IRELAND - A Special Birthday

Corcomroe Abby 2008 with our Friends, Carmel & Michael Joyce
(Carmel was at the 1997 Birthday picnic)

My birthday is a National Holiday in my house. It’s celebrated anywhere from two days to a week. This year the big day is a tour of the O’Keeffe Home in Abiquiu, followed by lunch at Ice’s Tea House in Alcalde, north of Santa Fe. Dinner will be at the fabulous Geronimo- my birthday tradition in Santa Fe. But, I digress. I want to reminisce about what may have been my best birthday ever, spent in the West of Ireland.
It is 1997 and I have a dilemma. My husband, Steve, will be with a tour group in Durango, Colorado on my birthday. I could drive 7 hours each way to have dinner with him- a depressing prospect! (Not him- the drive) Then, an invitation arrived from a friend to visit Ireland all expenses paid. I felt somewhat bad as Steve had always wanted to go to Ireland- but when I weighed all the options, Ireland won hands down. Sorry, (Don’t feel too sorry for him, we went together the next year.)
As the plane descended at Shannon Airport, I looked out the window and saw green fields and stone walls. It dawned on me why I had always loved Block Island- it looked like Ireland. (A place I had never been- at least not in this lifetime, but more on that later.) Driving north to Oughterard, County Galway, I was amazed to see palm trees growing at the side of the road- this was not a tropical clime. I discovered later that the Gulf Stream creates the proper climate conditions for this. Another surprise was the pastel houses in the towns we passed through
Anyway, it was love at first sight- but it really wasn’t. You may have trouble with this concept, but I kept getting affirmations that I had been here before. Sitting on the shore of Galway Bay looking across to the Burren in County Clare I flashed on a time I had been there waiting for a boat to come get me. Then, there were the places like Poulnabrone (the dolmen) and Corcomroe Abby (both in the Burren), where I broke into spontaneous tears and could not fathom why. The only illogical (and I don't mean logical) explanation I could come to was I had an unexplained connection to these places. But again, I digress.
The story for this blog is the actual day of my birthday, July 22nd. Five of us were invited to go out on our friend Joe’s boat on Lough Corrib. The destination,Inchagoill Island. We took a picnic lunch and some vino. The ride out was beautiful. There are reported to be at least 350 islands scattered throughout the 35-mile long lake. We passed one with a large house that was supposedly belonged to some rock star- who knows. We waived as we went by. We docked at an obscure beach Joe knew and set up our picnic. It was perfect. After lunch we took a short hike, destination a church ruin dating to the 5th Century. On my way into the wood’s I tripped over an incredible rock. I collect rocks but couldn’t take it with me on the walk- it was too heavy, I mentally marked the spot so I could come back for it. We arrived at the ruins of St. Patrick’s Church rumored to have been built by that venerable saint. It is believed that St. Patrick’s nephew, Limnic, is buried there. An inscribed stone at the sight dates to the 5th century and is believed to have the oldest Roman writing existing in Ireland today and 2nd oldest in Europe (outside the Catacombs in Rome). What a special place- you could feel the history. Also there, are the ruins of the 12th century Church of the Saint.
We left the ruins and to the Guinness Tower, a remnant from when the brewing family owned the island. We climbed the low tower and took photos. Two of us decided to take a short cut back to the beach. It turned out to be a questionable decision- it definitely wasn’t a short cut, we got lost in virgin woods. Luckily we found the shore and we began to circle the island knowing we had to find our beach eventually. It was a beautiful walk. Upon returning to our beach, I went in search of my stone. Amazingly, I went right to it and that 5-pound beauty came home from Ireland in my luggage. You can tell this was a bygone era. These days it would cost me to bring that rock home. Then, it was time for cake and gifts. I received two that I treasure to this day. A Sheela Na Gig, made by Joe, a pagan fertility goddess found engraved on churches throughout Ireland and O’Flarity, a leprechaun who is watching my back as I type this.
Reluctantly, towards the end of the afternoon, we left the island and returned to the 20th Century. Another precious gift from Joe was a video of that day that gets played every year, on you guessed it, my birthday.