Diary Friday

Yes. It’s that time of week again.

More from our family trip in Ireland, when I was 14. There are many italics here, and many underlines and much punctuation!!!!!!

I like this one because it’s about my first trip to Glendalough, which is now one of my favorite places on the face of the earth. I’ve been there 4 or 5 times now, and any time I go to Ireland, I will make sure to stop by. Words can’t describe the magic of the place. Here are some pictures … but you just have to GO to really get it.

My last time in Glendalough I had one of the most unforgettable experiences of my life.

Moments like that are a power-surge. You remember them, and you are filled with strength, gratitude. How lucky I am to have experienced that.

What I love about this diary entry is that I somehow knew, even then, what Glendalough would end up meaning to me. I fell in love with the place immediately.

So here I am in all my embarrassingly gushing 14 year old-ness. I will have to interject snarky comments from time to time, just to stave off the mortification.

GLENDALOUGH – IRELAND

I am writing here from Glendullough and it is so wild!!!! I love fresh air! [Wow, Sheila, that’s funny, because most people love polluted dirty air. Hm.] But it is SO SO SO windy here!!!!!!

We got out of the car and walked down a path with green fields on both sides with trillions of cow doadies on it. [Oh boy. That’s cow dung in O’Malley parlance. How embarrassing. As a matter of fact, I underlined the word “trillions” twice, just to make SURE I got my point across to posterity.]

We went towards this dark dark blue lake with white caps. [What? A lake with white caps at Glendalough? I know there’s a lake … but white caps? What am I talking about here, Dad?]

It is SOOOOOOO windy! [Uhm, we got it, Sheila. It’s windy.] I almost couldn’t walk! It’s cold too. The lake is choppy. I went over this quaint rumbly stone bridge over a rocky stream. A girl was hopping from rock to rock and she fell in. She was laughing, though. We had to climb up one big step to come to this old church – Reefert Church. [Ehm, I don’t think that’s the right name.] It was stones with no roof, and not crumbling down, surrounded by graves. It was built in the 11th century and all of the O’Toole’s are supposed to be there. It was really breezy there [Not windy???] and the inside had these arched doorways and windows.

We then went on, up and up and up this steep stairway through the woods. It was exhausting but the view was breathtaking. All the other mountains around, and everything down there looked like toys. We stopped at a sandy plateau to look at a waterfall – a typical mountain waterfall. [Okay, this makes me laugh. I had never seen a “mountain waterfall” in my life. I’m from Rhode Island. We don’t have mountains there.] The waterfall splashed down from shiny rocks through moss and ferns.

Dad said that all St. Kevin’s Cell was was two rocks!

We sat down to have lunch. I wasn’t that hungry so I just had a sip of Coke.

[Why does that crack me up? Just one sip, Sheila?? Why not have two? Live a little!]

Some girls my age had climbed all the way up one of the mountains and they had reached the top and were screaming and capering around. Birds flew near — strange ones, with blue heads, orange crests, and black and white feathers … they wanted our crackers.

We got back into the car and a short way away we stopped at a round tower. We went through iron gates and through a graveyard with pretty new stones, and the tower was SO high! It was probably the highest one we’ve seen yet. It was used as a bell tower to summon monks to prayer. It was 100 feet high with 6 floors. The door is 12 feet off the ground and the monks used a rope ladder to get in.

Jean and I stood straight at the foot of it and arched our necks looking all the way up and the tower looked like it was going to fall on us! [Note: My sisters and I, as adults, came to Glendalough on what turned out to be an INFAMOUS night. We had such a shrieking laughing fit in the graveyard – it was a real “you had to be there” moment, that we basically are still laughing about it. We even have a picture of it. The three of us, teary-eyed with laughter, standing in the open crumbling courtyard of the “cathedral”. The other tourists must have hated us because we were literally HOWLING with laughter. Anyway, it’s funny to think of me and my sisters, as little girls, walking through Glendalough … and then flash-forward 25 years … and there we all are again.]

I ran down through the overgrown grass to the Cathedral, also surrounded by graves. These stones were grey and splotched with white like all church stones are. It is the largest church in Glendalough. It was built in sections, see, and the oldest part is the Nave from the 900s!!! In the 1100s they built a new arched doorway.

This place isn’t spectacular or anything. [hahah That is so ridiculous! After going on and on about the place, I have to get “cool” again and say, “This place isn’t all THAT.”]

There was another church and it was St. Kevin’s Church. These stones were dark gray and it had a small round tower attached to it that looks sort of like a chimney which earned the place the name “St. Kevin’s Kitchen.”

We came over a wooden bridge over the prettiest rushing stream with clear clear water. I was a little behind everyone and when I came up I saw this dirt road with a woody hill rising up. Mum and Dad were sitting on a rock and Brendan, Jean and Siobhan were up a dirt path in the woods on a mossy rock like a ledge. I went climbing up, it was so slippery.

I sat on the rock with the breeze on my cheeks [Oh, Jaysus, listen to me narrate my own life…] and the trees all around us and my feet dangling over the edge. Siobhan and Jean started to play some game of theirs.

It was really nice there. I think I could have sat there all day. It is a perfect place to write stories. If I lived in Ireland around here, this would be a perfect place to come to if I wanted some peace and quiet or if I wanted to be by myself.

I got a souvenir from Ireland at Glendalough too – a claddagh ring. The most famous symbol here. Mum said it’s about the best thing I could get here.

[Then I drew a picture of the Claddagh ring.]

That’s what it looks like. The hands symbolize love, the crown symbolizes prosperity. [Heh. I’m wearing a Claddagh ring right now!]

We didn’t do much the rest of the afternoon.

Wednesday is a terrific day on t.v.

— Falcon Island: kind of dumb but with lots of kids

— Sullivan’s: sentimental, but good acting, cute guys, and realistic plots [I mean, really, what more does one need?]

— Greatest American Hero: one of my most favorite shows on t.v. I love Bill Maxwell. He’s hilarious. I also adore Michael Pare. [Yes … I wrote over and over the word “adore” until the pen went through the page. ]

— Taxi: What can I say? It was hilarious. Oh, I love that show. I laughed so hard and so long.

— Callan: spies, really exciting, funny. I would love to be a spy.

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15 Responses to Diary Friday

  1. peteb says:

    Thanks, Sheila, that’s a wonderful diary entry.. and I was laughing out loud all the way through.

    Oh, and “white caps”.. WINDY.. “choppy”.. possible connection? :)

    And I’d hazard a guess that the Coke was rationed.. no guarantee that the next shop would have The Real Thing.. just a guess.

  2. red says:

    Wait wait wait … How did you know it was windy??? What on earth clued you in to THAT?

  3. peteb says:

    Oh, I just kind of grokked it.

  4. red says:

    And my little TV show reviews … I sound like an insane person.

  5. popskull says:

    two more reasons why we’re honeymooning in Ireland… the lake with white caps! and TRILLIONS of doadies! sweet.

  6. red says:

    hahahahahaha

    I have no idea how long you guys’ll be over there … but Glendalough is an hour south of Dublin. Doadies or no doadies, you should check it out. :)

  7. peteb says:

    And good reviews of those TV shows though.. at least the ones I recognise.. which admittedly isn’t many.. all right.. so just Taxi..

    Plus.. already you’re staking out your perfect story-writing space..

  8. popskull says:

    red, were doing a week basically on the road from Dublin to Shannon. Glendalough, Ring of Kerry, zip up to Galway too. Kind of a greatest hits, with the bumming exception of the North.

    But its our first time over there, so what we do see will be enough. I’m pumped for the Abbey theater and The Book of Kells. Next trip I’ll make like the Playboy of the Western World and go out to the Aran Islands.

  9. homebru says:

    White caps are created when the wind blows across water forcing waves. At high enough wind speed, the wind will blow the tops off of the waves in an water / air mixture called “white caps”.

    You can judge the wind speed by the condition of the water surface. Although the Beaufort Scale was developed to report sea conditions, it is also accurate on lakes over 5 to 10 acres.

    See: http://www.geology.wmich.edu/Kominz/windwater.html

  10. peteb says:

    *ahem*

    “white caps”.. WINDY.. “choppy”.. possible connection? :)

  11. red says:

    Oh my God. My silly question to my father brought forth a white-capped flood of science information.

    popskull: See Clonmacnoise, if you drive across from Dublin to Galway. It’s on the way, right off the road. :)

    I’m jealous! I want to go back.

  12. MikeR says:

    It would require a hard heart indeed for anyone to fail to smile at your intensely precocious youthful exuberance, red. It’s very cool that you have all this documentary evidence – even cooler that you’re willing to share.

  13. popskull says:

    red, I just read the link to the serious Glendalough post of yours and I have to tell you that there was a picture in all of the nonsense the travel agent threw in front of us and the one that stopped me cold was a small picture of Glendalough. It snapped me to. An old tower, and I thought exactly like you said, it could be as easily 1500 years ago right there. And THAT more than anything else got me so immensely psyched for our trip. It sounds cheesey, but there is something powerful there that I need to be near. And the travel agent was like Eddie in Call it Clover, “ahh, that’s just ruins,” and she flips the page.

  14. red says:

    Glendalough is a really powerful place. There is something going ON there. I’m really glad you’re gonna get to experience it.

  15. dad says:

    Dearest: Reefert it is. The stonework in that little chapel is as perfect as you will ever see. Glendalough, Clonmacnois and Newgrange are the three things to see in my book [and this from someone who never wants to leave Dublin]. Loved the post, dad

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