Ireland 2014

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I THINK THIS IS THE TURN

My parents and I are on completely different schedules. I get up at 6. They can arise any time between 8:30 and 9:30. Even after that, it takes them awhile to get going. My strategy is to go and do something in the morning and come get them for some late morning tourist stuff.

My dad wants to go to the Locke bar off the Abby river for lunch. I ask him if we can go at 1pm. He counters with noon. It’s his trip. We go by his clock. Grumble. Grumble.

I’m aiming for short trips to the surrounding environs that I haven’t visited before. This time I’m heading south of the river Shannon to Glin where there are supposed to be some nice sites. Glin was one of the few towns that was overseen by a Knight.

If you are going to do a long trip, it helps to get up early. Failure number one. Yeah, I’m still trying to get to my old rhythms and I wake at 7:30. This puts me on the road again amid the morning traffic so it is slow going out the dock road towards Glin.

The sun shines in a beautiful blue sky. My head is on a swivel looking for good photo opportunities which aren’t that hard to find. For instance, I spot a ruined a castle off to my left surrounded by trees, lit by the rising sun.

It is still early in the trip, when I have plenty of time, and I opt to pull off to see if I can photograph the castle. I drive down a narrow little lane looking for a sign or a turn to the ruin. The Irish gods of directions are not helpful. I can't find anything to lead me to the castle.

Well, there is more to photograph down the main road so I head back to it.

In my rearview, I catch sight of a splendid ruin along the banks of a small river. I find a turn around and head back to the ruin.

The ruin was in Askeaton and was another abbey complete with cloister. The early pictures I took were tricky to compose since someone had parked their pick-up truck in the center of the cemetery.

I wanted to get a picture of the abby on the river so I headed out the gate and looked for a way I could get in position. This led me to the river, which led me to the town which led to more wandering taking pictures.

The ruins of a Hellfire club stood right next to the ruins of another Desmond Castle. Not as nice the Desmond Castle in Adare because a lot of it was covered in scaffolding. But photographs abounded.

I photographed the swan on the River Deel who was accompanied by a shy Heron. I heard the howling of the Greyhounds from the kennels. I wandered into fields I shouldn’t have. The usual for my peregrinations.

By the time I finished my photo walk, I realized the clock was no longer my friend. If I was going to have time to wander around Glin, I was going to have to have tunnel vision on the road. No more stops for pictures.

This lasted to about Foynes where I had to shoot a bay on the Shannon Estuary. But that was the last one.

I blew right through Glin without realizing it. Well, I did realize it, but I couldn’t believe how nondescript it was. Just a bunch of small houses and not much else. I turned around about kilometer later and came back to the town. Still not much there.

A check of the watch told me that I didn’t have time to stop anyway before I had to get back to the hotel for the noon date with my parents. Fortunately, I had seen a shortcut back on Google Maps.

A shortcut that I found. Ha!

The route was well marked but it was on tiny little roads which didn’t allow me to go very fast. I was just going to make it back to the hotel. It seemed to take forever before I was back on the main road just outside Adare.

I pulled into the hotel parking lot with a few minutes to spare.

I knocked on the parents door. It cracked open enough for me to see my father. They were just getting up. “Why don’t I come back in an hour. Like at 1?” The time I wanted to get together originally? Sure.

My father, at first, wanted to go to the Locke Bar for lunch but he was't feeling well. The new plan was just to skip lunch and wait for dinner.

We headed over the Sarsfield bridge to Arthur’s Quay shopping mall so my mother could stop in the Tourist Board just outside the mall and then go to an Irish Handicraft store they have been visiting for a long time.

My mother wanted to go to the tourist board because it had a really good gift shop inside. Too bad that closed a couple of years ago when ownership of the building changed hands.

I dropped them at the curb and proceeded into the car park (parking lots are for Americans). One of the problems with driving in car parks, is I don’t have a great sense of the width of car. Everything looks incredibly narrow. I drive up the ramps and around the other cars incredibly slowly, living in constant fear I’m going to scrape all the paint from the car.

I go into the handicraft store, but my parents hadn’t arrived yet. The women in the store asked me what I was looking for. I said, “My mother”

I found them outside actually crossing the street by themselves. They are making progress.

In the shop, the sales crew immediately knew my parents. Stools were brought out so they could sit. The clerk started bringing out clothes for my mother to admire and hopefully purchase.To be kind, most of the clothes were a bit tight on my mother and there were no sizes bigger.

With packages in hand, they headed upstairs to the bathrooms. I spotted a health food store and went in. They actually had my 100% cranberry juice. It looked like purple sludge but it had the right percentage. I bought a couple of bottles.

My father finished first and I found him a seat in the food court. My mother came out and assumed since we were sitting in the food court we were getting food. Um, no. Dad didn’t want to eat because he wasn’t feeling well. Remember?

She didn’t. She headed to the counter for food. She also hoped she could have chocolate milk with her lunch.

My mother had two stops she wanted to make before she collapsed, the Hunt Museum and the Limerick Museum also known as the Jim Kemmy museum. The Hunt museum was just a short walk from Arthur’s Quay mall. Well, short for anyone else. But she wanted to do it.

With me carrying her purse, and my father left behind in the park to do his Sudoku, I led her the hundred yards to the museum.

My mother gets fragments of information in her head and treats them as the god’s truth. She had heard that the Hunt Museum had a lot of information on Fairy Rings. Fairy Rings are circular groups of trees that dot the landscape of Ireland. The Irish won’t go near them and it’s considered bad luck to enter one. When my father oversaw the building of the Verbatim plant, special care was taken not to disturb the fairy ring on the property.

The guard at the front door just gave my mother a perplexed look when she asked him about Fairy Forts. He might have had an air of disgust about another dumb american accusing the Irish of being superstitious.

The confusion came because the Hunt Museum had a lot of information on bronze age ring forts. Since they both had the word ‘ring’ in it, they must be the same. Since, they didn’t have information on Fairy Rings, my mother didn’t want to tour the place. She would tour the gift shop.

I went back to the tiny paint removal maze to grab the car and retrieve my father from the park. A guard was going to ticket me because I pulled into the bus lane to grab my father. I illegally parked in front of the gate of the Hunt Museum to get my mother.

Although the Jim Kemmy museum was just another short walk away, I would be driving. My father and I had a discussion about where the museum was and the best way to get there. I had done the silly thing of looking the place up and finding it on the map. Then I parked in a parking lot opposite the council buildings, which currently housed the museum, despite my father’s assertion I should go to the front to be closer to the entrance.

The walk from Arthur’s Quay had sapped my mother’s energy for the day. I was dispatched to go in and find out about Jim Kemmy and his museum.

Well, the Jim Kemmy museum is no longer the Jim Kemmy museum. It is now the Limerick City museum. There has been a bunch of political maneuvering in Limerick now that the City Council and the County Council have merged. ( I could spend a lot of time talking about that merger, but I think it probably best left for another time). Part of that fallout is the museum is simply the Limerick museum.

The museum currently resides in temporary quarters in the City Council building with most of the museum contents currently in storage. They only had a few displays about early Irish History and Limerick lace making. Nothing about Jim Kemmy.

I returned to the car to pass on this news. My mother wanted further information which I did not have.

Since we were in the car, my father decided to hunt down a long lost friend by the name of Noel Kennedy. I believe my father met him in the Ardhu Bar which was attached to the Ryan Hotel. My father stayed in the Ryan for many months when he first came to Ireland back 1978.

Noel had a heart attack about twenty five years ago which led to him having a stroke. Every time we come to Ireland, we look for him. But he has been in a rest home or somewhere else every time we’ve called on his house. The most recent reports we had said that he had passed away.

My father figured we would give it one more shot. This leads to the usual ‘I think the house was down this street . . . . ‘

But my father’s instincts on this occasion were good and we found the house right behind the Gaelic grounds off the Ennis Road (Yes, leaving clues for myself if I have to find the place again)

Again, the boy was dispatched to knock on the door to find out the current state of Noel. I was leery, hoping that we had the right house.

An infirm man I didn’t recognize opened the door. I told him he were looking for Noel Kennedy. The man shook as he pointed to his chest and said “I’m Noel Kennedy” I guess reports of his untimely demise were greatly exaggerated.

He got a big smile on his face when I said my name. Then I told him to wait a minute while I went and got my father from the car.

Noel’s wife Mary appeared, castigating Noel for not using his walker. She told us his balance was bad and he has a tendency to fall. My father came in and we all moved to the living room. Mary filled us in on the details and then my father and Noel had a chat which I think made both of them happy.

I brought up the fact that Noel was one of the few people to beat my father at squash during his time here. Noel laughed. My father denied it. I wasn’t going to remind him the events of that story. The gist of it was Noel thought they had started the game while my father thought they were just warming up.

Noel haltingly told us about his sons who were doing very well for themselves. Mary mentioned that Noel was heading back to the rest home so they could work on his legs and maybe get some strength back in his legs.

It was a tearful good-bye when we left.

Since we were close to Thomond park, the big Munster Rugby facility, I mentioned we should go by another old set of friends, Mick and Lilly Goggin who I remembered as living close to Thomond.

Again, we went through the I think it was this street shenanigans. Again, the boy was dispatched to knock on a strange door. It’s like a real life ‘Let’s Make a Deal’ for what’s behind that door.

Well, we were two for two as Mick Goggin opened the door.

Lilly was the receptionist at Verbatim Ireland for ten years and was the first person I think my father hired to work at the factory.

Lilly had been sick all week and we were told she wasn’t going to get out of bed. But when she heard my father was outside in the car she put on her flip-flops and came to the car.

More chatting. More promises to meet later. Mick told us he was now president of the Munster Rugby team, which was the team for the province and played at Thomond Park which loomed over our heads.

I knew there was a Munster match this weekend, same day as the wedding, and I jokingly asked if he could get us tickets. Without a hesitation, he said “Of course” Crap. I could go to a high level Rugby match with probably really good seats.

I declined with heavy heart. We wrapped up the street car chat and headed back to the hotel.

For dinner my parents opted for pizza. Shamefaced, I asked at the front desk for the number of a good local place that delivered. That turned out to be Apache Pizza. It also turned out to be a bad idea since the pizza was not what you would call good.

The parents love to go to shows. They had found a dance company that was putting on a new show at the Lime Tree Theater at the Mary Immaculate college. The show was an aerial dance extravaganza and was based on the W.B. Yeat’s poem ‘The Second Coming’

I found directions to the place and loaded the parents in the car. The usual drill is I go to reception and validate the parking. My parents slowly make their way to the curb while I descend to the underground garage. I’m still not sure why the goddamn Irish made everything so narrow. Then I drive up the ramp through the tiny gate and get my parents at the curb. I’m usually blocking a couple of cars from making the turn around in front of the hotel. On a good day, I block a whole bus full of tourists.

We drive to the dock road, looking for the turn. My father has also decided he knows where this place is despite the fact there has been no map consultation on his part. I think we are at the turn when my father tells me this isn’t the turn. I argue back this is where it said to turn on the map. My father says I’m wrong. I tell him I question his direction skills.

My father and I should never drive together. Too much alpha male direction finding.

Turns out, I was wrong and he was right. That didn’t burn at all.

I drop them at the modern looking theater and go hunt for parking.

Fortunately there are elevators to take us to our seats. A nice usher brought my parents chairs while we waited for the doors to open. There were also bathrooms which they availed themselves of.

The Second Coming was a very experimental piece of work. It was deconstructed Irish Step dancing with the dancers switching from haphazard out of control, almost drunk dancing to very precise footwork. At certain times, some of the dancers were attached to wires and pulled up into the air to perform some acrobatic aerial dancing.

They had an actor play Yeats. His job was to say a few lines and then watch the dancers. A weird projection showed a distorted image of him on the screen at the back of the stage done in real time.

There were also a lot of ceramic eggs being handed around. The best part was when dozens of pairs of shoes fell from the rafters.

The show ended with with two of the dancers climbing some spiral wires that went from the stage floor to the ceiling. It was all very experimental.

I can’t say if I enjoyed it or not. It wasn’t my cup of tea. But it was nice to expose myself to new things.

I was able to find my way back to the hotel without any help at all.