My husband and I decided to sell our house in Dublin and move lock, stock and barrel to rural Ireland. We moved into a rundown cottage in Doonass in Co.Clare in the eighties. Renovations were ongoing which we found difficult at times. As Autumn approached we finally got the chance to explore our local area.
The 20th July 1969, the day that Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed the Apollo Eagle on the moon was a momentous event for the world. However, for the inhabitants of my local village, Ballinacurra, Midleton, Co. Cork, my family and myself it was a date which has always been very special for a different
I had a dream last night that a tsunami hit Donabate. From a height above the hill, looking far below. I watched helpless and heart beating, as the swell grew and took on a life of its own. Beginning small, a murmur of motion. Waves forming, pronounced and large, like a serpent below the sea.
Julia was a strange girl. At least most of sixth class thought so. She enjoyed social media like the rest but her occasional messages were about issues in which they had little or no interest. To keep in with her class mates she found herself wading through commentary about body image, shopping bargains and celebrity
She looked into the screen and waved goodbye to her students. Closing her textbook, she switched off the laptop, the diminishing icon heralding the end to her online classes for the day. Her mood was unusually low, these were strange times after all. Perhaps some fresh air might lift the heaviness from her mind. The
Since the virus came, everywhere and everything is quieter, these times, I can sit back, take in the sounds that have been suppressed for so long. Growing up on a country road we were so aware of our surrounding environment. In particular I have vivid memory of bird song and the ever present sound of
The gullet is a small stream of water that runs under the boreen where I live. It flows in to the Camogue River near the village of Emly. In winter it floods up so much it is barely able to get through the eye of the bridge. When I was a young lad it had
Presently I am cocooning, and well into my 70s. I have lovely memories of the Brusna River, on the Caltra Road, close to my home, in Ballina. In my childhood days, mid 1950s as children, we spent our summers playing in the River. Soon after our breakfast, we would go off with our nice clean
The monk and Pangur Bán, his cat, slept soundly on a wild, wet, wintry night in 1010. The North Sea was rough, the Scandinavian rivers were still frozen so the Viking longboats could not sail. I would like to fly SAS to Sweden, over the North Sea oilrigs, but Lockdown only allows travel of 5
Cocooning in my garden, in brilliant sunshine, in thought -why does the Rogerstown Estuary in front of my house not reflect the blue of the sky like in Greece all those years ago?; 1963; memorable for the deaths of J.F. Kennedy and Pope John XXll 1… In my reverie I drift back in time ……
We moved to River Lane before we knew that was its name. Google, estate agents and the vendors didn’t even know, but the Coronavirus brought the OSi map back into all our lives as we rushed to the boundaries of our 2km radius. Our little terrace of just six houses is fortuitously placed bordering a
I gaze out my village window at the rippling waves of grey-green luminescence that carry the ocean tide into Roundstone Bay. The witnessing of these daily tides takes on a greater importance now in this time of Corona virus lockdown. The repetitive daily cycles, governed by the moon and the ceaseless spinning of our planet,