Slow Descent

So it's official: I will bike five miles for a beer. Probably more, but that's how far away the town is from my house. Five miles of HILLS....scenic, scenic hills.

I've started talking to animals, sort of. They don't talk back -- don't worry, I haven't gone completely bonkers -- but failing other human contact (I've been alone in the farmhouse for a day minus the screaming children and demanding teenagers and kind hosts, and it's sort of nice) I tend to assume that the cat has a greater personality than he does.

Today I got the bike out of the shed and had to shoo the herd of chickens away from the table by the window. "What, are you guys trying to Peeping-Tom me? Get out of here." Then I walked it past the pigs, who oinked in a friendly kind of way. "Sorry, Miss Piggy and Madame Cochon, no rotten egg shells for you today." I pedaled down the road, my back muscles wussy from misuse, and couldn't pass the friendly horse without saying hello. She was wrapped in her blanket, staring warily through her chain-link fence at me; we exchanged no actual words apart from my fumbled, "You're preettttyyy", but I did blow into her nose a lot, which is horse for "hi, should we bite each other or be friends".

Despite all this talking, when the friendly men in the all-male pub said hello to me, I said "hi" really quickly, grabbed my coat, pushed past the crowd by the fire, and awkwardly opened the exit door the wrong way. I think I'll leave this experience mute.

Ideal Meal

Since my last entry was so damn serious, this one is just a list of everything I would eat each day if I had the money and wherewithal to compile it into my kitchen.

1. Life cereal, not the cinnamon kind.

2. Smoked salmon. They're all about it in Ireland, and god do I love Ireland now.

3. A pint of blueberries.

4. Boozeberries.

5. Nutella on anything,

6. Tomato bisque soup from Common Cup, the kind that has lots and lots of hashbrowns in it.

7. Mussels -- most particularly this kind I had when I was spectacularly toasted in Greece one night. I don't remember them that well, but I know that they were fabulous, up for grabs at this one woman's house, and also that I ate the whole plate.

8. Seven-layer white cake from Taste of Scandinavia, the kind that has jam and chocolate and bananas and ganache and cream in it.

9. Sea scallops with ginger and white wine. Every single time I have had scallops in a restaurant, they have been fabulous. Every time I try to make them at home, they suck and taste purely of fish. If I meet someone who can saute them properly, I will marry them.

10. Bread. I would eat bread for each meal, if only my body would let me. I suppose that Joey and I are quite similar in that way, although because he is six feet tall and a hundred and forty pounds, he can eat far more bread than I can, without similar consequences regarding his butt's growth.

11. Most importantly: watermelon, mango, and grapes. Christina Rossetti had it right when she wrote that poem. I would not have been able to resist the goblins tempting me with their luscious fruit, not in the slightest.

Free Range

The town was a cluster of squat two-story buildings painted vibrant colors against the dank air; squat, vibrantly-colored patrons hustled in and out. A little hunched woman draped in a red coat lurched across a crosswalk, waving her hand at the line of cars stopped impatiently behind the painted line. I stared at her as I jogged past, aimed at the old church.

Along the stone wall, a tidy row of Celtic crosses: the church's Reverend Fathers from years past lined up along the street, awaiting eternity. There was no room for anyone else, and I wondered where the current priest would be buried; there was simply no place for more time to pass, or more holy men. Was this because of an oversight -- the road built too close by -- or was it a quiet architectural prayer for a swift Second Coming?

There wasn't time. I had to conquer the hill before night fell and traffic could not see me in my long dark coat, and so I did, placing heel before toe, the muscles like taut rubber bands in the back of my thighs. The road curved, revealing another slope; I groaned; I conquered it. I was at the top.

Mountains in the distance, blue, like the worn-down teeth of a dog. Clouds that shifted, changed, morphed as I watched. A patchwork of fields in green and gray, separated by hedges -- sheep -- a cluster of multicolored cows -- at the bottom, there, the lake, the bog, with its shining unpredictable currents and still man-made patches of muck that could swallow a stick, or a person -- all of it separated from me by a thicket of sticks that served as a fence. I could see the curve of the world, a little yellow blossom in a hedge, but I had no time to marvel -- I had to go down.

After a hurtling descent and a few near-somersaults, I found myself on the road that led to the home, or at least I thought it was -- but the light was different now, near evening instead of pure noon, and so I traveled, constantly questioning. That was not the path. That certainly was not? Did I turn, before? Did I see this hedge? Was this rather long and unremarkable road part of the journey? Was that stone wall --

As I was on the point of near-panic, I saw their field, and everything changed, was made solid. I drew a deep breath and whistled -- they looked up, shook back their blankets, trotted over, and welcomed me. Go on, the deep-brown one said, you're nearly home. She licked my hand, then tried to bite it. I offered her grass and stroked her neck.

It was nearer sunset when I walked in the door, footsore. Two white heads looked up.

"MacROOM!" the older one said. "I would've taken ye there meself!"

"Do ye like it there, in Macroom?" the younger one said, brandishing a teapot at me. "Tea?"

"There's tart there, in the pan," said the elder, lighting the wood stove. I couldn't see what she did, but flames flared up right away.

"And custard. They were tryin' to eat it all up," the younger said, flipping the switch to make the pot whistle, "but I wouldn't..."

"Granny, read my book!" whistled the young girl at the big wooden table, brandishing a sheaf of torn white paper. The elder waddled over.

"The princess and the frog look at each other, and begin to kiss," read her Granny. "Sophie, this is lovely." Then, with a practiced air: "Didn't this happen to you, Auntie May?"

"Kissed a few frogs meself," said her sister. "But they stayed frogs."

I put down my coat, poured custard on my pie, and began to eat.

....

What I'm trying to say is that I now live in a Neil Gaiman book.

A Wrinkle in Time

Funny story: I was once afraid that the people who have taken me in for this month would turn out to be axe murderers.

Now, I have arrived in this house, in the outskirts of a tiny town that is itself the outskirt of a larger city. I have scratched their pigs on their heads. I have chuckled at their multiple chickens. I have played Duck-Duck-Goose with their two small daughters at least seven times today. They have fed me lemon cake.

If they're going to axe murder me, they're sure off to a terrible start.

These people are at once relaxed and archaic. Chelsea and Mel may live in an old pub -- seriously -- across from a still - running church and a defunct one-room schoolhouse, but it is a nice old pub. It has three-foot-thick walls and a big white kitchen with clean tiny European features. It is heated by coal fires, stoked by the boy, who is a solemn charming ten-year-old with a knack for being mildly injured by his science experiments; his sister, fourteen, is a dreamy picky eater who likes to tell tales.

I hesitate to draw conclusions, but I might be living in the farmhouse from A Wrinkle in Time. If I disappear, know that somewhere I'm battling a giant Irish brain.

Always Leaving

This semester in my German class, we learned all -- and I mean all, we read two books and saw two movies and a musical -- about Elisabeth, the queen of Austria-Hungary at the end of the nineteenth-century. I can see why my German prof was mildly fascinated by her, and why the country was for the entire forty years she ruled; she was incredibly beautiful and naturally brilliant. She had dark brown hair ("tinted by walnuts", one of our textbooks told us in a gossipy sort of way) that fell to her feet. She dressed beautifully, corresponded with the leading thinkers of the time, wrote poetry and excelled at sports. She ensnared the heart of a ruler when she was I think sixteen and quickly became the queen of the largest empire in Europe.

She was, in short, awesome, and so saying that I see any parallels to myself in her is bald vanity, but bear with me. I'm not saying that my famous beauty should put my image on everything from decorative china plates to postcards for a century, nor am I saying that I correspond with genius poets.

However, the Empress liked leaving, and it's something I'm learning that I do well. I'm really hoping we do it for different reasons, though. Empress Elisabeth had it all, but was never quite happy; historians think that although she was staunchly Catholic, she was trying to slowly commit suicide by traveling on dangerous trips, using dangerous methods of transportation. From her dark poetry, sad family life, and habit of wearing black every day, we can gather that she might have been seriously depressed. She was definitely anorexic, at least -- she ran from things both in the metaphorical sense and in the physical sense, jogging miles in a corset every day at a time when other women gave up and sat on fainting couches. (She was also an avid horseback rider, although I was angered to learn that while she took her horses over the scariest jumps possible, ones that sportsMEN of the time wouldn't take, she never ONCE broke both wrists.) She was never at home for more than a few weeks without taking off again.

I left Bray today. I quit the ELTAP program after four weeks, first of all because I realized it was costing me far too much money, and secondly because I'm tired of being indoors all the time. So I found a WWOOFing post in southern Ireland --- the WWOOF program places willing workers on willing organic farms. They are fed and housed in exchange for food and board (and, well, sometimes money). I will be staying with a woman who had rhuematoid arthritis surgery and can't feed her goats. (The best part is that she has CASTS ON BOTH WRISTS!)

I'm sitting in a nice hotel room in Cork right now, a town where I know exactly nobody, and I like it. I'm happy this way, running -- not away from something, but to the unknown. Is that the difference between me and Empress Elisabeth? Or did she also have moments like this, moments where she sat in her hotel room and thought, "This is pretty tops, maybe I'll order room service for dinner and watch TV all night, or maybe I'll go out to the bars and people-watch? Oh, and fuck Valentine's Day"? Is this feeling of unlimited potential in solitude all it takes to make a person constantly leave?

Three Facts

1. There is a dog in this coffee shop. I am petting him. His owner informs me that his name is Hector. Animals here wear bandanas, follow their owners, and fetch newspapers. It's like the Disney Channel, but with Irish accents, and in real life.

2. Bananagrams came with me to Ireland, and it's, as of now, my most valuable piece of luggage.

Bananagrams, if you don't already know, is a game: merely a bunch of Scrabble tiles in a cloth case inexplicably shaped like a banana. The object of it is to form your portion of those tiles into a bunch of words intersecting other words, like a crossword puzzle. But for being a crazy simple game, it's given both Irish and American people a lot of (banana-shaped) pleasure lately.

I started forcing the children I teach English as a Second Language to to play it in class, but it's also gotten a lot of playtime at home -- one of my housemates has lately taken a shine to sitting down, pouring a cup of coffee, spreading the banana open, and then spending an hour frowning at the tiles, arranging them into a delicately-formed grid with a common, subliminal theme. Occasionally I or another housemate, Heather, help him. The first one we formed had, not unsurprisingly, the theme of "sex" ('QUEEF! BJ! HEAD!' and my invention, when we couldn't find any use for our x and multiple i's -- 'XIII'!).

The second one was both more useful and more adult, mature, and subtle. Our landlords have been rather ornery -- despite infrequent hot water and, occasionally, no water, they refused to reduce our ridiculously exorbitant rent even a little bit. I looked up from my reading to find Blair seated at the table, frowning at a puzzle that included 'DIEMURPHYSDIE', 'NOLAUNDRY', and 'WTFRENT'.

We considered leaving it up for when they walk unexpectedly into our house all the time, but then again they're old and so it might kill them.

3. The schoolteachers at St. Cronan's, where I teach, have a turn of phrase that is always slightly jarring when I hear it. As I mentioned before, I'm a terrible disciplinarian, so I usually witness mischief instead of solving it -- the other day, two boys were hitting each other with backpacks before the after-school program started, and I was shifting from foot to foot uneasily, watching them. All of a sudden, from out of nowhere, Mrs. Lyons appeared, and thundered,

"WHAT ARE YOU MEANT TO BE DOING??"

The boys instantly ran to their chairs and sat down, chastened, but I stood, debating the merits of graduate school, of the Peace Corps, of any number of future possible careers. What AM I meant to be doing?...

Well, now, at least, it's dinner time, and I'm off to go roast some fish.

It's a Hell of a Townnnn!

Sometimes, being at this school is hard. Not because of the endless nuances of the photocopier. Not because I only talk to adults half an hour a day; not because I'm on my feet in uncomfortable shoes. Being a teacher is hard mostly because I remember what it was like to be a kid.

This is especially apparent in the after-school program here. I'm a designated homework helper from 2:30 until 3:30; during that time, the powers that be demand ultimate concentration on one's homework from the instant one is done with one's snack. Granted, this is only for an hour, and I know it's practically impossible to get a child back into School Mode after he's been in Play Mode. Still, I can see the insolence in their eyes the instant they walk into the door. "You're not my mom. Or my teacher. What the hell?" If one said that to me, I'm not sure what I'd respond with.

One of the boys in the after-school program is restless both after school and in it. In class, O. draws ceaselessly on his folder as his Second Language teacher talks. He is ten, blond, with an intense expression. He is Polish, and can read and speak in Russian. He loves guns -- I often catch him pointing a piece of plastic that is shaped only vaguely like a rifle at other boys, going "Pppppppp!" at their faces. When I take that away, he continues undaunted, using his finger. It's a little scary, or would be if he didn't have such an enthusiastic, crazy brain.

Today, I watched him work at modifying the line drawings on his verb - forms worksheet. They were insipid scrawlings of children doing things like "move -- moved" and "walk -- walked". While Mrs. Lyons, the teacher, helped other boys, I watched O draw giant springs on the feet of a boy who was jumping, doodle large black spectacles on the face of the girl with the box. I told myself he probably had verb forms down anyways.

Still, Mrs. Lyons, when she noticed, was obligated to take his marker away, as she'd taken away his folder that had a halfway-finished drawing of a dragon on it. (Along with some characters in mock Chinese -- we'd been discussing Chinese New Year in class, and O.'s 'words' had been gleefully shot down by his classmate Timmy, who legitimately was from China).

I realized rather belatedly that getting him back on track had probably been my job, since I was a) watching him do it and b) after all there as a sort of apprentice teacher.

I think I always tend to let kids go too far. After school today, I sat with two boys while they snacked, preparing to make them shut up and look at their homework after one last graham cracker. But I looked away for a second, and then looked back to find one hitting the other on the head with his water bottle.

"Hey, there," I said. "If you keep going with that I'll have to eat it." (Why not, "stop it"?)

The one boy looked at me, set the water bottle down and then -- I have no idea why -- pushed it with his fingers like an air-hockey puck across the table.

I have no idea why I did this, either, but I scuttled my hands like claws towards it, seized it, looked greedily around, then took it beneath the table for "dinner". I heard them above me going, "She's gonna do it!"; I emerged to find them staring gleefully at me.

The puck boy went beneath the table, retrieved it, and started gnawing on it like a dinosaur wordlessly. I watched his teeth squish and rip at the plastic, but I still didn't say anything until another adult came by, shook her head, took it out of his hands, put it in his backpack, and said, "I think we'll have to separate these two".

For a second, I'd thought she'd meant me.

(I also love Roald Dahl, The Simpsons, A Series of Unfortunate Events, and Avatar, all of which the people of Ireland love. I should really be a student rather than a teacher.)