Turn, Turn, Turn

Togadh in Meiricea mé, ach rugadh in Eireann mé.


I was raised in America, but I was born in Ireland.


It's Thursday afternoon in Galway, and I'm sitting in Café Luna--back where it all started, in my usual seat with the flowery pillows propped up beneath the small in my back--the same spot where I've spent countless afternoons pretending to write papers, picking at loaves of treacle raisin bread from the Oven Door Bakery, and drunk off the sound of the voices around me. Today, ABBA is playing on the radio and there is a toothless woman talking to herself in the booth directly next to mine. I am sipping tea out of a white mug. The wind is wailing outside, but the skies are clear; in typical Irish fashion, the weather today has already been sunny, rainy, cloudy, damp, and all of the above in simultaneity--and it's only 2 o'clock. I think that one of these days, the Irish will just abandon the idea of climate forecasting altogether; and in its place, will issue a nation-wide instruction to look out the damn window... and if it's not hailing bricks, to walk downtown for a few pints.


I've been struggling with how to write this last post for a while now. It seems to me that it should be perfect, that all the words should line up in flawless tick-tick-tick order and make sense of the wonder that this experience has been to me... but they can't, and it won't. Make sense, that is. There is no way to make sense of a time when your heart ka-BOOMS into something it has never been before; grows and grows until it is gigantically disproportionate to the rest of your body. There is no way for me to possibly explain the weightiness that is only just beginning to come in around the edges...or the fact that it's approximately 3 parts tragedy, and 5 parts soul-splitting happiness. No matter what way I look at it, though, the heartbreak and gratitude currently coexisting in the pit of my stomach have a common theme about them: they're reminding me that I don't want to leave. I'm not ready. I'm not ready. Hold the phone, pause, rewind, STOP--I'm not ready! I don't want to say goodbye.


The funny thing is, I remember saying the exact same thing to my mom the day before I left for Ireland... when that damn travel document hadn't come in the mail and I was fairly certain my first hour in Dublin would be spent babbling immigration officials into believing that I was not, in fact, an illegal refugee. I sat on her lap and cried, and cried, and cried because I was convinced that I wasn't prepared to come here--the truth is, I was scared to death. And now I'm here, I've been here for nearly five months--yet it has taken me this long to realize that I was ready. Every cell in my body was primed for this experience, and now it has happened and I'm left reeling with the massive significance of it all. So maybe it's the same this time too, and I'm ready as I'll ever be to leave Galway. Maybe we're never really ready to leave behind something that touches our souls so dizzyingly, so completely, the way this place has touched me.


With that in mind, seeing as I’m probably never going to be ready to leave, I might as well suck it up and do what I set out to do today. I want to say goodbye. Anyone who has spoken on the phone with me knows that I hate goodbyes—they’re a fact of life that I go to great lengths to avoid, because I can’t stand hearing the finality in that parting tone of voice, or reading into the nuance of vocal inflection and imperfection and how long is too long of a hug. Finality. I hate it. I buy temporary tattoos. I engage in some pretty serious delusion when it comes to dealing with the fact that there are some people who are smaller players in my life; whose chapters will be shorter. HOWEVER, this time around, there is a deeper part of me that knows—no matter how many people catch that brutal 3 a.m. bus to Dublin with their bags in tow—that I’m not saying goodbye to Galway for good, nor the people in it. It’s merely the end of this particular chapter—this unbelievable little chunk of time that has seen so much growth, and love, and change—and all melodrama aside, there is beauty in that. It deserves to be acknowledged.

So where to begin? The group room in the Newark airport, where we all sat munching on stale pretzels and secretly scanning the room to wonder which of these people, if any, would end up being our roommates. We were detached and auditioning each other for the role of new best friend, though we hardly knew it at the time. Dublin, and the first of many times that I would envision losing my fingers to frostbite: a mess of nametags and digestive biscuits, wide-eyed strangers eager to roam the streets and spend our first euro on overpriced Guinness and Jameson. Temple Bar: American music being played by Irish people. Fairy lights. Listening to Kevin play guitar in Erin and Ellie’s hotel room, Erin thinking that Shaun was one of our group leaders, sitting down to free meals that stretched over three hours. I remember. Everything since then has been so sped up; a lifecycle crammed into a matter of months. To say that we became fast friends would be almost comically modest, because it went way beyond that—it seemed like we bypassed the whole getting-to-know each other process and skipped straight to being siblings, filling in the blanks as we went along. The lives that we led before we got here became irrelevant; they were the lenses we brought to dinner table discussions, but less important than the new one we were developing together… the one we had in common, that only we could and can understand.

Okay, I’m realizing there’s absolutely no way to go about this without sounding like a gigantic cheeseball, so I’m just gonna go with it. Bear with me.

I wish I could say something to each and every person here. I wish I could put into words just how important they’ve been to me, every single one of them—even you, perpetually pissed-off Gort security guard—because when I look back on this experience, it’s been about the people. It’s interesting, but for all the time I spent alone here, for all the spiky confusions that I’ve worked through within the walls of my own mind…this has been the most social semester of my life. To the people I’ve met here: I treasure every minute we spent together, the inside jokes that belong only to us. Here goes.

Hannah was the first person I met, and I remember it clear as day because who else—when I’ve been travelling for hours upon hours and am wearing leggings TUCKED IN to my (probably mismatched) socks—would stop what she was doing and say “HI! I’m Hannah. I’ve been here for almost seven hours because my name was on the terrorist watch list, and they had to take me into a back room and look through my stuff. I guess they got me confused with someone else. Where are you from?” And if I thought that things were only going to get less hilarious from then on, I was wrong. Hannah is a gem. She went out of her way to include me, talk to me, and act like my oldest friend in the world…from the minute we were discussing her potential spot on the no-fly list, right up to this afternoon when she invited me to Dunnes. She has a signature knock on our door. She has a signature way of speaking (YES-uh!) and a signature style (God bless the headband). She always struck me as a confident person, taking to Ireland like a fish in water, unashamedly adopting the lingo and lifestyle with bravery that I can only hope to emulate one day—but now she’s independent too, comfortable being alone. In a group dynamic, she’s sassy. She’s full of life and genuine excitement about the world… she’s loyal, unafraid to be herself, and has always been on my side when I’ve needed her. Shify-Eye Pauly. I honestly don’t know what I would have done without her.

Erin was one of the people I met next, and I remember for many reasons: one, that HAIR. Two, she had a guitar—always a good sign—and she was carrying an amount of luggage that most families of four bring on a yearlong trip to the Himalayas. And the best part about it was…none of it had wheels. There was something comically brilliant about this girl, dragging her duffels along with the biggest smile on her face, that drew me in from the start. Erin is HILARIOUS. The amount of eccentricities we’ve picked up from her—“that’s not a thing,” cat blanket, “hate that”—means we’ll never forget her. I could never forget her anyhow. Erin has this deep, poetic soul—sensitive, sweet, and funny as hell. She’s somebody who, no matter if she saw you three minutes ago or three weeks ago, will envelop you in a gigantic bear hug and tell you how genuinely happy she is to see you. And she is. She’s someone who I feel like I could call up in the middle of the night, twenty years from now, and she’d open her door and act like no time has passed. Then there’s Ellie—“What’s. A. Fucking. Hypothesis.”—who besides being lovely and sweet, has a wicked sense of humor. I’ll never forget almost blowing off the bridge on the way to church, and wondering if this was God’s way of tsk-tsking us for losing track of time in our girl talk, chocolate cake, and Sunday morning coffee. The last “crazie,” of course, Shannon—the best theatre kid I’ve met in a long time—who I’ll always remember for her genuine heart and ability to crack up an entire group of people with a single comment. This girl is going to take the world by storm, you mark my words. They all will.

As for my roommates…lordy, I don’t even know where to start. Okay. I’ll start with the mushy stuff: there is no one, and I mean no one, that I would rather have lived with. Seriously. From the moment Maggie and I first thought Higgins was breaking in to kill us in our sleep—and he blushed that ridiculous beet red and scuttled off, texting the lads that they were “Living with two dolls. They just called security because they thought I was a burglar. Brilliant”—I knew I was going to love him. DJ Higgins, king of the washing-dishes boogie, whose one-liners manage to crack up an entire room…even without the slightest eye contact on the part of the speaker. Ferry, the other half of Figgins—whose love for the O.C. is acceptable, because he’s “ruggedly handsome”—who opened up his home to us in Gort an Choirce, always went out of his way to ask me how my day was, and who has forever engrained the word “wee” into my vocabulary. I will miss seeing him every day, drinking his (thousandth?) cup of tea and playing Pro-Evo… the best non-roommate roommate a girl could ever hope for. And Grubb. Oh, Grubby. What will I do without the Ginger Bear, sitting on the couch with a bag of crisps, always ready to deliver a wink and a ridiculous comment—usually in need of translation—or a song? “I WISH ALL THE LADIES…” Life will be so much less exciting without the constant wonder whether he will tumble into our room in the wee hours of the morning, and need to be dragged out by the hood of his sweatshirt. If there were medals given for the best belch—or at least an award for the look of pure delight on the belcher’s face post-delivery—than it belongs to Grubb, hands down. Owen, who has the most distinctive laugh—who has a talent for painting and doing his hair with meticulous precision—who has taught me there are few bad moods that an episode of Teen Mom (or when we’re feeling intelligent, True Blood) can’t cure. I’m pretty sure he has insulted me at least a dozen times, and I’m pretty sure I loved every single one of them. I will never again be able to listen to Metallica or Dire Straits without thinking, at least a little, that Owen is better at the guitar solos.

McGinley, someone whose presence I’m pretty certain I’m only going to appreciate—and therefore miss—more and more as time goes on. If it’s possible to be silly, witty, smart, thoughtful, and ridiculous at the same time…well, then, McGinley’s got it. On the one hand, he’s over-the-top hilarious (signature dance moves to “Ridin Solo”: CHECK); but on the other, he’s just a sweetheart. He cares deeply for people, and I consider myself lucky to have been one of them. It’s probably because I rescued his wallet from Tesco. Cliona, who I was always happy to be around; she’s mellow, fun, beautiful… but has a cheeky sense of humor to boot. And Cian, the man with the plan and the voice and the guitar—who gave Maggie and I personal concerts, and hands out compliments like it’s his job. Besides forcibly removing Hannah from the premises on multiple occasions, I’ve never seen him be anything but nice...crazy as a fruitcake, but nice. It's a musician thing. Cian is thoughtful, someone who takes time to process what you’re saying to him and to respond…and it never went unnoticed by me, just as I’m sure it won’t go unappreciated by the thousands of screaming female fans waiting in his musical future. MICKEY, aka Mr. Brightside, aka Firework. He wants to be American, but what he doesn’t realize is that he is already way cooler—funnier, sweeter, more able to quote Mean Girls at the drop of a hat—than any American could ever be. His laughter, especially when it snowballs out of control and the tears run down his face from the sheer joy of it all, has brought so much happiness into my life. If I ever need cheering up, I’ll look no further than the image of Mickey sprinting down Headford Road in the middle of the night, fireworks being set off in the Tesco parking lot as he face plants for the umpteenth time… or the time he and Cliona walked into our room, traffic cones on their heads, for no other reason except that it was Wednesday morning and time to start drinking again.

Shaun. The most American person I’ve ever met, and probably will ever meet. His Beetlejuice-like appearances in our living room—how did he do that, anyhow?—were always the highlight of our day. He “sprawled like small dragon.” He ate some “PHENOMENAL” mac-n-cheese and identified every single one of the jellybeans in our pack (“chocolate. PTEWWW.”) I don’t think anyone has ever made me laugh as hard as Shaun has. Except for maybe… Alyssa. Oh, that girl. How can I even start to describe her? She is Long Island with a capital L, hilarious and spunky and honest, and a true friend. Some of the best sentences I’ve heard in my entire life have come out of this girl’s mouth. She is—self-proclaimed—the most comfortable person to snuggle with, and has the most joyful smile in the world. And the best part is, it’s always there. I haven’t quite accepted the fact that I won’t be around her every day, won’t be able to call her up for a CUP OF CAWFEEE…but I’ll be seeing her again. Probably at camp. And Victoria—my fellow West-Coaster, easygoing and free, who has the best grunge Seattle dance I’ve seen this far away from home. I love that she knows everything about bartending, and that she shares my passion for Mexican food. She’s a strong woman, comfortable in her skin and in her environment, and I’ve learned a lot from her…especially if I ever get a DRAGON tattoo. Sorry, dragonFLY tattoo…on my lower back. Obviously.

Then over in Menlo territory: Nonie, beautiful on the inside and out. She is adorable, and her presence lights up the room—but there is also something else there, an honesty and a bravery, that makes her strong too. I hope one day I will see a Lane family portrait where a gaggle of beautiful blonde mini-Nonies are all smiling straight at the camera, their hands in her signature photo-pose. That would be a sight indeed. And Kerry: smart as a whip, completely unaware of just how gorgeous she is, and a hell of a dancer. There is so much soul to that girl; she just gets it. She’s grounded. She’s way cooler than Emma Watson. And—if she’s ever in Claremont—you can bet your ass we’ll hit the underground salsa scene with all we’ve got. There’s Kevin, who—despite his best effort to convince us otherwise—did find something here, and did get something out of it. He’s honest and committed to what he believes in, and I admire that. His guitar playing, especially when dressed in women’s clothing (Killary ’11: NEVER FORGET), will no doubt sweep the Providence music scene one day. I’ll never again see a white hat without doing a double take. And Jack—the American (or is he Irish?) who has to be one of the nicest people walking the planet…plus, by the scar on his chin, we all know he isn’t afraid to spill a little blood in the name of getting down to a Ke$ha song. I’ve never before referred to someone as being jolly, but if I were to start now… well, Jack is a jolly guy, and having him in the room can make all the difference in whether it is a good place or a great one. 

Chris, the “best platonic guy friend I’ve had in a long time”…who turned out to be not so platonic after all. I guess other people saw it coming. And maybe I did too, but didn’t want to recognize it—or something else less dramatic, less soap-opera sounding than that. I don’t know. I do know, though, that it’s always interesting when two people finally collide in a new color and the only thought present is why haven’t we been doing this the whole time? Who knows. Maybe in an alternate universe—one where we weren’t both emotionally bedraggled and obsessed with caring about nothing but our own agendas—we would have. It’s a dangerous game to play, visualizing the might-have-been. But when it’s said and done, what could have been better than the walks home in the middle of the night, pints of Ben & Jerry’s, pointless squabbles and inside jokes and countless conversations on the stairs? I wouldn’t change a thing. My only regret is not realizing it sooner.

And finally, Maggie. My roommate, my sister, my friend. Maggie. There’s nothing I can say that will make it any easier to say goodbye, or to do justice to how much she has meant to me—how much I have learned from her, and more importantly, seen her learn from Ireland. When we got here, I was awed by her devotion and strength, and the fact that she is one hundred percent herself—but over the course of these months, I’ve seen her blossom into someone who is relaxed as well, bursting at the seams with happiness and confidence. The only changes that I’ve seen this girl make have been positive ones. Thank you, Ireland, for taking such good care of someone that I truly love—for filling her with all your wonder, for healing her heart and for setting it free. She has shown me true friendship, and I’ve learned something from her every single day that we spent in our little room with the ensuite-bathroom, yellow flowers in the window, music (probably B*Witched) playing as we mindlessly chat (probably via Facebook) about the lifesaving powers of chocolate. I will never forget Maggie.

So there you have it. For me, Galway is Renzo afternoons, walks along the Salthill promenade with shamelessly sad music in my head, Elliot Smith and Alexi Murdoch, and not feeling sad at all. It’s the eye mural and the Hole in the Wall (which, bless its soul, will never have toilet paper.) It’s Fred, the unofficial mascot of Gort na Coiribe. It’s the Roisin around midnight, pints of Bavaria because it’s cheapest, and packages of chips from Vinnie’s or Charcoal Grill afterward. It’s the Crane Bar, with an elderly couple dancing at half twelve—the husband leaning against the bar to stay upright—and a hugely pregnant woman walking past, the man next to me shaking his head and telling me “Jaysus, that’s Ireland in a nutshell if I ever saw it.” It’s NUIG and the fact that none of the seats in the lecture halls are spaced exactly right, so you’re either sitting on the edge of your seat or all the way back in it, unable to reach your paper. It’s Smokey’s and Yorkie chocolate bars—we ate them just because they say “not for girls” on the wrapper. It’s the self-checkout at Tesco. It’s the roundabout on the way back to Gort, and the fact that there is no logical place to cross the street. It’s the cotton-ball clouds that roll in around 8 p.m., when it’s still bright, and the field on the walk from college that looks lit from the inside out. It’s the buskers on Shop Street in the middle of a Saturday, and the old men who sit outside Murphy’s with their eyes squinted against the sun: watching, but never saying anything.

Ireland by the Numbers

1: the number of times I loaned someone a copy of my David Sedaris. I gave him my attention, too, but I think he only wanted the book. He returned both slightly worse for wear, but with plenty of notes in the margins.

2: the number of times I have puked after drinking too much.

3: the number of times I desperately wanted to puke after drinking too much.

4: the number of times I went in the freezing Irish water. (Multiply by ten and you have the number of times I seriously questioned my sanity for doing so.)

5: the number of times I went to Writer’s Society meetings, and felt like I’d wandered into an incredibly eloquent (and well-read) dream.

INFINITE: the number of days that I will spend thinking of Galway, missing it, and being grateful for all it has given me. There are things that I miss about California—my family, the hot water, basic hygiene perhaps—but none of them outweigh the fact that is lodged in the pit of my stomach, and will be for a long time to come: I’m not ready to leave. I don’t think I’ll ever be. Everything turns, but not everything ends. This love won’t end.

Who knew that there were this many pieces to a heart? I’ve left a piece of mine in every fiber of this place, and in turn, I feel as though Ireland is in every bit of me. It has soaked into my core, shaken me at my very roots, and taught me how to live. I will never lose you, Ireland. I’ll be back. And when I do… well, I will be coming home.

Oh come ye back, my own true love

And stay a while with me.

If I had a friend

All on this earth

You’ve been a friend to me.

Seasonal Allergies. (Adaptwitterpatations)

I'm sitting on my bed, reading Joyce's Dubliners and feeling sore all over like I just ran 10 miles. Clearly, I didn't. And clearly, I can't be taking my venture into The Dead all that seriously if I'm choosing instead to embark upon a pointless, and possibly incomprehensible blog entry--in between looking at Facebook profiles of people I haven't spoken to in at least four years, obviously--and contemplating how much time is TOO much time to go without washing my sheets. Yes, in terms of laundry, I am at ground zero. I almost bought a five pack of granny panties in Dunnes today, just to prolong the emotional trauma of the Gort laundry facility by that much longer.

Am I lazy?

Yes. And I am in denial. The amount of mornings that I have left in Galway, my home, can almost be counted on two hands. I'll be like one of those toddlers who, when asked what birthday they are having, hold up 3 or 4 wonky fingers and give a sheepish grin--only the question will be, how many more days? And I'll hold up a cluster of Mondays and Tuesdays. I'm having trouble doing normal-person things like laundry or grocery shopping, because the stretch of time that needs to be covered by these basic rites of sanity is compressed; I can feel it closing in on me. My brain has already started to adapt to the thought of putting things into suitcases, of the delicious parting one-liners that I will deliver to the people who have rattled my cage--and even the ones who haven't. My sense of self has begun to adapt, just as it did when I was dreaming of coming here, to allow me to accept the fact that I'm leaving. Soon. Ten fingers and three toes.

So what am I focusing on, you might ask? Well, the bigger part of me has launched into seeing-people-mode, appreciating the little things, and soaking up as much of Galway life as I possibly can. It's not all that melancholy, either, because there is still so much standing between now and when I pack up; Tuesday sessions at the Crane, walks along the Salthill prom, afternoons in Renzo drinking tea, late night HBO with my roommates. I feel overwhelmed with gratitude for the entirety of my life here, right down to the battery-challenged lock on our door and the everpresent stickiness of our kitchen floor. However. There is a smaller part of me, a part that I'm not too proud of, that did her best to be miserable for nearly a week straight... that week being last week. The week my dad was here. Unfortunate timing? Yes. Unavoidable? Probably not. Necessary? I think so.


Abstract: She stick her toes in sanity, just in time to say goodbye to the cold Irish sea.


Chapter One: Angsty Pants 
So here's how it went down. Everything happens for a reason, right? There is some sort of cosmic soup cooking up our emotional setpoints at any given moment, and sometimes these ups-and-downs rear their ugly heads at particularly inopportune times. When my dad arrived in Galway, I had already been flirting with disaster; maybe it was the fact that every single one of my friends was out traveling the globe and/or home for Easter, but I was in a mood. It got worse the second day he was here; I dragged my toes around like a petulant teenager, responding with an "I don't knoooooooww" worthy of Dawson's Creek to every question he asked. By the third day, my bad attitude extended beyond daytime television, and I began a stunning rendition of a girl who has been possessed by the devil. Truly. Everything we did was wrongboringIdon'tcareI'mboredI'mtiredleavemealone. Why? Why why why? 

I don't know. When I look back at it now, I just feel like I had dug myself into a hole of bad attitude--everything became colored by it, and try as I might, I couldn't break out of it. However, as quickly as it came on, it passed. And I truly believe that it did happen for a reason, because having my dad here while I was going through it--being around someone who loves me so unconditionally, no matter how many times I roll my eyes or chew with my mouth open or complain about my hair--allowed me to emerge stronger on the other side. Having him here was the first test of whether or not I'm going to be able to bridge my worlds together; the one of my youth, my home, and the independent forcefield I've created around myself in Ireland. It's tough. Negotiating childhood and adulthood will always be tough. Maybe I needed my dad here, the person in my life whom I've always seen as invincible--timeless, immortal--to realize that this needed to be done. I hadn't thought of it before, but it had been a long time since I'd had someone here to be completely comfortable around; to release some of the energy I've been harboring between the lines of airline tickets, pub crawls, and adventure. I'm still me, I'm still going through something. I'm growing up, and it feels like hell most of the time. However, once I was able to realize that the only person standing in my way was me--that the second I wanted to get over myself and have a good time, I was capable of doing so--it felt like something unclamped from my heart, and it released a flood of good feeling.

So, with that out of the way, there was nothing left to do but enjoy each other's company and the beauty of Ireland in the spring. The weather was perfection, except the one day we went to Inis Mór, the largest of the Aran Islands; it was spitting and cloudy, but in a way, completely appropriate for the wildness of Dún Aonghasa and the Black Fort. At the end of his visit, we took the bus to Cork and stayed in a tiny B&B, explored the streets and listened to the sounds of Elly O'Keeffe--a singer songwriter who, if I were so pretentious as to say "is going to hit it big," is going to hit it big; we ate hippie food and talked endlessly...and didn't talk sometimes, which is okay too. We also scoured Galway in search of the best music, Guinness, and pancakes, and were successful on all fronts. I loved having him here. I wanted to show him off, I wanted people to know that we have the same blood running through us; the stuff that propels us to love wordplay (example: Papa-san in the árasán, aka "Dad in the house"--which was the only productive thing to come from the 3 hour 15 minute bus ride to Cork, 3 hours and 12 minutes of which was spent thinking of creative ways I could ask the bus driver to make a pit stop without revealing the fact that I was that blockhead who forgot to pee before boarding). Dad and I are peas in a pod, and I take the fact that we drive each other absolutely bonkers to be indicative of the fact that we have even more in common than we are able to realize. I saw the look on his face the first time we entered Tig Coili and there was the usual smattering of instruments, overly sociable Irish mothers, toothless bartenders, and babies bouncing on their fathers' knees. There is nothing so familiar than that scene; that baby was me, and that long-haired father holding her like she was pure gold...that was my Papa-bear. Still is.


Chapter Two: Gesundheit.
So yes, the absence of my friends made Gort na Coiribe feel like a ghost town last week, but there was something else contributing to my muddy mood. That something was standing on every single corner--holding hands, sucking face, and just being an all-around pain in the ass. That something was love, and it    was pissing me off like no other.

I'm a hopeless romantic. There are no two ways around that fact. I still think that the day will come when someone will treat me the way that two solid decades of Nicholas Sparks novels have convinced me is possible; however, this is an era of my life remarkably absent of romance, and the result has got me jaded as hell. Normally I am quite tolerant--there have even been times when my friends' descriptions of their relationships have made me feel happy for them, not miserable. This being said, there are times when it is easy to walk down the street and feel infinite happiness for the couples holding hands, and other times when it feels like one gigantic game of pin-the-tail-on-the-single-person. It sucks. And this time of year, ho boy--it's spring. That means people are in looooove and they aren't afraid to show it. For some reason, I got it into my head that I wanted whatever it was that they--the Other--had; I wanted to see what they saw in those prolonged gazes into each others' eyes. Mostly, I've forgotten what it feels like when someone looks at me that way. The truth is, though, I'm just severely allergic to couples right now... it's not their fault. They shouldn't be punished, even if the urge to throw spitballs at the backs of their color-coordinated jackets is sometimes unbearably tempting. I told this to my dad, and his eyes widened like I'd just informed him of my secret desire to pluck the wings off of flies and feed them to my pet boa constrictor named Satan. Really I'm not harboring psychopathic tendencies. I'm just a girl who has recently had her heart broken, and there are some things that even time can't make less electrically painful.

But the seasons do change. A heartbeat ago, it was winter and I was sleeping in three layers of fleece every night; now it's springtime, and the couples are popping up faster than the daffodils. They'll be gone again soon, in any case--right now their presence is making my nose run, but no matter. I carry kleenex around with me just in case, and eagerly await the day when they make an over-the-counter drug for the slow burn of seasonal lovesickness.

Chapter Three: Mo Chéad Searc
I've been trying to think of the right thing to say here for a while now, but my brain is mush. In the day or so that I've been contemplating what I wanted to write in this blog entry, things have flip-flopped and looped in ways that even my delusional imagination could not possibly have conceived of. I've contemplated leaving it here, at that--a little romp through my emotional gymnastics of the past week or so, a fantastic visit with Dad, coming to terms with the end of my experience in Ireland, spring fever--but there's something else on my mind, and I've decided it needs to be said. This might be the only place I ever get to acknowledge it.

Something has changed within me. I felt it last week when I was finally able to pull my head out of my own butt, and snap out of my crappy mood--as soon as I realized I could do it all by myself, there was nothing holding me back. As has been happening since I arrived here, I came face-to-face with a few of the emotional paralyses surrounding my ability to move forward; only this time, I finally bid some of them goodbye... for good. There was freedom, truth in that.
So here's what happened next. When I woke up this morning, I was met with an email from Jeremy that effectively destroyed the little blossom of friendship that I have been turning myself inside out to nurture for the past five months. It was unfeeling, unwarranted, and unlike anything I've been met with before; it was cruel. I expect I'll have nicer letters to look forward to from my stock broker. So I looked at it over and over again, turning the words around in my head until they lost all meaning..... and then it just clicked. There's more to life than this. 
Somewhere between the hills of Donegal and the waters of the Blue Grotto, I have found respect for myself, and it has colored my whole world with a different hue. It has allowed me, when confronted with something that hurts more than I can possibly explain, to calmly place my computer underneath my desk, grab my keys, and walk outside. If I leave Ireland next week with nothing else to show for myself than a scar on my back from the fireplace, an empty wallet, and this--this feeling that there is something out there for me, something still to be found from no one other than myself--than I will consider it time well spent. It has already been time well spent.

Epilogue
My dad forgot to give me back my adapter, so I bought a new one from the electric shop, chatting with the cashier for an amount of time that only the Irish would consider to be normal. The same day, I also bought a red dress and got a haircut that--while bearing an unfortunate resemblance to Dorothy Hamill--feels light and easy. I'm sucking the poison from my life. When I got home, I plugged in my new adapter, and imagined that I could see the electrical currents moving this way and that in a desperate attempt to decipher their sudden intersection of voltages. I imagine it is quite the relief when they meet the little white box at the middle, three-pronged and confident, that unscrambles them--allowing them to travel, unchecked, toward the little green light at the base of things.

Malteasing

If you knew the inordinate amount of time that I've spent juggling puns for the title of this blog entry, you'd be seriously ashamed; however, being my father's daughter and all, I'm not ashamed in the slightest. In fact, I told Maggie that I was "punny"--this was at 2:45 a.m. on the bus to Dublin, to take the plane to Malta, to begin the first leg of our European adventure--and she laughed. Then again, most people would have laughed, it was the middle of the freaking night. When you're on 2 hours of sleep, a garbage disposal would be hilarious.

It's been over a week since our Maltese excursion, and already the details of it are beginning to fade....like it was a dream, someone else's very vivid dream, and I got to borrow it for a while. It all happened so fast. One day in March, Maggie texted me: "any interest in going to Malta?"--this being before, of course, either of us had the foggiest idea where Malta was. Somewhere near Italy? Where all those fluffy white dogs come from? And what, exactly, is a Maltese falcon? Will we meet Gregory Peck?

These were the questions running through our mind... that, and how to navigate the labyrinthine Ryanair website. It wasn't until we had bought tickets for Malta (and its neighbor, Sicily) that we realized we were heading approximately 685 miles from Libya...oops. Plot spoiler: everything turned out to be just fine. Truly. We were all a little nervous once we found out the proximity, and cursed ourselves for having slept through elementary geography back in 5th grade--Alyssa bit her nails down to the quick, for the first (but NOT the last) time--and kept our eyes peeled for any hint of travel warning. But none came, and , the wee hours of April 12 rolled around and we found ourselves on the bus to Dublin...passports, sunscreen, and optimism in hand.

I say that we "found" ourselves on the bus, because you have to understand--there wasn't a single moment on the entire trip that I felt anything less than awed by my location in space and reality. When we stepped off the airplane and into the dry Maltese air, I put on sunglasses. For the first time in 5 months. There were palm trees and clouds speckling our sight line, and I simply couldn't believe--still can't--that I could possibly be lucky enough to be there. It never proved to be a bad thing, this weird dreamlike state... it just made the scenery seem that much more colorful, that much more like a gift. It means my feet never quite touched the ground. I doubled the amount of countries that I've been to in one week--what kind of lucky duck gets to say that?

I do, apparently. And there wasn't a dull moment on the entire trip... seriously. Both good and bad, it was unforgettable. I should have known as soon as the bus pulled up to the airport stop, because the words "no risk, no fun!" were printed above the bus entrance, which--surprise!--had no door, directly next to a crinkled photo of Jesus Christ and a pink Playboy bunny sticker. All the essentials, I guess. We bounced and bumped our way from the airport to Valletta, Malta's most popular and historic city; and despite our giant backpacks and delirium, walked around for at least three hours. Right as we entered the gate, we passed by Libyan Airlines-- enclosed behind a metal grate and a layer of filth. Someone had thrown a fistful of black paint at one of the windows, which were almost too cloudy for us to see the creepy man staring out at us as we took pictures... almost. He gave us an unmistakable look of strike one, tourists: put your damn cameras AWAY and get a grip. So we did. Or at least, we got the hell away from there, and started speaking Irish as much as possible to avoid seeming so blatantly American. Ni thuigim. If anyone there could understand us, we would have looked like complete idiots, piecing together our spotty Irish into interactions like "What's your name?" "America. Where is the bathroom? I like studying." "I live in Ireland now. It's sunny today! Thanks be to God." "Really? I have five sisters."

An-mhaith. Next stop on the tour was to sample the local cuisine; because in case I forgot to mention, this excursion was as much of a Food Tour than anything else. I am simultaneously disgusted by and proud of the amount we ate, but at least we attempted to eat our way through the week with the utmost respect for Maltese and Italian traditional fare--which we soon found out, involves a whole lot of rabbit and bean paste. Fortunately, we managed to avoid those two for the most part, and instead focused our energies on eating more Pastizzi than humanly possible. Oh, pastizzi. They are these lovely pea/ricotta-filled pastries, usually running at about 30 cents apiece--meaning that we justified eating a half dozen at a time on the grounds of being economical. Eh, whatcha gonna do. We ate our first round with ice-cold cokes and sat on the wall by Victoria Gate, looking over the harbor where The Count of Monte Cristo was filmed. Sooo cool.

Now, this was the initial point that I remember Alyssa's Long Island flag start waving itself; she sprawled herself out on the stone wall, chattering about Batmitzvahs and mani-pedis, and proceeded to "catch some rays." This girl is absolutely the most hilarious, and slightly travel-illiterate, person I have ever met. Whenever we stopped for more than thirty seconds at a time, she would literally roll up her sleeves and shirt and pop her face up to the sun--this girl will stop at NOTHING to get a tan. Sitting out over the water that day, she could not have been funnier. At one point, lounging back on her backpack with her eyes closed, she let out a throaty "helloooooooo sunshine" to the world. Only, it happened to be right as a fortysomething man was walking past....and he proceeded to lean into Maggie and ask, slightly frightened, "was she talking to me?"

Hahahahahaha. Oh, Alyssa. I don't think anything I could write here would do justice to how hilarious that girl was during our trip--or the fact that, at multiple points, I wasn't sure whether I wanted to whoop her upside the head or adopt her. A little of both, I think. Traveling with others is such a tricky thing--I don't think I ever fully realized that until now. My Ireland family has become just that: family. We have a beautifully contradictory relationship, where we simultaneously drive each other nuts and know that we can never again be without one other. We've interrupted each other's mindsets; we've adopted facial expressions, turns of phrase, habits. Alyssa has gotten us all to start playing with our hair on a regular basis. I know I'm doing that prematurely nostalgic thing again, oy vey... but I can't help it. It's important to explaining my experience this past week, because these people mean more to me than I can possibly explain.

Alrighty, back to the action. Our hostel, Shamrock Apartments, was in Bugibba--a beach-bummy little town about 40 minutes away by Maltese bus. We had a helluva time finding it, but it was well worth it: clean, spacious, and only 6 euro per night. There's something a little bit screwy about expenses in Malta--for example, where else in the world does it cost more to buy an ashtray than it does to sleep for the night? Furthermore, where on earth is it less expensive to drink alcohol than water?! Holy moly. We stocked up on bottled water from the wee shop near the apartments, but during our nights out in St. Julian's/Paceville--the nightlife capital of the island--we didn't buy a single drink. Club promoters hand you tickets for free cocktails as you walk into the club; no limit to how many. It's hilarious, because we--being who we are--scarcely took advantage of this. Ultimately, drinking only would have slowed us down in our mission to eat twelve meals per day. We bounced around the clubs a little bit, amazed at the fact that we were the only Americans there... but unanimously decided that the best moment of all was when we walked into a club that was completely empty, and had the dancefloor to ourselves. We jogged laps around a Maltese nightclub. I'll never forget that.

During the daytime, we saw the sights: Wednesday we took the bus to Wied iz-Zurrieq and the famous Blue Grotto, which looks exactly like it sounds. It was my first real taste of what I've always pictured the Mediterranean to look like: white stone walls, yellow flowers, blue upon blue upon blue water. We paid 7 euro to take a little motorboat on a tour of the most famous caves in the grotto; not imagining that, like the Maltese buses, our chances of survival were about 50/50. We literally hit the waves at the absolutely WORST angle that it is possible for a dinghy to hit waves, and each time, caught about four feet of air. There was a tourist couple perched on the bench in front of ours, neither of whom spoke English--or common sense, apparently, as the husband neglected to move over to the right side of the boat to balance out the weight, despite our sweeping hand gestures to that effect, and we nearly capsized. Like, reallyreally nearly. It was completely worth it, though, even though Alyssa turned an impressive shade of green and looked like she had decided it simply wasn't worth it to go on, no cave could be that beautiful. But it was. The grotto was ancient and creepy and breathtaking, and we celebrated it--and our survival--afterward over Maltese bread, butter, and Cisk lager (the local brew) in a rooftop café. After that, we took a cab to Marsaxlokk, a fishing village in the southwest part of the island. It's famous for its colored boats, and now I know why--they are one of the most astounding things I've ever seen. It is like a giant watercolor crayola set emptied out over the entire harbor, and is just sitting there bobbing in the perfect aquamarine sea. There was a market selling fresh honey, prickly-pear jelly, limoncello, nougat, trinkets, you name it--and we strolled up and down for hours. I got horrifically sunburnt, but wore it as a victory badge: this certainly wasn't Ireland. If I ever go back to Malta, which I certainly hope I do, Marsaxlokk will be the first place I go... I feel like my concept of vivid hues has been peeled away and replaced with a newer, technicolor version.

The next day, we visited the "Silent City" of Mdina: which we all read about at one point or another, either on Wikipedia or in a guidebook, and all promptly forgot minutes later. All I remember is that the island's locus was shifted to Mdina at one point, and infrastructure was built around it; and that we were told there would be no cars allowed, it was perfectly preserved in silence. Obviously, we swallowed it hook-line-and-sinker, and along with the zillion other tracksuited tourists there that day, took pictures next to the Dungeons! Knights! Glass-blowers, oh my! and were seriously disappointed by the amount of white noise in the so-called "silent" city. There was a whole mess of cars there, right next to the women in Medieval costume begging us to take the authentic Maltese train. We opted for chocolate cake instead, which was highly recommended on one of the "Best things to do in Malta" lists that Maggie printed out--and boy, am I glad we did. We had a panoramic view of the entire countryside, and it was breathtaking. We left Mdina to go to Ta'Qali craft village, walking through wildflowers and countless rows of grapevines along the way. We perused ceramics and glass and the most gorgeous silver filigree I've ever seen, and then when our pockets were significantly lighter, took the bus back to Bugibba and--you guessed it--ate some more.

Without a doubt, Malta was one of the most incredible places I've ever been--if not the most. It's a tough call, because the beauty of Ireland blows my mind on a daily basis... but this was a whole different breed of gorgeous. It was sun, stone, and history. Instead of endless expanses of green, it was turquoise.

Somewhere in the middle of the night--we're fans of the weirdo flights, it would seem--we hopped on a 5 euro plane ride to Trapani, Sicily. Now, let it be said that Sicily was the point when our trip started to get a little less Disney movie, and a little more Marx brothers: In the 28 or so hours that we were there, we managed to exploit just about every opportunity for comical misunderstanding. It was one long culture clash, and I loved it. It began the second we stepped off the tarmac, and realized that--though we had an address for our B&B--we had no idea how to get there. It also occurred to us at this (very late stage in the game) that we were, in fact, in Italy... and that we don't, in fact, speak Italian. Not even a little bit. We somehow managed to get into a cab and get to Paceco, where our abode awaited--and after a prolonged and disorienting conversation with the owner that involved a whole lot of hand gesturing, tucked ourselves into bed... sincerely hoping that there were no other boarders to be disrupted by our clomping around the room, or Alyssa's rather dynamic vocalization of her craving for hot wings.

Breakfast was at 8 the next morning, served by--no joke--Vincenzo, Veeeeencheeenzooooh, the owner's very shy and handsome son. He laid out colorful mugs and plates, and an assortment of crackers and biscuits. We ate so many of them that I think he got the hint... the next morning, there were twice as many packages. Viva la  American eating habits, I guess. Anyhow, he took our coffee orders first thing--the lot of us trying desperately to fashion some sort of pigeon Italian out of our limited French, Spanish, and common sense--but apparently, it was too much for us to handle. I think he asked if I wanted cappucino, so I just nodded and held out my mug. Alyssa, on the other hand, is a caw-fee person, so she asked for a big one--placing her hands about five inches apart to indicate the size--and Vincenzo cocked his head at her, smiling. "You drink this coffee you no sleep before three days," he said... clearly thinking that she meant she wanted a mugful of espresso. Oops number one. We polished off breakfast and headed out into Trapani, trying to locate a bus stop without knowing how much it would cost, or what bus we wanted, or where we wanted to go--oops number two. Again, we made it on... thank goodness for the list of basic Italian phrases that Maggie found in her archives. Apparently "non capisco," if repeated over and over again and with gusto, can get you pretty far.... eventually people just give up and you hand them a couple of euro and hope that the bus goes in your direction. That or you wait until it gets to its last stop, and smile stupidly until someone hands you a map.

So that's what we did, anyhow--and after a lot of aimless wandering (broken up by necessary gelato stops), we found our way to the heart of Trapani. It was gorgeous; old, old churches filled with frescos, pigeons perched on statues, sidewalk cafés boasting breadsticks and wineglasses, metrosexual men wearing scarves and handbags. Ah, Europe. The best part of my day was when I broke off from the group to wander around alone-- I sat by the ocean and let my thoughts buzz around a little bit, bought postcards and sampled wine at the tourist office, and pretended to be Audrey Hepburn. The whole city closed down between the hours of 3 and 5, most likely for siesta--or siestizzzimo, or whatever the Italian equivalent is--and I felt like I had the entire place to myself. It was good for me, being alone like that. I soaked it up like a little sponge.

So where's the comedy, you might ask? We finished the night off with a fresh seafood dinner at a restaurant by the sea, and that's when things started to get really funny. First of all, they opened the restaurant for us because no European eats before 8 p.m.--we couldn't have seemed more American (and therefore cranky, and obese) if we had been wearing cowboy hats and blasting Tom Petty out of jukeboxes on our shoulders. We ordered wine and bread, and ordered seafood dishes mysteriously lacking in any concrete description--and as a result, Alyssa ended up with a plate of prawns that still had the heads on. We tried to explain that it was perfectly normal, that they were as fresh as can be--but she wasn't havin' any of it. Those little buggers still had eyes and whiskers. Not one to be squeamish, Victoria and I ate them--this being after she had already consumed what looked to be an entire octopus covered in breadcrumbs, delivered steaming to her plate.

We left soon afterward, in search of--what else--gelato; and after a successful round, began the trek home. But guess what? That's when it started raining. Pouring, actually. We were still ages from the bus station...and not having any other choice, ran through it like the sopping, clueless kids that we are. The sequence of events that followed can only be made funnier by being told in rapid succession, so here goes: we realize the bus has stopped running. We can't find a sign for the route to Paceco. We wonder if Paceco is actually a real place, or if we are part of some Mafia scam. We walk across the street into a restaurant and gather the attention of all the employees behind the counter. I remove my jacket and realize that my shirt is soaked in two places only... directly over my boobs. We call a cab company and wrestle with more Italiglish, even more hand gestures. We realize that hand gestures cannot be communicated via telephone. The number of employees watching us at this point has doubled; should we start charging admission? One of the waiters realizes that the B&B we're staying belongs to Vincenzo's family, and he knows Vincenzo! He calls him and laughs about the stupid American girls, how funny they are. I go to the bathroom, and instead of pulling the toilet's flush (located on the ceiling), I pull the restaurant's alarm... repeatedly, for almost two minutes. I walk out of the bathroom and am met by a very concerned management team. I turn almost twelve separate shades of magenta. We get in a cab and finally get home; the cabbie realizes he had driven the night before as well, and are equally as hilarious as we were then. We curse the euro and pay him in about a thousand tiny coins. We finally get to the door, and we can't open it. We call Vincenzo. He opens it for us, and with that delicious, decidedly-Italian smirk, tells us he'll see us in the morning at 8 O'CLOCK (holds up eight fingers in case we are in fact even more mentally handicapped than he thinks we are), and sends us on our merry way. Yeesh.

I wish I could say that was the end of the embarrassment, but the next morning, the B&B owner couldn't find the right bus stop and ended up having to drive us all the way to the airport himself. He went about a kajillion kilometers per hour on the highway, and we laughed so hard at our own silliness that tears ran down our faces.

By the time we were on our flight home, we were content to sit in our own thoughtful corners with our music in our ears and our sunburns on our noses. On the bus from Dublin to Galway, we sat separated throughout the bus...like someone had smacked their hand in the middle of a puddle and sent us scattering to different seats. It was nice. I looked out the window and felt so, so happy to be back in Ireland--almost disturbingly so. I was overwhelmed by the feeling that this was it, that this was home. That's the thing...it's wonderful to travel, and I'm loving it more by the minute. But I don't feel like I'm traveling in Ireland anymore,  I feel like I'm home. I feel like I've been here forever and only just starting to realize what that means.

I'm waking up.

Bloody Hell

Okay, here’s the part where I stretch what would amount to approximately two minutes of semi-boring conversation into an entire blog entry, most of which will revolve around my newfound obsession with the show True Blood. That’s right. Smack dab in the middle of finals, and the first time in an entire semester that I’ve had to buckle down and study, Maggie and I have become obsessed with the HBO show—so much so that we’ve boycotted virtually all other downstairs activity. When the boys see us come into the living room, they get that look on their faces that says you’re gonna steal the tv from me, I know you’re gonna do it…and sure enough, we usually do.

It’s simple. Ireland has taken our previously borderline-OCD work habits and put them through the blender…leaving us with a rationale that usually amounts to something like: “but it’s ONLY worth 99% of my grade” and “I’ll write it, just as soon as I finish staring at these ducks.” With the rate that I’ve managed to procrastinate, I left myself exactly ten days to write the equivalent of six essays; one of which was a research paper, and two of which I hadn’t read the books for. “But they were written in the eighteenth century! Plus, I’m waiting to see if the ducks will move.”

It’s crazy, because back at Scripps, I never would have waited until the last minute to do this much work. Never. I would have been outlining, highlighting, and three-hole-punching at least two weeks in advance—and while that might have made it easier to get them done, I can’t honestly say that it eliminated any of the stress factor. If anything, I think my disgustingly color-coded time management skills made me more stressed out; where as here, I’m realizing that they’re only essays. It doesn’t mean that I’m not doing the best I can—in fact, I’m pretty proud of the two papers I’ve done so far. It just means that I no longer believe in completing them at the expense of my personal happiness, because at the end of the day, having more than three peer-reviewed literary criticisms in my works cited is not going to alter the quality of my character—whereas taking a sunset walk down the Salthill promenade, which is what I did this afternoon, absolutely will.

It’s the Irish mindset: as Owen put it, they are the hardest workers in the world…24 hours a day, 7 days a week, one week a year.

So it’s just my essays and myself this weekend, as Maggie and Hannah and Alyssa have jetted off to Norway, Shaun is in Barcelona, and who knows else is who knows where. The only thing that I have left to entertain myself, besides the three essays waiting oh-so-patiently for my attention, is this blog—the IMDb of all the True Blood characters (I promised I wouldn’t watch any more episodes until Maggie returns)—the fact that within five minutes of one another, our shower broke, the smoke alarm went off (twice), and the internet stopped working—and the memory of Thursday night, which was surely one of the most unpleasant experiences of my life.

Warning: this paragraph contains content not suited for young eyes. It’s not even suited for my eyes, really—but I’m sharing it because a) I’m keeping this blog to record, honestly, what my time here is like and that means not censoring and b) my life up to this point has been, all things considered, shockingly PG-13. So. Anyone who knows me back home knows that I’m not a partier. When I tell my roommates that I don’t drink at school—and that a glass of wine at a potluck is usually enough for me to have deep and meaningful conversations with everyone around me, followed by approximately 10 hours of sleep—they look at me like I’m crazy. Apparently Cian told Maggie that we Americans are “opening their eyes to drinking”—that is, we’re showing them just how much they do it, and just how much we don’t. Anyhow, this being said, Thursday was the last day of classes—that’s right, other than essays/exams, it’s summertime and the daffodils have sprung!—and in Galway that translates into a gigantic celebration. If that weren’t enough, it was also Hannah’s 21^st birthday, and she decided to throw a party. Can you see where this is going? Anyhow, in the name of trying something new, I let people talk me into trying vodka and orange juice. I’m simultaneously proud and embarrassed that my main incentive in doing so was the fact that it was a LUdriver (Tico family, you know what I’m talking about!). But apparently, while my grandmother can handle her hard alcohol, I cannot. How was I supposed to know? If she had been here, she would have laughed because the amount that I drank equaled approximately one-and-a-half of one of the drinks that Grandma Lu makes at the average Tico picnic. It was hardly any. But apparently, the iron stomach that I pride myself on—the same one that allows me to do boneheaded things like inhale 3 extra-spicy enchiladas, a bag of sour patch kids, and four kiwis all without feeling the burn—does not extend to hard alcohol. Oops. I guess there are people out there who can drink it, I just don’t think I’m going to end up being one of them. During Hannah’s birthday party, I poured my heart out to Maggie, deleted about half the text messages from my phone in a valiant attempt at GIRL POWER, and went to Club Karma—where I proceeded to get sick in the bathroom. That, and the ten hours of vomiting that followed, mark the first time that I’ve gotten physically ill since I had food poisoning in 2005. It was first time I’ve ever gotten sick from drinking, and I don’t plan on letting it happen again. So as for the screwdrivers, Grandma Lu—they’re all yours.

So there’s my embarrassing story for the week! Not too bad, all things considered. I feel very Dawson’s Creek, yet proud of the fact that I didn’t drink in high school, the time when everyone makes a point to sprinkle a little bit of STUPID onto their breakfast cereal. What does send me back a couple of years though, as I mentioned, is my newfound obsession with True Blood. It’s bizarre, because I don’t even like blood…I go weak in the knees when I get a papercut. But there’s something about this show—what is it?—that is more addicting than anything I’ve ever seen. I think it’s the southern accents, or the destiny theme—I’m a sucker (no pun intended) for Kismet. When Bill looks into Sookie’s eyes…I melt.

See what I mean? I have A.D.D. of the emotion. Elena told me that studying abroad is like an entire life cycle packed into a few months: there is the birth, the growing up, the adolescence, the maturation…and eventually, there is a death. So what stage am I in? I traverse the road between silly, happy, sad, and content on an almost daily basis. Walking along the prom at Salthill today, I heard the words of Alexi Murdoch (whom I am obsessed with, in a completely un-angsty way):

And when I’m alone,

when I shake off the weight of this stone,

that’s when I miss you:

you who are my home.

 …and I felt lonelier than I’ve ever been, only it was beautiful. The most beautiful, fulfilling sadness I’ve ever felt. The thing about True Blood is that all the girls on it—besides being severely malnourished, which is a topic for another feminist platform at another time—well, they’re never without a man. They’re never content just to be. And the way I figure it, the way I have to figure it in order to stay okay, is that this is the most beautiful time in my life for me to be one hundred percent on my own. Maggie is in Norway, and that’s okay. Mama is in Santa Barbara, Jeremy is in Neverland, the Co-op family is in Claremont, and that’s okay too. I am in Galway, Ireland—doggy paddling through Jenna’s Existential Crisis, Chapter 20: the Revelation—and laughing. It’s all worth saving, even the moments that should never be recorded (but thanks to the invention of blogs, will be floating around cyberspace for centuries to come).

I have a folder on my shelf labeled “Keepers,” and it is bursting at the seams.

St. Patrick or: How I Learned to Stop Complaining and Go Outside

It's been far, far too long. I can come up with zillions of baby excuses--like the fact that I've been on hyperspeed lately, flitting around like the social butterfly that I never was in high school or college, with hardly a chance to catch my breath or trim my toenails (Ew. Sorry.) ... but ultimately, I've been neglecting to write because there's simply TOO MUCH TO SAY. It's the same "Dear Diary" mindset that is to blame for the gaping holes in my journal-keeping--I'm either in the habit of updating constantly, or not at all. No in-between. In the same diary, I'll have made three entries in the same day, chronicling the ebb and flow of emotion between breakfast and lunch--and two pages later, have written: "Hard to believe it's been four years! Today, I turned nineteen." So basically, that was a roundabout way of saying that for the past two weeks, I've been making mental notes of what I want to share with everyone as soon as I get home and get to my blog--and then, purposely, obstinately, forgetting to actually do it. But now I'm here; and in an effort to be more organized than I've been in the two months since I stepped off the plane and onto Irish soil, I'm going to take it chronologically.

1. DONEGAL: the more I think about it, the more I realize how much of a deus ex machina weekend this trip really was. RAG week was great craic--other than the fact that I felt like a contestant on the imaginary show "I want to live to see 21, get me out of here" and that our apartment resembled a country recently devastated by guerilla warfare--but I was ready for it to be over. We all piled into Owen's car on Friday afternoon; and about 5 hours worth of Eminem and Donegal countryside later (not a match made in , were sitting in his cozy living room on real chairs, drinking milky tea that didn't have anything chunky floating in it, and feeling like we'd just won the lottery. From there, the weekend only got better--the boys' families are AMAZING. They brought us into their homes, fed us until we thought we would burst at the seams, showed us embarrassing photos of their kids, and tucked us under Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle comforters at night. We explored the hills of Sliabh Liag, which made the Cliffs of Moher look shrimpy--my heart was so full, I could barely speak--visited the horses at Higgins' farm, which made Maggie feel the same way--and laughed at virtually every word that came out of Shaun's mouth. It was wholesome, warm, and exactly what the doctor ordered. Plus, getting to see the mothership that our roommates come from gave Maggie and I a healthy dose of their humor, and familiarized us with the key to understanding it. Here is the secret: Irish boys lie. It's just what they do. It's not malicious, or in any way hostile--but they'll do it until they can't get away with it any longer, and even then, they'll try to take it a little bit further. On the way home, Maggie finally realized that Mickey is not, in fact, a Protestant, and he has been lying to her for the past two months just for the hell of it. Maggie's take on it? NOT FUNNY. But in the lads' opinion, it's all fair play: and each time a tall tale comes out of their mouth, we are to swallow down a gigantic grain of salt, politely tell them to "f**k off," and not take them--or ourselves--so gosh darn seriously.

2. KILLARY-ING ME SOFTLY. The week following Donegal blurred by, as they tend to do...and on Friday, a group of us embarked upon the second IFSA-Butler weekend; this time, to the Killary Adventure Centre in Connemara. Even after looking the place up online, none of us had any real idea of what was meant by "adventure"--was this going to be a bunch of granola-eating hippies leaving us in the woods with only a compass and our senses of humor, or two days of supervised freeze tag in a gymnasium? As it turns out, it was a little of both--and it was by far, by FAR, the most fun I've had in years. We arrived at night and ate dinner, surrounded by the aforementioned granola freaks--but really good looking granola freaks--and spent an embarrassingly long amount of time playing board games. That's right. We were all campers, wearing matching sweatshirts, and we were at adventure camp. The only difference was we were practically the same age as our supervisors: so instead of lights-out-at-ten, we were drinking pints and playing trivia with the staff 'til the wee hours of the morning. 

After breakfast the next day, we all set out for different activities: I chose the giant swing to start off... which is exactly how it sounds, and in the best way possible. After that, I conquered the rock wall, did cartwheels all over the lawn, shimmied my way into the second freezing wetsuit I've voluntarily worn since being here (there is a good chance I have actually lost my mind), and kayaked all over Ireland's only fjord. The rolling green hills and snowcapped mountains were something directly out of a dream; my dream, and one that I can't quite place my finger on... but I know that I've had over and over again. I was overwhelmed with the feeling of victory: confidence that I had chosen to come to Ireland, and joy at the fact that--even though I can't quite describe why to anyone else--I knew all along that I needed to come here. This was the place that I needed to come, and I did. Then my soul got a little bit ahead of my common sense--and minus the gloves and boots and headpiece that kept me from catching hypothermia on the surf trip, I ditched my kayak and hiked up a cliff and jumped off it, into the deep freezing water below. I DID IT, and even though I'm paying for it dearly (if I asked the phlegm in my lungs, it would tell me to go screw myself), it was completely worth it. I ran back to the centre, passing many sheep along my way (because in Connemara, sheep have the right of way. Not pedestrians, screw pedestrians. SHEEP.) and indulged in one of the hottest showers and richest dinners I've ever had. The night concluded in a disco, deejayed by a man who could not have been younger than 65, and many a hilarious encounter with our adventure instructors--who by now, we were best friends with. We danced until at least 3 that morning, and woke up early the next morning to climb the tower and Zipline through the sleety rain. 

Where did all this energy come from? Is there a chance that--despite my best efforts to convince myself otherwise, after all these years of avoiding team sports--that I AM AN ADVENTURER? If you asked the girl in the wetsuit doing relay races in her kayak, despite the arctic water, I think she would have told you that yes, I am. I am that.

3. MUMFORD AND SONS. If you know who they are, then I hardly need to explain just what that means. I was lucky enough to get a ticket to the Mumford and Sons concert on Tuesday, in the basement of the Radisson hotel, right here in Galway...no stadium seating, no seating period: just us, Mumford, and a room full of sweat. After waiting for what seemed like hours (probably because it was hours, accentuated by the fact that the boys next to us were doing that elbowy-edge-in-front-of-you thing that everyone knows is the #1 concert etiquette crime), the band came out--and it was surreal. If these guys are bonafide celebrities, then they're the last ones to know it. They treated us like family. They sang to us like they've known us forever, and--while they think their songs are pretty cool--they have no inkling as to why we know every word, every inflection, every moment the bass drum is going to kick in. The power went out on the last song, and rather than ditch the encore, they came right to the edge of the stage--so close we could see their cowlicks, the details of their faces, every spot missed by their razors--and did the last song acoustically. We were lucky ducks to be there that evening, this I know. We heard songs that haven't been released yet... and saints preserve us, we're gonna get to be those buttheads who, the first time the new single hits the radio, get to say: "I heard it FIIIIRRRRRRRRST!"

4. M'ATHAIR AGUS D'ATHAIR I nGAILLIMH. That's right, Mama and Patrick came to Galway this week! It was a strange, out-of-body experience to walk into the King's Head, and in the sea of unfamiliar faces that at this point has become a familiar phenomenon, to see my mommy's blue eyes. She and Patrick have taken to Irish life like fish in water, which is a particularly appropriate metaphor... seeing as they've made a point to stay, erm, hydrated since being here. I absolutely love it. There has only been one night this entire week--including Paddy's day--that I have not been in my bed before those crazy kids have even come home from the pubs. They're regulars; the bartenders serve them after last call, and everyone around them becomes their best friends. I am proud of them, and freaked out by the fact that--now that they're here--it feels like they've always been here. Maybe not in body... but in spirit, they certainly have.

5. ST. PATRICK'S DAY. Have you heard? Apparently, it's kind of a big deal. People drink, just like they do every day--but they do it all day, with face paint, wearing green! There's little I can say to describe what it was like to be here, other than the fact that it was messy, lighthearted, and grand. I loved the fact that, surrounded by at least a dozen foreign languages walking down Shop Street, I got to feel like a local. I loved the parade, which was peppered with countless Irish kids running up and down the street wearing fake leprechaun beards that looked brown in comparison with the ginger of their natural hair color. And I LOVED, more than anything, the fact that as I sat in the Hole in the Wall surrounded by all the friends I've made here so far, a little light went on in the back of my brain: this is bucket list material, right here. I've always wanted to experience St. Patrick's Day in Ireland, and now I've done it.

And so it goes: I'm continuing to ramble down the strange path that I am on, growing more and more aware every single day--without being too prematurely nostalgic--of how intense, strange, and heartbreakingly short this experience is. I know they say 'you can't take it with you,' but I don't know any other way to be anymore. I can't remember the person that I was before this started.

I leave with a quote--to a) prove that I actually am reading Tess of the d'Urbervilles, in case my genre studies professor is listening and b) capture the way I am, thankfully, feeling... now that I've taken a little jaunt out of the labyrinth of my own emotional brain, jumped off a cliff or two, and run through the wild Irish hills.

"All the while she wondered if any strange good thing might come of her being in her ancestral land; and some spirit within her rose automatically as the sap in the twigs. It was unexpended youth, surging up anew after its temporary check, and bringing with it hope, and the invincible instinct towards self-delight."

RAGtime

The infamous Galway RAG week is all around, and it is:

1. Anarchy
2. Inescapable
3. Fun
4. Hell on earth?

Maybe "hell" is a bit of an exaggeration. I don't imagine there will be too much fun down there, where as here, there is still the lighthearted Irish spirit that I have come to know and love in the air-- but still, I have to say that my personal hell will feature many of things I have seen in and around my home since Sunday night... also known as the last night that I had a good night's sleep, a cup to put my tea in, and a walk to the living room that did not involve mortal fear for my life.

To those of you who don't know, RAG week is a time when all the rules fly out the window--the few that existed in the first place, that is--and Galway breaks into utter mayhem. It's a return to a simpler time, really: like before paved roads, and self-dignity. The week began as "Raise and Give" week, hence the RAG, and was intended for the University to spend a week focusing on nonprofit service work and charity...but somewhere along the line (about a decade ago, I'm guessing) it turned into RAAAAAGGGGG week: one long, messy party. The  week that we are all in the middle of, that we know and have an exquisitely confused love/hate relationship with, has been renamed "College Week" by the University in a desperate attempt to dissociate the chaos that this week evolved into from its good samaritan origins...but for all those involved, it is still known as the RAG.

Let me explain.

Last weekend, we all got an email from the management at Gort na Coiribe, politely alerting us that they expected Gort na Coiribe residents to remain "respectful" during College Week, with no loud noises or belligerent behavior to cause harm to the property. Right. I didn't pay too much attention to the email, and the weekend rolled by peacefully... on Saturday, my friends and I went to the Cliffs of Moher and gulped down world-class natural beauty by the gallon, just reveling in the sunny weather and the opportunity to be out in it. Back at the house, we played Mary Chapin Carpenter and ate real food off of clean plates, missing the guys (who had gone home for the weekend) but also enjoying the chance to be girly and relaxed. If I had known how desperately I would cling to that memory during RAG week, just in order to remind myself that there was a time when I could sit on a surface without potentially catching hepatitis, I would have taken it in more carefully; but as it goes, Sunday rolled around, and with it a bunch of students and suitcases full of alcohol...and by sundown, Gort na Coiribe had officially launched into party mode.

I had no way of anticipating just what it would be, or what people meant when they said that it was literally one straight week of madness--but in retrospect, I guess when an Irish person tells you something is crazy, they mean business. If the Irish version of "crazy" is held on a spectrum next to ours, its like comparing a bunny rabbit to a bulldozer. Not even a bunny rabbit. It's like comparing the nose on an unborn bunny fetus INSIDE the bunny rabbit to a bulldozer. My roommates arrived back at our place around 8:00 Sunday night, and proceeded to throw one hell of a dance party...and it was happy, goofy, and hilarious. People were wandering in and out of our apartment all night, and I went to bed thinking that if that was the extent of RAG week, I might just survive with all my limbs intact.

Famous last words.

The next morning, I went to Irish...and by the time I was walking back over the bridge at noon, people were milling through the streets like little ants holding cans of something or other, blasting music out of their cars. For the past few days, the weather has been completely unreal--sunny, warm, and crystal clear--so everyone has been taking full advantage of it, wearing swim trunks and t-shirts and sunglasses. It feels like summer in California, only with more drunken Irish folk rambling through the streets, and more people breaking things. Erin, Ellie, Shannon and I walked over to the green in front of Cuirt na Coiribe to be met by a mob of people--and truly, the only way I can describe what we experienced there is to say that it was like that scene out of an apocalypse movie when all the characters realize it is the end of the world, and run into Wal-Mart searching for canned goods. It was unreal. There was a lone recycling bin sitting at the center of the lawn, and before I knew what was going on, everyone started throwing bottles at it--some full, some empty--until the entire surrounding area looked like the place that Budweisers go to die. I wondered if any of the bottles had actually made it into the can, but before I could think too seriously about it, one person walked to the center of the circle, peered into the can, and fell--trash can and all--into the pile of bottles. I'm happy to report that he went down laughing, and also managed to evacuate the scene before a herd of guys thought it would be a good idea to light the can on fire. When that got too boring, they wrestled a few trees to the ground and lit those on fire as well. You know, just an average day.

It seemed like everyone and their extended family was in our house that night, but judging by the scene I saw every time I looked out our front door, we only had a fraction of the population. Every single door was wide open, the entire street was covered in litter, and it was jam-packed with bodies. At one point, I believe there were a couple people jumping on Owen's car--but luckily, unlike the car down the road, all its windows remained intact. Our living room turned into one big slippery mess of people--but by and large, they were all people I love and know really well, so I was one of the lucky ones. When I poked my head out of my window on Tuesday morning, it was bright and sunny--like a summer's day--and the lads were already down on the porch below me, drinking beer. They waved up, smiling--and it occurred to me then just how drastically far apart our two worlds are, and always will be. And you know what? That's okay with me. Let 'em have their RAG week, I'll never be able to keep up... but if anyone ever asks me to do an anthropological report on Ireland, well... I have some good mental pictures to explain.

One would have to be the random girl who wandered into our house around 1 p.m. asking for toast, and then proceeded to make out with an equally random boy in our hallway for about five minutes following. Another image would have to be the current state of our house, which besides being covered with some mysterious purple substance that I'm pretty sure is blackcurrant jam, looks like somebody chewed it up and spit it out again. Shaun wandered in looking for the remote control to his TV, which (naturally) had found its way to our living room.. and after climbing over a shattered jar of marinara sauce, he jumped down to the lawn beside our house to retrieve the coffee table that he had, apparently, thrown over the ledge sometime during the night. As the Irish would say: Jaysus. The last mental image I will take with me will be the lot of us moving our couches out to the porch yesterday afternoon and sitting in the sun, listening to classic rock all afternoon, drinking margaritas and eating tortilla chips. There's a new spray of freckles across all of our noses, and it felt like summertime.

The crucial difference between the Irish and myself, I suppose, is that the afternoon was all I wanted--by the time they were gearing up for round two, and round three, and round four, I was so overwhelmed by it all that all I wanted to do was go for a walk. I spent the sunset down by the river near the University, listening to the roar of humans across the bridge and feeling oddly not guilty for not wanting to be a part of it. If life is all about balance, then last night my balance involved me taking a raincheck from the festivities and being in bed by 11 p.m. with my book. It also involves me being here today, in Café Luna, hiding from the masses... at least for a little while... until whatever is going to happen next comes knocking on my door. Or climbing in my window.

So, to recap. RAG week is:

1. Disgusting
2. Hilarious
3. A part of life, as simple as the cobblestone roads or the old woman who sits outside AIB telling fortunes to anyone who will stop long enough to ask her.

When my Irish Studies professor walked in this morning, she took one look at the lot of us and asked: "What are you all doing here? Didn't you know it's College Week?" I guess not. I guess you can take the  girl out of Scripps, but you can't take the Scripps out of the girl. Kerry and I decided to compensate for our overachieving by leaving the lecture at the halfway break--because to us, that is living dangerously. Maybe not knock-your-tooth-out crazy (saw one of those) or slowly-pierce-your-ear-with-someone-else's-earring crazy (yep, saw that too)... but crazy nonetheless.