By mid summer....

Hi everyone,

The following was written the first week in July, 2006

A note from a friend inspired me to take a brief moment to catch up all those I love with the latest news from Ireland. I see that while my accent isn’t changing much that my use of words reflects some of the local vernacular.

Traffic, crowds, more neighbors

Summer at the beach is the name of the game these last few weeks. Adding to the congestion is Kinsale’s art festival which is this week as well. Together the place has “a great buzz” but little parking (smile). By that we mean seriously little parking and, as my New Zealand chiropractor commented, “an excellent time to see Irish parking skills.” You have to keep in mind that as of twenty years ago not everyone in Ireland owned a car, the roads are the size of an alley in Denver and not consistently paved. The result is an ad hoc type of parking. The little country road that gets us home also gets the public to the beach – with no parking at the end of the road the sides quickly back up with parked cars. While parking on one side is fine, cars can still go back and forth passing oncoming cars with care. With a car parked on both side it become treacherous, So treacherous in fact that the Castlepark residents are once again asking council to intervene with some signs to help the situation. There is little likelihood that anything will happen though as the trauma is only two months a year – and then quickly forgotten. The entire situation is “mad!”

More of our neighbors have arrived. Castlepark is not about 2/3rds full – and some of the known crabbiest neighbors are with us. What has become clear is that there is nothing to worry about – a few engagements and then they will be gone. You may remember that we bought a house around which there had been a great deal of contention within the residents association, due to the building behavior of the last owner. Glad to say that the tension between our neighbors has lessened with time. Plus we have well mannered dogs that don’t bark much and a fountain with flowers to beautify this section of the village. They seem to have better things to worry about than the Americans who seem to be behaving ourselves. All is good.

The neighbor in front of us, and our dear friend, is not someone who behaves himself. In fact he has a pretty typically Irish “if you can get away with it all is well” attitude. The latest adventure happened one day at the beginning of summer, when low and behold a large lorry drove up with gardening supplies. The next thing we see is that the gardeners are taking out turf and building a deck off of our neighbors’ property. Keep in mind that none of us own the land around our houses – it is communal. You should also know that most, if not all houses have encroached on that land from time to time, but doing so always causes a hot reaction at the time. This day John and Kate build a deck in front of their sliding door on the communal green. In fairness, they didn’t fasten it to the ground, and should there be a problem it can easily be removed but we had the president of the residents association over to see, calls made, letters written, etc. It also seems to have blown over with time.

Dog(s) win awards

Margie and I spent Sunday last at a pet show in Belgooly. The yearly event was part of what would have seemed similar to a fair in the states. A bit of history is important to this story as well. Ireland has always had a strong agricultural community, one that until the 1970s was not mechanized. Then in the mid 70’s vast changes happened as the local farmer moved from taking their milk to a creamery everyday where it was made into butter, then that butter competed with every other Irish creamery’s butter – getting them all the lowest possible return on their money. Then almost like magic, in the mid 70’s Ireland joined the European economy, got guaranteed prices on goods, stopped competing within itself region to region and developed a world identity. This story becomes important because a fair here has tractors, and other types of farm equipment that is ancient and yet in great working order – after all it was still in use not long ago.

In addition to tractors, and old cars the fair had a circus, food booths and of course the dog show. Margie had never been to one, and my dog Stefan has bad hips, and they couldn’t care less if the breeds were pure (although most were I think). Margie and Shadow took third place in two events, large pets and gun dogs. The gun dog one we hadn’t considered because our dogs wouldn’t know a gun if they saw one, but the judges asked us to come in – I think they agreed with me that the Dalmatian that entered was not really much of a gun dog – but then neither were our two.

When we got home we reassigned one of the little wooden plaques to Stefan and called him the most adventurous dog in Castlepark. He earned his title today, when we were up on the hill picking up rubbish left by campers over the weekend. Margie suddenly screams that Stefan is down in the water below us (a drop of about 20 feet). Luckily for us all he was able to scramble back up the hill – otherwise it would have been a cold swim around from the beach to rescue him.

Vacation in Scotland while others visit in Ireland

We’ve had a run of company. While I went off to the north of Scotland with two girlfriends, Margie entertained another three here in Kinsale. The apartment came in handy as the place we live is too small for company, plus the apartment lets people enjoy the real buzz of life in a medieval town where our house is more separate.

So far we have done well to continue our work writing a book while being able to enjoy friends. Speaking of the book, we are working on Chapter 6 of 10. It is due to the publisher in October, and after that we will celebrate by going to Budapest for a week. Not a bad life after all (Grin).

Finally, the colors here are changing to purples set against the green. There are tons of purples to running to reds caused by the huge butterfly bushes to the hedgerows of fushia. About two weeks ago I noticed that there were also two colored “mists.” The first, created by short grasses that had gone to seed on top and then turned brown in the sun, edged the green of the grass on the hill with what looked like brown, ankle deep mist – Lovely. The second type was created by fishing lines. On the walk into town there is an area where the fishermen store their gear. One of their nets is a blue monofilament knotted in a diamond pattern, which, when laid on the ground around their pots, creates an aqua misty looking area of contrast to the bright orange and brown of the rest of their ropes and pots.

Love to you all,

Alana