Return To Allihies - Latest Wanderings!

To continue from where I left off last time, hubby and I have left Skibbereen where we spent a wonderful four months and have now moved into our lovely rented house in Allihies in the Beara Peninsula, West Cork. I've probably declared this many times but since our first visit to Allihies twelve years ago, it's been drawing us back time after time to the point where we now know this is where we want to live out a good deal of our retirement years.

Our plan is to divide our time between West Cork and Dublin, probably spending a fair amount of time over the coming months with the family in Dublin because as I mentioned in the earlier post, we are to become grandparents in August.

Each day here brings its own beauty - early morning thick mists wholly enveloping land and sea, horizontal rain with gale force winds and sunshine that casts a golden glow across the fields, coaxing the foxglove and fuchsia flowers into full bloom - all that sometimes in one day!  Rarely are two hours the same.

Since we arrived here three weeks ago we've been walking the bohreens and back roads to Allihies village almost on a daily basis and when the swirling West Cork winds permit, we cross the rugged Ballydonegan landscape.  For what seems like miles we walk along the cliff edge, where, far below, blue-black waters weave and crash their way between the dark, mountainous rocks.  I find it terrifying and exhilarating at the same time.

The first thing I noticed when we arrived back down here after a two year break is that everywhere seems the same, nothing has changed, for that I am so grateful.  Not a property developer in sight!

Over the weeks we have made new friends, these two little guys find shelter from the winds just outside my writing room window, usually early in the morning and on warm sunny days, they relax on the lawn with their mother.  They're so used to us now that if we come out they just glance up then continue chewing the cud!

I plan to write regular updates on life in our little haven in Allihies.




All images taken by me, June 2013.

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Remembering JFK - First U.S President To Walk On Irish Soil

I'm not quite sure where you'd need to have been hiding for the past few months not to realise that, at this very moment, Ireland is in the midst of commemorating President John F. Kennedy's 50th anniversary visit to these green shores.

Although Dublin, Cork and Limerick were honoured with his visit it was his "homecoming" to (The Kennedy Homestead) Dunganstown, New Ross in County Wexford which drew the greatest media attention and indeed, the massive outpourings of "Cead Mile Failte" from family and locals alike. It was from this place in 1848 that the President's great-grandfather, Patrick Kennedy, left for the United States along with the many other emigrants aboard the Dunbrody Famine Ship.

I was exactly eleven and a half years old on that evening in June 1963 as the presidential cavalcade moved slowly along Westmoreland Street, Dublin.  Standing tall and tanned in the open-top car was the President of the United States, JFK, as he was affectionately known to one and all.   Deciding I wanted a good view of this exciting person who had traveled from a far off land (well, actually Germany that morning) to be with us I gradually inched my way out to the front of the crowd, my mother within grabbing distance behind me.

I'm not quite sure if it was his brown skin (I'd never seen anyone with a tan before!), dazzling smile or his amazing presence, probably all three I suspect but I went weak at the knees when he passed by.  I'm even certain he made eye contact with me as he waved, well, I live in hope!

As we didn't have a telly until a little later on, mother and myself would head over to our neighbour across the street to view on her Bush or Pye 17" box all the comings and goings of the President as he traveled around the country giving, what became, his historic speeches.   Yes, for me, the summer of '63 was a good one.

Above image: President John F. Kennedy in New Ross, County Wexford, 27th June 1963 via Wiki.

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New Poetry Blog!

Over the past couple of weeks I've had lots of time to sort out some of the things I've been putting on hold over the last few months and one of them is starting up my new poetry blog.  I'm so excited!  Rather than mix my rambling words in with all my usual stuff I've decided to separate them and give them their own space, I hope they will thank me some day by attracting the eye of some high street publisher, well, any publisher really!

So, before I get too carried away I will give you the name of the blog which is, Ann Brien ~ Thoughts From A Dog-Eared Notebook, subtitle, Words in Progress......

I hope you will stop by from time to time.  I'll leave the poems already on here for your convenience.

Thanks in anticipation!


Above image via Wiki.

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Julia

The subject of the lines below is a lady who was very much part of my early and later life.   At difficult times she always seemed to be there, a warm shoulder to lean on.  Her presence during one very painful life event helped me more than she'll ever know.  Amazingly, her voice has not altered with time, which for me is magic because when I hear her speak, I'm once again that little girl, so excited at being in the company of someone who is very special to me.  It's been a few years since I heard that voice, so before this year is out, I intend to right that.  Meantime, this is for you, dear cousin.



Julia


My newest mother is peering down the Brownie camera lens
while I, in your arms, scowl at the box.
I'm two and a half years old
And not used to having my photograph taken.
My newest backyard is still an unfamiliar playground,
But safe within your arms, the strangeness holds no fear.

I'm eight years old,
It's dark, you hold my hand as we descend the cast-iron steps to your underground workplace.
I've never been in a canteen,
My eyes and ears absorb the sights and sounds of tea trays being delivered through little wall hatches
And the merry chatter of people enjoying their evening meal.

I feel certain it's the same evening, you take me to a big house,
Up the stairway to a room where both cheery mother and bustling brood welcome us with lively banter.
I love being here.
I protest at leaving the joyful spirit of this tenement lodging.

I'm ten years old,
I wait at the corner of our avenue on balmy summer Friday nights.
You bring sixpenny bars of chocolate, that's all I remember.

I'm twelve years old,
You arrive to our house every few weeks with your first-born daughter
In her magnificent high pram with the rose on the side.
I get to wheel her up the avenue.   I get to hold her.
I want to be a mother like you.

I'm seventeen years old,
I'm living with your Mam and Dad.
I don't see you as often as I'd like
But I see your first-born daughter some week-ends.

I'm forty five years old,
You hold me in your arms as I grieve the loss of my not-so-new mother.
She had her problems but she was a good mother.

I'm forty nine years old,
We hold each other as we grieve the loss of my not-so-new father.
He had his problems but he was a good father.

We're both older mothers now.
I don't see you at all.
I want to hear your voice again.
I want to hold you and feel your motherly arms around me.
I want to savour the chocolate bars one more time.


© Ann Brien 2012


Above image:  Me, taken by Julia in my backyard, 1954.

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Too Cold For "Piggybeds"

I'm not quite sure what it is about this time of year but I find myself yet again wanting to describe a winter memory as I experienced it during my childhood in Ringsend, Dublin.   I pray all these  memories I will carry with me to the end of my days, and with some luck, into the next life.

How wonderful it would be if we could transfer our happy recollections into our childrens' minds for them to glimpse what life was like for a child in the 1950s and 60s long before street games were replaced by sitting at a computer monitor where the only physical movement is that of your fingers on a keyboard and the periodic clicking of a mouse.   I suppose it has something in its favour, perhaps the children of today have a level of mental fitness that we could never achieve, but Boy, were we physically fit as fiddles!

Below is a little piece I wrote when remembering the other day, the winter's evening my friends and I had been playing "piggybeds" (a kind of hopscotch) at the end of my avenue and when it became too cold, they went home.

I, of course, with my goulish fascination for bleak winter nights remained in the avenue for a while in the hope that a storm-force wind would suddenly blow up and then I'd also get to hear the eerie fog-horn which always excited and terrified me at the same time!


Too Cold For "Piggybeds"


The street lamp casts its amber glow upon the eight-squared white chalk pattern,
A dirt-filled polish tin lies abandoned just outside square four, its abrupt end to play, the consequence of frozen fingers.
Mesmerised by the bleakness of this November evening,
My gaze begins its long fix on nature's tapestry;
The fog-shrouded moon,
The navy clouds, their wispy pink tendrils trailing off in zig-zag directions and, across the road,
The ink-black Liffey as she rhythmically pounds the sea wall.
Enveloped in the freezing mist
My thoughts now turn to bright red flames leaping in our living-room hearth,
And so, without much inner persuasion, I place the long-discarded "piggy" in the safety of neighbouring hedgerow,
Then make my way homeward to the promising comforts of warm hands and Irish stew.


© Ann Brien 2012


Above image: My avenue, taken by me, July 2011 (hedgerow to right still in existence!).

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Terraced Lives

Every so often, in fact, very often, I browse through the photographs I've taken over the years, and the ones that I linger over the most are those of my beloved hometown of Ringsend, Dublin.

This particular image I took of my avenue shortly before I left in the summer of 1969. As I stared intently at the houses facing onto one another, side by side in a straight row, they looked like dancers waiting for their musical cue to move forward. I believe houses hold memories. I tried to imagine how many family situations made their way through the wallpapered walls of the neighbouring houses, our neighbours on both sides were placid to the extreme.

As I'm fascinated by rooftops I'm so happy to have captured the avenue back at a time when huge TV aerials were essential if you wanted to view television channels from across the water, namely, the BBC and UTV. We didn't have one so made do with Radio Telefis Eireann, great programmes they were too!  Below are my few words of tribute to a time gone by.


Terraced Lives

Like stone-faced dancers
The houses face each other.
Conjoined bricks and mortar hold within them secrets of the dwellers
And, through faded creamy rosebud paper, sounds from distant rooms.
Like grotesque mosquitoes hung in time
Steel grey aerials stand tall against the darkened skyline,
Their rooftop vantage serving the human need to look beyond its own wretched life
Onto an imagined brighter landscape.

© Ann Brien 2012


Above image: Cambridge Avenue, Ringsend, Dublin taken by me, May 1969.

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Ireland's Little Bay of Naples - A Day In Killiney

Last Thursday morning started off with warm sunshine and a clear blue sky.  Not having experienced much of that this summer I decided it would be the perfect day for a trip to Killiney, the lovely seaside resort in south County Dublin.

At around mid-day, hubby and I got the bus into town, then the DART (Dublin Area Rapid Transit), our wonderful train service which travels along our Dublin Bay coastline, to Killiney Station. After walking the full length of Killiney Beach we then sat on a rock to munch on our bananas and Hula Hoops, washed down with, by then, warm bottled water. I was in seventh Heaven!

We had planned on walking the hour long journey back to Dalkey village but en route decided to take in Killiney Hill.  The climb was breathtaking in every respect!  Half way up I really did think I wouldn't be able to make it, I was completely out of breath and gasping like a set of asthmatic bagpipes!  I knew hubby would have been disappointed and I definitely had to prove to myself that this was well within my capability, so onward I struggled.  It was worth every wheeze as the images convey.

A couple of hours later we arrived in Dalkey village where we revived ourselves with coffees in The Queens Bar and Restaurant in Castle Street.  Afterwards, headed to the DART station where we only had a few minutes to wait for the train back to the city centre.  As it was 5.30pm and right in the middle of evening rush hour we strolled around town then met up with our youngest son for dinner in Buswells Hotel, Molesworth Street, my favourite haunt.  All in all, a lovely day out.

All above Killiney/Dalkey images taken by me.

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