Alone Time

It’s 10:00 am and I have the whole day to myself. I’ve been to the pool for a swim, Skyped with my husband in Ireland, showered, read the Sunday Times from cover to cover and savored two cups of Blue Mountain coffee. Heaven, as I see it.

I don’t have much time alone. This is my precious summer vacation, my respite from classes of 35 middle schoolers. I like them. I really do. But not every day. Still, no one consulted with me about the hours of the school calendar. Two weeks to go before my time is managed more than most working people. A classroom teacher is on every minute of contact time. Even her bathroom and water breaks are regulated.

Normally, in the summer, I’m in Ireland with my husband for 8 weeks while he plays the saxophone throughout County Kerry. This year, as many of you know, my daughter is expecting her first child. It hasn’t been an easy pregnancy. Jennifer has health issues which, happily, have resolved themselves. For me, it meant flying home a month early, cooking, cleaning, shopping and chauffeuring. Healthy little John Hogan Readey is expected momentarily. The anticipation is making it difficult to sleep. All of which makes me appreciate a Sunday on my own.

I don’t want to be alone permanently. I’ve done that, too, and it’s beyond lonely. The idea is to have an occasional day where nothing is pre-arranged and no one is expecting you, where the house is quiet and the energy low, where a great book awaits, (currently I’m reading Maggie O’Farrell) and, hopefully, the writing muse is stirred.

Tomorrow, the phone will ring. Jennifer will need a ride to her doctor’s appointment. Michael, home from Chicago, will want to “hang out,” dental appointments will be made and a long overdue air conditioning maintenance scheduled. Today, however, is still ahead and still my own.

Slain Abhaile

Jeanette

The Ireland Novels

Now available on all eBook sites.

 

Hannie Rising, excerpt 3

It still amazed her how much she missed him. When he was alive there had been times when she’d longed to be alone, when she’d envisioned the luxurious comfort of sleeping in the middle of the bed, of washing only her own clothes, of listening to music she preferred and eating only salad and a boiled egg for tea. She never voiced those sentiments, of course, not even to Maura. But she’d wished for them. Sometimes, in her Catholic background of tangled guilt, she wondered if she’d wished too hard, if God had punished her by giving her what she thought she wanted and then realized, too late, that she didn’t want it at all, that she would give anything to wash Mickey’s clothes and cook his meals and hear his voice at the other end of her mobile.

It was a silly idea, of course. Johannah wasn’t pious enough, nor egocentric enough, to believe that God was overly concerned with the wishes of a middle-aged woman from Kerry. Mickey’s heart attack was the result of blocked arteries, a family predisposition, the doctor called it, plaque lining the arteries preventing blood flow to the heart. Smoking and drinking hadn’t helped. Neither had the vanillas he regularly consumed. Sick arteries weren’t always evident. Who would have thought Mickey Enright with his flat stomach, smooth skin and head full of brown hair was at risk for a heart attack? But he was and now he was gone and she was alone.

 

Hannie Rising - An Irish novel - excerpt 2

She looked around the spare room where Mickey once threw bottle caps at the referees on television when he didn’t agree with the call. Now his wife used it as an office. The floor boards shone with the same reverence Maura had seen in the entry hall at the rectory. Not a speck of dust filtered through the still air. Every book was shelved according to color and a distinctive lemon scent rose from the couch cushions. “You need to go back to work, Hannie,” she said matter-of-factly. “This place looks like a feckin’ undertaker lives here.”

The Comforts of Home

            Since 2007 I have been an expatriate living in Ireland…but, only for the summer. In August I go home to Southern California, a place of temperate weather, white-sand beaches, palm trees and choices, wonderful, amazing, convenient choices that I never appreciated until Ireland.

Yes, the emerald isle is really emerald and even more beautiful than those photos on travel sites and yes, Irish history, for those of us fascinated by events of the past, is around every corner and probably the oldest and most interesting in Western Europe. For a writer of historical fiction, it’s a dream come true. The Irish people are characters as well, witty conversationalists who turn a topic as uneventful as the weather into recordable prose. But, for me, accustomed to garbage disposals, air conditioned buildings, multi-laned streets, ice, refillable beverages, king-sized beds and restaurants that open before 10:00 am and stay open after 9:00 pm, even on a Sunday, it can be inconvenient.

Shallow? Probably, but, on the other hand, window screens in a rural country where there are septic tanks, backyard compost piles, lots of humidity and no garbage disposals, all of which breed flies the size of buses, prevent disease. And while I’m sure the hot water switch for the electric shower, always located on the OUTSIDE of the bathroom, and the electricity switch for the cooker (stove) are both appropriately green, forgetting that power isn’t available at the twist of a tap can make for an embarrassing, not to mention uncomfortable, situation when you’re standing in a cold shower without a stitch on.

The work ethic, a far more serious topic, is different here, too, but that’s the topic of next week’s blog.

Slain abhaile,

Jeanette

An Irish Wake

Paddy Conway, my husband’s friend, was laid to rest last Thursday. I’m sure all cultures have unique ways of honoring the dead, but the Irish are definitely “serious” when it comes to sending off a loved one on his final journey. First, there is the notice in the local paper announcing the death. Not surprisingly, given their penchant for words, the Irish are a literate population, no skipping The Kerryman or Kerry’s Eye for a morning jog or last minute latte stop.

Then, there is the viewing, open casket, at the funeral parlor. Cremation isn’t really a typical Irish practice. The family is seated in a room with the deceased while friends and family file in, pay their respects and view the body before retreating to another room for conversation, a two hour event.

The following day, mourners attend Mass at the parish church where the priest does his normal thing. There are a few, very short eulogies, no surprises, a homily, communion, the deceased’s favorite music sung and played by his fellow musician friends, (Paddy was a musician) the inevitable and beautiful Ave Maria, Gabriel’s Lament, and Tennessee Waltz. Then, six men hoist the casket to their shoulders and carry it to the waiting hearse.

This is where it changes to something completely different, something infrequently seen anywhere outside small towns and villages featured in National Geographic. To the uplifting, jazzy tunes of Wabash Cannonball, mourners, following the priest, spread out behind the hearse, blocking streets and intersections as they walk behind the slow-moving vehicle ALL the way to the cemetery, no small accomplishment given the heat and humidity of the day and the age of the walkers.

Rath, or Ra as it’s pronounced, is a relatively new cemetery, its inhabitants interred only as far back as the mid-19th century, a mere drop in the bucket for a town that dates back 800 years. And what a cemetery it is. Spread out as far as the eye can see, Celtic crosses, family crypts and small monuments studded with glittering mica stand side by side, back up against each other, the gravel square footage of each gravesite often gaudily adorned with hearts, framed photos, messages, balloons, statues, benches and plaques. My husband’s family is there, parents and grandparents, aunts and uncles and brothers, as are the families of everyone belonging to the town of Tralee and outlying townlands.

I can’t help thinking about the cemeteries of Southern California or even Arlington and the gated, manicured uniformity of cut grass and small, rectangular stones or crosses marking the resting places of our dead, the tasteful flowers and tiny American flags conjuring up serenity and distance, qualities not considered necessary in this green land thousands of miles from home.

At the gravesite, it’s music again, prayers, the casket is lowered into the ground and then it’s back to the pub. This is where the real send off begins, with sandwiches and alcohol, a few tears, more stories and even more laughter, a fine ending for a kind man. Rest in peace, Paddy Conway.