Warning: the following is an acutely personal post. I usually try to keep things on the lighter side but tonight I'm going for honesty. Things have not been going the best for us this last while. I've been trying to hold it together, but the cracks are starting to show. This week I left work …
Where do you come from?
Have you ever felt like you belonged in a certain place, as though your blood and breath ran through the ground beneath your feet? I used to feel that way about Bozeman, my hometown. I loved every blade of grass, every sidewalk crack, every crooked tree, every gentle mountain breeze, every snowflake. I felt like …
Belle Bretagne
A couple of weeks ago, we took a family vacation to France. A work friend mentioned last year how her young family travels to Brittany every summer and it sounded so wonderful, I looked into it myself. I found an unbeatable Black Friday deal on Eurocamp.ie and booked us a week at a campsite in …
Podcasts
Since last September, I've been doggy-paddling through the bottomless pool of podcasts on my daily commute (which can sometimes take over 2 hrs each way). I've subscribed and un-subscribed to quite a few over the last few months - some are just too heavy, or not very interesting, or simply just hard to listen to …
365
We've hit the first milestone - it's been one year since we moved back to Ireland, after five up-and-down years in the USA. It's not been an easy year, but I have to say it's been a good one, all things considered, and overall we're happy with our "final answer." Perhaps it's just a thing …
Messy Miracles
Today is Sunday, Mother's Day (UK/Ireland), the "Spring Forward" of Daylight Savings Time (UK/Ireland), and the last day of March. It's the beginning and end of many things, a fitting backdrop for the way I feel. Mother's Day is hard for me. I struggle with it every year because, true or not, I don't believe …
Thoughts for International Women’s Day
I love Ireland - you know this. Every day being back brings this country and its people a little closer to my soul. But, as with all things, there are dark sides to the ones we love. And there are parts of Irish history pertaining to women in particular that are extremely troubling - and …
Catching Up
We've had a pretty mild winter this year in Ireland, all things considered. I haven't really minded being back in the world of grey skies and rainy streets because I love the contrasting warm fires and hot stews, not to mention misty mornings and lovely sunsets. If anything, I would have liked to see a …
Pitch Black
Ireland gets darker than any place I've ever lived. It gets so dark I can't even explain it to you - darker than the desert, darker than the mountains, darker than anything I know. I think I forgot that when we moved away for a while, and came back. Even then, I'd only experienced the …
American Baby
We recently celebrated the first birthday of our Isla, the third (and final?) baby, the only one of my children to be born in America! She is our little ray of California sunshine, a joy to us during ups and downs, and rounds out our family of five perfectly. When I think about my pregnancy …
