyway. Whether it’s in July or May or the end of December, it’s gonna happen. I’m not going to spend the rest of my life living here. I suppose I had some vague and naive notions of carving out something more permanent here, but the simple facts are these: there aren’t any jobs over here, and I don’t think I really want to do that anyway.
I’m a Midwesterner, and I think I want to remain a Midwesterner. My family and my friends and my life are there. And my job is there. And it’s a job worth returning to, despite all of the stress and chaos that has enveloped it lately. I’m a teacher, and I’m anxious to get back to doing what I do best. And if I want to make a move to a different teaching position, I have to get moving on those other classes that I have to take back home.
So there it is. This is something that I’ve been pondering for a long time, so please don’t think this is a rash decision I’m making. I have looked at all sorts of different scenarios, but they all end up with the same conclusion: this adventure ends next month.
And I’m okay with it. It’s been an amazing and life-altering experience, living in Dublin these past months. I walked away from everything that I knew and I started over in a foreign land, taking the time to learn new ideas about theatre, and of course, I spent a lot of time with some amazing people. That’s easily been the best part about being here. And it makes me more than a bit sad to be leaving it all earlier than I expected.
But while it makes me sad, it doesn’t make me depressed, and that’s an important difference. Sure, I was pretty down in the dumps yesterday, as I came to this final decision after mentioning it my friends the other night, but today I woke up with a clear idea of what’s to come. I’ve been quietly putting some plans into place, and I’ll be fine. It’ll be a bit rough at times, since I won’t have a full-time job or a house to go back to for a bit, but I have a plan. And it’s time to get to work on the next great journey my life will be taking, and I am optimistic and excited about where it will take me.
To be continued…
And on Thor’s Day, we celebrated the First Thanksgiving.
Just imagine Issy sitting at the table instead of taking the picture.
There is no Thanksgiving in Ireland. Nor in most of Europe, from what I can gather. It is not a uniquely American holiday, but there is certainly something very American about Thanksgiving.
Its origins lie in that old chestnut about the Pilgrims and the Indians sitting down together to celebrate being best buds, but we all know that it’s a lot more complicated than that. But no one wants to dwell on the ill-treatment of the Native Americans by our ancestors, so….HEY! FOOTBALL!
We gather together to eat ourselves silly, collapse in front of the TV, then get up and do it all again a few hours later. (In my family, there can often be multiple celebrations to attend in a single day.) And the foods are these weird combination of things that shouldn’t be mixed together, but are, and are delicious. (I still don’t go near 24 Hour Salad, though.)
These are all the standard traditions and ideas of Thanksgiving that everyone mentions in Articles About Thanksgiving, so I won’t try to analyze it any more, because I’m trying to write something unique about the holiday. And this is the interesting part: I gathered together my Irish, English, and Italian gang of friends to celebrate a proper American Thanksgiving, hoping some new insight would be gleaned from their experience as First Timers, but it just confirmed everything that’s already been said about the holiday.
Eat too much? Check. Everyone brought food, and we tried a bit of everything during the three-course meal. (Well, except for the vegetarians.) They all had to go to work the next day, and everyone still seems to be stuffed from the night before, according to their Facebook status updates.
Marvel at the strange foods? Check. I made green bean casserole for them, which they found bizarre before even seeing it. When I took it out of the oven, I was puzzled by how runny it was, and then we realized that over here, their cream of mushroom soup cans aren’t condensed. So no proper thick, gooey, delicious casserole for us, but it was still somewhat edible.
The last of the sort-of Key Lime pie.
The foods I did get right were Grandma’s cranberry relish, which is served cold, as a nice palate-cleanser. I also made a variation on what we call an “Eagle Brand” pie, which is basically a Key Lime pie, made from graham cracker crust and condensed milk, but is also very, very delicious. And incredibly sweet. I think I gave everyone at the table diabetes last night.
It was all very typical, but at the same time it was one of the best Thanksgivings I’ve ever had. For my entire life, I’ve been an attendant at Thanksgiving, and the other big holiday gatherings like Christmas and Easter. I’m the Bachelor Uncle Guy with the Small Townhouse who doesn’t have to host, or make any food, doesn’t have any signature dishes, just bring a little wine, make a few jokes, then get cranky/lonely/sleepy. It can be rough for the personality when you’re a permanent guest at life’s major celebrations.
But thankfully, for once, last night, I was able to be the host. I got to invite people into my home, carve the turkey, pour the wine, and make the toast. This was Thanksgiving on my terms, and it was an incredible experience.
I don’t mean to come across as selfish or arrogant, mind you. (I’m looking at those previous sentences, with all of the “I”s and “my”s, like I’m a toddler who won’t let anyone else play with the blocks.) My students and actors may be used to seeing me as the Man with the Plan, but in the real world, more often than not I’m just shuffling along, riding in the passenger side of life. It’s what happens when you remain a single guy living within 25 miles of your hometown. You don’t get the chance to create your own traditions.
And so last night, we held the First Thanksgiving, in a small apartment just outside of Dublin. Linus and Arianna brought wine and starters, Elisa made two kinds of potatoes AND made the gravy AND helped me cook the turkey AND made French Onion dip, because she thought it would be something I would like. (No one’s heard of it over here, but Elisa grew up partly in Canada, so she’s able to tap into that North American cultural tradition thing better than the rest. Did I mention the cheesy potatoes?) Ken arrived on his magical transforming bicycle and made dream bars, and Donal and Issy honored the occasion by presenting me with a smallpox blanket and a bottle of whiskey. (It wouldn’t be an Irish Thanksgiving without them poking a little fun at the tragic legacy of the Native Americans.)
Smallpox blanket and whiskey!
I was short on cutlery, had barely enough wine glasses, no proper serving spoons, and we Frankensteined my dining table and my small desk together for the feasting. Linus sat in an office chair and questioned the thick slices of turkey I had carved. (Not sure if I carved them too thick, or if they carve turkey really thin over here.) And I played good American music like Wilco and June Carter Cash and John Prine.
Through the miracle of modern technology we were able to have my family “join us” from Sandwich for a few minutes, and my two worlds briefly became one. And while I haven’t talked about my family too much on this site, I hope they know that I missed them greatly, and I tried to honor them in my own small efforts, with relish and Eagle Brand pie. And I thought about them often.
But for now, I am here, and it is important to stay focused on the here, instead of the “back home.” I’ll be back there soon enough, but I need to enjoy every single moment I can of living in Ireland, because it ain’t gonna last forever. It’s been an incredible journey, in many ways, and for the experiences I’ve had, and the people I’ve shared them with, I am especially grateful on this Thanksgiving Day.
A few more photos…
Starters! i.e. appetizers.
A view from the other side: Mom and Grandma talking to us via Skype.
I have LEFTOVERS!
On Sun’s Day, it was the beginning of the end.
The semester ends in two weeks. November 30th is the last day of class, where I get to present a six-minute movement piece starring myself. Yesterday I finally got a clear idea of what to do with it, but it’s still been the assignment that I dread, and that I just want done. Hopefully it makes sense. There’s a nice bit of metatext (as we call it in the academic biz) where the piece’s theme is about a student pushing against the constraints of traditional schooling. Take that for what you will.
Today I did as I normally do on a Sunday: sleep late and read the news before getting on with my day. I usually buy a Sunday Observer and read that throughout the week, as I’m always being pulled back to my assignments. I think the quality of the newspapers is going to be one of the things I will miss the most, once I leave here. Ours have been gutted and trimmed back, but over here they’re still stuffed with great writing and lengthy articles.
And as usual, I had a hearty breakfast and helped further clog my arteries with Superquinn’s award-winning sausages. The eggs from Tesco come in this lovely bright green carton that I never get tired of seeing in my fridge. Seriously, how can you not enjoy looking at something like that? It’s almost a shame to crack ’em open.
Free-range eggs from Tesco’s, with mini-milk jug!
I cleaned up the place a bit, organizing some of the receipts and little bits that had collected on my desk and coffee table. I found my used train ticket from last month’s trip up north, and instead of throwing it away I tossed it into my desk. I can never throw away train tickets. If you’re lucky, the train ride itself can be as much fun as the place you’re traveling to, and it’s yet another one of those little objects that are unique to being “over here.” I miss having a car sometimes, but I never, ever get tired of taking a train somewhere, even if it’s just out to my friends’ place in the northern suburbs of Dublin.
I threw a load of laundry into my tiny washing machine and walked into the village to buy a few groceries. Talked to the butcher about a turkey breast for Thursday, and as I left the clerk, a young Polish girl, smiled and wished me a Happy Thanksgiving. It made me happier than I could properly describe.
The afternoon and early evening were spent writing another scene for a short play I’m writing for another class. While I grumble about the movement piece, and privately express some severe frustration with some of the other classes I’m taking, I’ve been rejuvenated by the one class I wasn’t expecting to take. (Remember, I’m auditing the course.) It probably helps that I’m not writing on a deadline, or that I’m trying to write for young actors. I’m free to put down whatever I want, and so far it’s going well. We’ll see where it winds up.
If my computer had eyes, it would see THIS for several hours every day.
Alright, so after reading this post, some of you may have wondered: who or what is a Haroosh?
Well, this is Haroosh.
Haroosh and an Apple Buddy
Haroosh belongs to Kyle, a former student of mine. He was a sort-of sidekick for Kyle, you see. Sat on his desk, listened to me read-aloud, went on aventures. He’s an example of what’s great about being a fifth grader: you’re starting to get a little older, but you still have enough of an imagination to create an entire life for a fake baby chick.
Haroosh was also around when Kyle ran the light board for a pair of shows I directed at his junior high. At the end of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, after everyone knew I was heading to Ireland for a year, Kyle presented Haroosh to me and said, “I think Haroosh should go with you and see the world.”
Now, some of you may read this and think, “Aww, how cute!” and leave it at that. Well, for me, it was a very solemn, serious moment. This was someone giving up their sidekick, their animal familiar, their trusted friend. Haroosh was an expression of Kyle, from a class that was particularly good at expressing themselves in unique ways. (See: Apple Buddies, above.)
And so Haroosh has come with me to Ireland, to see what I see.
Haroosh stares out the window of 316.
He’s mostly been cooped up in the places I’ve lived, but he should feel very privileged to have been a brief resident of 316 S. Circular Road. Our first home, and “a remarkable place altogether.”
Haroosh watches the 2012 Olympics
Before school started, we spent most of our free time watching the BBC coverage of the 2012 London Olympics. Haroosh was quite the fan of Jessica Ennis.
Haroosh and Squid Pig
Here Haroosh joins a couple of other items that came with: Max’s Viking mug that I got for Christmas last year, and Squid Pig, another pet from another student. Hope Madison reads this and knows that ole Squid Pig made the journey as well.
Haroosh and I enjoying a small rail museum in Dundalk.
And of course Haroosh came with when I headed up north to Carlingford last month.
Haroosh looking across Carlingford Lough to Northern Ireland.
I’m starting to plan another trip that I’ll be taking once classes end in a few weeks. The Masters students are all headed to London in mid-December to catch a bunch of plays, but I’m planning something extra as well (as long as the budget holds), and Haroosh shall hopefully be reunited with one of Kyle’s good friends from that class.
And when I finally head home, after this journey is done, I hope Haroosh finds his way back to Kyle. And I hope that Haroosh stays with him, sitting on his dresser or his desk, watching him do homework, or tucked away in his bag as Kyle grows up and heads off onto his own adventures. It’s important to have reminders of who we were when we were young, when the only thing that mattered in life was a few good friends and a big imagination. (Maybe that’s all that still matters?)
When we grow up, we put away childish things, and we get serious. But that can be so, so boring sometimes. Maybe that’s why I was so good at teaching 5th grade. I never forgot what it was like to be eleven.
And I hung on to the things that matter.
Doggy goes where I go.
The Lovely Bleakness
It was time to put the books away, to step away from the seminar room and the rehearsal room, and to see some new places.
It was time to get on a train and stare out the window and watch the world pass by. It was time to get lost in thought, and perhaps discover a new story or two along the way.
It was time to see mountains.
Last Tuesday I woke up early, loaded up my backpack, and headed for the train station. Bought a cheap ticket (thanks to my student discount!) and went north.
I ended up in a small town named Carlingford, located on a fjord right on the border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. I’m not going to take the time (for now) to explain the history and reasons why there is an “Ireland” and a “Northern” Ireland. But you need to be aware of the fact that they are two separate countries, and “regular” Ireland is NOT part of the U.K., while Northern Ireland is.
I may try to explain this in a future post, but for now I recommend heading over to my favorite travel blogger, The Everywhereist, and allow her to explain the difference.
Carlingford is named for the fjord (or inlet) the town sits on, and has something to do with Viking settlers. Going further back, it’s name in Irish was Cuan Snámh-Aighneach, Snámh-Aighneach or Cuan Cairlinne. (Don’t ask me to pronounce that.)
Viking mural next to the primary school in Carlingford.
But I’m not here for a history lesson. I’m here to talk about the joys of wandering, of traveling to unknown parts, of being completely alone and having that be the best thing in the world.
Sometimes.
When I’m working on a new play, I like to get away from familiar places, from my shelves of books and DVDs, from the usual streets and faces I see every day. And now that I “live” in Dublin, I had to get away from my small Blackrock apartment as well. There’s something about going to a new place, the way your mind drifts while you watch the landscape rush by while you’re on the train, that has always been very helpful for me as a writer.
Or it could just be that you have nothing else to do BUT write. Most of my really good ideas came to me while sitting (alone) at dinner, or in my Bed and Breakfast, after a day spent walking the town and the hills, or up the Slieve Foy as far as I could go in my non-waterproof sneakers. (Really wish I had packed the hiking boots, but they’re sitting in my parents’ basement at the moment.) Sometimes you have to get to a certain point of loneliness and/or boredom for the words to start flowing.
The Slieve Foy Mountain. Highest peak in Co. Lough.
And so after a couple of days in Carlingford, I had the outlines for not just one but two new plays. One’s a dark satire about marriage (I think), and another’s about a fifth grade music prodigy. And I think they share some of the same characters, and even some of the same events, but I haven’t gotten that far with them. Sometimes when you write, the story leads you into directions you didn’t expect, so we’ll see where these end up.
Came back to Dublin in time for a friend’s 40th birthday, and it was wonderful to be among good friends in my temporary home.
Take THAT, 40! (Photo blatantly stolen by me from Elisa’s Facebook page.)
And today I read the opening scene from that new play to our guest professor, and he thought it was great stuff.
Ahh! I almost forgot the best part! I made a video, kids! It’s a little travelogue of my trip to Carlingford and back. Check it out!
You can also see a lot more photos of Carlingford and the rest of my trip here. It’s a public Facebook album. Hopefully I did it right.
Four weeks of classes left.
It’s “Reading Week”, which means I’m off class all this week. And it’s pretty sweet. It’s a time to get caught up on assignments, review what’s been studied, and prepare for the final four weeks of class. That’s right. I’ll be more or less done with this semester on November 30th.
(There’s a huge paper that I have to do that’s worth 70% of my grade for this Research class, and we haven’t been given any information about it yet, but it’s not due until December 4th or something like that. So I’m not sweating it right now.)
And that’s not even including the stuff I have saved on my computer…
Today I pored through all my notes and readings for the Movement class, trying to make heads or tails of it. It’s all that dance theory stuff I complained about earlier, so I won’t bother repeating myself, since all I seem to be doing lately is fret about that class. We don’t meet again until November 12th, so I have a nice long break from having to swoop around and write my name in the air.
After doing that all day I decided I needed to get out of the apartment a bit and stretch my legs. I’m finally getting over this cold I had, so I actually tried to run for a bit. My lungs weren’t really interested in doing that for very long, but it’s more than I’ve done lately. I’m hoping I keep up with it and don’t get too bogged down with work in November. (Exercise relieves stress, kids!)
We’re deep into fall here, although most people would say that it’s actually winter that has settled in. The sky is overcast a good amount of the time, and it rains a lot, and….wait…that’s kind of like what fall was like. And summer was pretty wet as well. Okay, so it’s still wet and overcast all the time, but now the temperature has gone down, too!
Where during the summer it was usually in the high 60s and low 70s, and fall meant temps in the 50s, winter means low 40s/high 30s. And that seems to be the extent of it. I know it’ll get colder, but nothing like we have in Illinois. Snow is fairly non-existent. The leaves are turning, but not in that dramatic all-at-once brilliance you have back home. The leaves reluctantly change to a dull brown or yellow, and take their time falling onto the ground. We moved the clocks back yesterday, so it was getting pretty dark outside when I went for that sort-of-run around 4:30.
My suburban-Dublin neighborhood, but here it feels like it’s the middle of the country.
Because I’m off this week, and because I’ve lived very frugally during October, I’m going to treat myself with a little excursion to the northern part of Ireland. I’ll be back soon with a report from the borderlands between the Republic of Ireland, where I live, and Northern Ireland, which is a separate country still part of the United Kingdom.
Just a few pictures taken while I’ve been here. I haven’t taken the time to take the “good” camera out for some proper shots yet, and I haven’t really been in the country yet. Hope to change that soon.
That’s a LUAS train, part of Dublin’s public transport system. Apparently this one was booked out for a wedding party. (Look closely and you’ll see the “Just Married” up top.)
The harbor of Dun Laoghaire at sunset. This is about a 5-minute trip for me on the DART, another part of the public transport network. Not having a car has taught me all about buses and trains and light rails. And good places for a walk. The pier at Dun Laoghaire (Dun “Leery”, is how it’s pronounced) is an excellent place for an evening stroll in summertime. When it’s not raining.
This is taken on the way up Killiney Hill, in Dalkey, a bit more south of where I live. You can see the pier I mentioned: there are two, actually, and they make a sort of “C” shape. Dublin city is on the far side of the bay. I live just to the middle-left of the photo.
Bono apparently lives around here.
Looking south from the other side of Killiney Hill. Sun was in the wrong spot, and I was just using my phone, so it’s not the best photo. Still, it’s pretty amazing that you can be in the city going 15 minutes one way, and almost in the mountains going the same amount of time the other way.
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