My Trip for Aunt Mary

Well friends,

Here we are again. This blog will be a bit longer than the others because I have a story to tell. Last Saturday, October 23rd I took a train to Westport, County Mayo. The trip was to commemorate a year of my Aunt Mary's passing. Before she died, she had made a request of me to someday go to Croagh Patrick Mountian in Ireland and bury a portion of her hair. She believed that Croagh Patrick was the peak where her father's spirit had ascended a few years prior. She wanted a piece of her to be with her father, so she had given me her hair and asked me to visit Croagh Patrick if I ever made it to Ireland. She died before she knew I was accepted to grad school out here, but I know she knows I'm here.

It was an honour to be able to go there within a year of her death, and it brought a huge element of closure. So, on Saturday I departed for Westport with my friend Courtney with the intention of climbing on Sunday. Here is a picture of the mountain from the train:

When Courtney and I arrived in Westport, we called a hostel to make sure we had a room available. We walked along the river that cuts through the middle of town and arrived at Abbeywood House Hostel. Here's a picture of the town and of the church close to where we were staying:

It was a gorgeous evening, and this was what we could see from the window in our room to prepare us for the next day:

After our 3.5 hour train ride, we freshened up at the hostel and went into town to grab some dinner. We had a gourmet meal at a place called MANGOS. Best seafood chowder I have ever had and then a steak with potatoes, and a raspberry remoulade with coffee. It was amazing. You could taste the love that went into making it, and it was the kind of meal you want to eat slowly because your tastebuds just need time to recognize what's going on. It only seemed fitting for Alison Krauss to be playing over the sound system.

We went to a pub called Matt Malloy's afterward (owned by the Matt Malloy from the Chieftains). Great comapny, great music, great craic.

As we walked back to the hostel, the stars came out to put us to sleep. And I just breathed as deeply as I could.

We woke up the next morning and checked out of the hostel. We quickly swallowed some OJ and coffee and departed for Croagh Patrick via taxi. Because we had never been to the west coast of Ireland, the taxi driver took us on the scenic route with no extra charge. We arrived at the mountain and I purchased two walking sticks for 4 euros, which proved to be the single greatest investment I've ever made. We stashed the rest of our stuff in a locker at the Visitor Centre at the base of the mountain and began the climb.

We were greeted by Mr. Saint Patrick himself. That's the peak behind him:

As you can see from the pictures, we couldn't have picked a better day to climb. I thank Aunt Mary for that. Crystal blue skies and a mild temperature.

The first leg of the mountain shocked my senses, and my muscles were going to get pissed off pretty quickly. This may surprise some of you, but I'm not a mountain climber. But if climbing this mountain wasn't a metaphor for life, then I don't know what is. Between the feelings of doubt, anger, fatigue and victory, I knew I had to keep climbing.

I climbed for Aunt Mary. I climbed because she wanted a piece of herself there.

I climbed because she couldn't.

Courtney stayed a good 5-15 feet ahead of me in the most reassuring of ways. It gave me a goal to the next spot. If I didn't have to catch up to her, I don't know if I would've kept going. We hadn't slept enough, we hadn't eaten anything, and we were climbing at a 60 degree angle most of the way...

About 70% of the way up, we got to the "First Station." There was a gorgeous view, and I thought it would be appropriate to bury some of her hair here, and then the rest of it at the peak.

The 1st Station is that large pile of rock with a plaque in it, and that's me after hiding her hair in the pile:

And here's her view from the First Station:

During the last 25% of the climb, my body and lungs had had enough. I wanted to cry and lay down and stop. A couple times I looked at the sky and yelled to Aunt Mary "Are you kidding me?! You couldn't have picked a smaller mountain?!"

But I didn't stop climbing. I was too close, and even though I couldn't see the peak from where I was at that point, I just kept repeating in my head '5 more minutes, 5 more minutes, 5 more minutes...'

We finally made it to the peak after a fairly treacherous climb:

It was pretty cold at the top, and Courtney and I refueled on some chocolate, fruit and nuts. We drank some water and I found where I wanted to spread the little amount of ashed I had of Aunt Mary's and bury the rest of her hair. There was a pile of rocks positioned behind St. Patrick's bed and the Second Station. It seemed this pile was the highest point on the peak, and that's where I thought she should be. The two pictures below have the pile of rocks from 2 angles. In the 2nd picture, it's the pile in the background and not the foreground.

And I wept. For so many reasons.

This is her view from her Pile on the peak. At one point there was a rainbow.

We started the descent after a while. Going up was hard? You have no idea what coming down was like. Our feet were tired at that point, our legs ached, and the footing of the mountain was more unstable on the way down. I slid at one point in a lunge position and bruised my leg and my pride a little bit. We finally reached a flatter area in the middle and continued down. Our bodies were running on chocolate and adrenaline at this point. One step at a time we made it down. It was sunny, crsip, and near perfect for a late-October day. Here's the shadow of the mountain on our way down:

When we finally reached the bottom, we were greeted with a locked door at the closed Visitor Centre. This was unfortunate since the rest of our clothes, wine, and supplies were locked in there. After a fruitless attempt at finding someone that could let us in, we walked into a packed pub that didn't take credit card. In the shuffle of frustration and exhaustion, we ended up sitting next to three strangers named Julian, Lynn, and Teddy. As Courtney and I got up to leave to figure out what to do, I mentioned our plight to our three stranger-friends. They immediately offered to help, and the five of us piled into the pick-up truck with their dog Denzel so that we could find an ATM to take out cash for dinner and lodging.

Turns out that the town that is at the base of the mountain doesn't have an ATM and no one takes credit/debit cards. So Teddy, Lynn, and Julian took us back to Westport. After making sure that we were okay and had our bearings, they took off and Courtney and I went into the first tavern we saw, bought some food, booked a room at the B&B upstairs, and showered.

We had to wake up the next morning, take a cab BACK to Croagh Patrick to retrieve our stuff from the locker, and then we got on a train back to Dublin. Over our 3.5 hour trip, Courtney and I split a bottle and a half of wine and had a great trip back. I will forever be grateful for the opportunity to be in this country and for the ability to climb a Mountain. I plan to visit Croagh Patrick and Aunt Mary in the Spring sometime around St. Patrick's Day. I'll need to bring a little Carolan's Irish Cream with small chocolate cups to share with people at the peak.

It just wouldn't feel right if I didn't....

Me and Courtney:

Tap Tap Tap

Hi friends,

The time in between blog posts is getting longer, but I wanted to check in and let you know that I'm still alive and well.

This past week I did some really great things. I went and saw a production called WERK at the Abbey Theatre, I took a tap dance class, I opened an Irish bank account, I got an Irish debit card, and I bought a new dress and boots!

Tomorrow I leave for Westport, Ireland clear on the other side of the country, but it's only 3.5 hours by train. Two friends and I are staying in a hostel tomorrow night and then we'll climb Croagh Patrick Mountain on Sunday to commemorate a year of Aunt Mary's passing. Weird, right? Time flies.

On another note, I spent the day by myself today. After a quick hour of class, I spent my time walking, shopping and sipping on hot chocolate at St. Stephen's Green in the drizzle. If you ever plan to come visit Ireland, go get some hot chocolate at Butler's Chocolates and then take a walk through St. Stephen's. It's divine.

That's all I have to share for today. I'll have plenty to talk about after my trip to Westport.

Thanks for reading!

WTF, mate?

Happy Wednesday Everyone!

This week I took my first class as a part of the Tae Kwon Do Society here at Trinity. It's been a while since I've been to a class, much less where one tells me to put on sparring pads and get into fighting position. It felt wonderful, actually. It was a beginners class so I ended up fighting with a lot of people that had great power, but no control. I got kicked in the back twice and once really hard on my right elbow. The other interesting thing is that you're allowed to punch AND kick to the head in this program (at my school, we didn't allow punching to the head, only kicking). The techniques were really different, and even the names of kicks varied, but that's because it's a slightly different style of martial art. I studied under the World Taekwondo Federation, or the WTF, and the classes I'm taking at Trinity are a part of the ITF, International Taekwondo Federation. Either way, I go back tonight for my second class, and I'm bringing the heat.

Did quite a bit of studying over the past several days, and I am enjoying my classes more and more. This week, we got to talk about Phenomenology in Theatre. Not only is it amazing theory, but it's also a blasty blast to say Phenomenology and Phenomenologists. It's almost as fun as saying Semiotics and Semioticians (both phenomenology and semiotics are theories of analysis in theatre, and it's been really awesome understanding this world).

My friend Moira and I performed our comedic writing yesterday, got some fantastic criticism, and we will continue to work it through. We also saw a bizarre children's production last night called Goodbye, Mr. Muffin. Spoiler Alert! Mr. Muffin is a guinea pig and he dies. The End. I sat there and watched this play, and I knew within the first 5 minutes that Mr. Muffin was a goner, but what struck me was that a play like this probably wouldn't be acceptable in the states. It was a VERY small scale 40 minute show with a guinea pig puppet and one guy telling this story and acting out Mr. Muffin. It never occurred to me to use theatre to teach children about death and dying in such a way. It was a wonderful concept, but I did feel it was a bit too dark to be called children's theatre.

Anywho, I must be off now. I have to open an Irish account. OH! And people out here don't call the Irish language "Gaelic." They call it Irish. In fact, it's almost a bit offensive to call it Gaelic. I thought that was interesting...

Love you all!

Aaaaaahhhhhhh......

I just thought I would check in today. Not too much going on, and classes are done for the week. I have quite a bit of reading to do over the next three days.

Today, Moira (a classmate) and I started writing a scene for a short story which we will present to our comedy instructor on Monday. I have a feeling it's comedic gold, and I could easily see it being turned into a youtube mini series. I'll keep you posted. It's a little deranged, but good comedy doesn't take place without a few risks, right?

Another beautiful day today. The campus square is magical, and I brought my laptop today so that I could sit outside and write. Blue skies and quickly moving clouds. Thinking about my family a lot this week. It's strange to know that it's already been 3 weeks since I've left, but on the other hand I feel as though I've been here half a year already.

I love you all, and hope you're well. In a couple weeks I'll be making a trip to Croagh Patrick Mountain on the west coast, so I should have much more adventure coming!

Much love.

Week Two/Week Three

I'm going into my third week of living here and my second week of classes. Once again it has been a beautiful day, and we had yet another wonderful Comedy class.

There is a ton of reading, a ton of analysis, and a ton of discussion in these classes. I quite like it. Discussion has always come easy for me (shocking, right.) I love this program because it comes with a whole different cast of characters and we're all going through the same workload and the same trials and tribulations.

Not too much has happened lately by way of adventure, other than the simple fact that I live in Dublin, Ireland. I am really starting to consider purchasing a bicycle though. It was be a much better investment than taking the bus everyday, though I am still eluded by which direction I can expect a car to drive from. The streets are very narrow here, so it would take a bit of practice to get used to it on a bike.

The interesting thing about Dublin is that while it's a city, it's really more like a large village. I have my local butcher that I go to, and the local pubs for the quiet communication. I walked the 3 miles from my Hall to Campus and it was a much less daunting walk than I had anticipated. All-in-all, I love it here, and its only going to get better.

Much Love.