Change is Hard

Just as I crested the top of the stairs on Thursday, I saw the tram pulling away from our stop.  The next tram wasn't due for 17 minutes.

In the grand scheme of Important Things, this was not one of them.  There would be another tram coming. The weather was beautiful so it wouldn't be unpleasant to wait. It wasn't like I were going anywhere emergent or like I were on a tight schedule. There wasn't any reason for this to cause me to cry.

And yet, it did.  I stood at the railing of the platform, looking out toward the distant mountains and struggling to keep the tears from escaping my eyes and rolling down my cheeks.

After finishing my errands and on the way home, I started thinking about my reaction. It seemed an exaggerated response to such a minor irritation, and I don't like it when things don't make sense.

It struck me that my life here feels out of synch. Like the tram pulling away just moments before my arrival, I am just slightly out of step with my environment. It's like trying to dance the waltz to a song with a 7/8 time signature.  Or trying to listen to the radio station that's just slightly out of tune.

I feel like we live in a hotel room.  With the exception of two bookcases and a rocking chair, none of the furniture is ours, none of it is something we specifically chose. I'm fearful of putting any art on the walls, afraid that even a removable fastening might damage the paint. Moving into a furnished place has been both a blessing and a curse - nice that we didn't have to bring much with us and pay more shipping costs, unfortunate in that we got what we got.  I'm a creature that's sensitive to my environment and it just feels so sterile, so uncomfortable, not cozy at all.

I don't feel like I fit in anywhere. I feel like a tourist, an "other," someone who doesn't really belong here. I don't have any kind of community and, even for an introvert, that can feel very lonely and scary.

Nothing feels familiar, even the places I've visited multiple times.  Back in Minnesota, my cubicle at work felt familiar. The library felt familiar. The grocery store felt familiar. The streets I drove on every day felt familiar. Seeing our resident squirrels and bunnies and deer felt familiar.

I guess I thought I'd have an easier time acclimating, which is ridiculous considering that I've met me before. Would it have been easier if we'd moved to another US state rather than a completely new country?  Maybe.  Maybe not.  I think I've mentioned before that I didn't seem to have this much trouble when I moved from Minnesota to Texas but the circumstances were different and I was different.  That was 30 years ago.

My inner critic chides me for complaining and kvetching.  You ASKED for this gift, she says. You told the Universe this is what you wanted, and look at you - not even being able to appreciate this opportunity because you're too focused on what's lacking.  What are you doing to fix the situation?

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that I haven't done a very good job of integrating here either.  I haven't thrown myself head-first into finding ways to assimilate - attending cultural events, trying to get together with like-minded people, doing what I CAN do to make our apartment more homey.  So, much of the responsibility for my current predicament is resting at my own feet.

I've been getting lots of signs lately to "let go."  You can't grasp or accept the here-and-now if you're still holding onto the past. You're wasting energy dragging what-was into what-is. Back in 2005, I had a tarot reading, and the only thing I remember the guy saying was that I spend a lot of energy wishing things were different instead accepting the way things actually were.

When you have separation anxiety, letting go is difficult.  The release of something, the absence or distance, is the reason for the anxiety, after all.  But is holding onto my previous life keeping me from flourishing in my present one?

Joseph Campbell has a great quote where he said "We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”

In a couple of weeks, we'll have been here for nine months.  It's interesting to me that I've been seeing a lot of "rebirth" signs along my path recently, just as my emotions are coming to a head.  Perhaps all of this time leading up to next month has been a gestation period for me, and I'm getting ready to burst into a new life.  Richard Bach wrote "What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly."

Change is hard.  Growth is hard.  Being born is hard.  But the alternative - stagnation, paralysis, death - doesn't sound all that appealing to me.

So.  It's onward and upward.  I've got a lot of work to do.

(The following is a vision board I created many, many years ago.  I actually think I brought it along when we moved here.  For someone so resistant to change, it's funny how this board was all about change.  And there's that butterfly again.)

Beyond the Sea

Eli had scheduled vacation for this past Thursday and Friday.  I asked him if we could visit the sea on one of those days, and he was in very enthusiastic agreement.

We planned our trip for Thursday, thinking it might be less crowded.  We haven't been here long enough to see if people take many three-day weekends but if they do, we figured we'd be safer going out on a day other than Friday.

Miraculously, Bus 7 was on time and soon we were on our way toward Killiney Beach.  We passed a playground along the route, and I noticed they had a merry-go-round there.  It brought me back to the days of riding on a contraption like that as a kid, holding tightly to the bar while my impish cousin tried to spin it so fast that the riders would be dislodged and flung off.  This playground also had a merry-go-round for one - it looked like one of those papasan chairs that seemed to be all the rage back in the 70s.

After a 15-20 minute ride, we got out in Dun Laoghaire and walked a few blocks to get to the DART (Dublin Area Rapid Transit) platform.  Unlike the sleek, silver, needle-nosed LUAS trams, the DART train is boxy and square-faced.  It was my first time on the DART, and I enjoyed it.  The seats were more comfortable - seemed larger and the seat backs were taller - and the ride was quiet.

The third stop let us out at Killiney Beach, right next to the water.  I wanted to visit a restroom before we went down to the beach, and Google Maps told me there was a public restroom close-by.  At the entrance to the car park, there was a sign with a bathroom symbol that pointed to the right so off we started down the sidewalk.

After walking for quite some time, we started to get into a residential area, and I began to think we weren't in the correct spot.  Eli pulled up Google Maps on his phone, and we figured out the bathrooms....were located in the car park.

Back we went toward the car park.  But it wasn't a total waste.  I got some extra steps in and I noticed one of the mileage signs along the DART track said 9 3/4 (for Harry Potter fans, you'll remember that Platform 9 3/4 was how you got to the Hogwarts Express train).

The restroom itself posed another conundrum.  There was no wording on the doors - just these medieval-looking woodcut plaques (these are not my photos - I grabbed them off the internet):

We assumed the image with the longer hair pointed to the women's restroom, so in I went.  And it was pretty gross so I stayed only as long as necessary.

We crossed the street and walked down some stairs, finally on the beach.  Our stretch of beach was pretty rocky - lots of small stones and not many patches of sand.  It made walking challenging since the terrain was rough and shifting.

I stood and took a deep breath.  The scent was fresh rather than being briny or fishy.  A handful of people were in the water, but more were simply sitting on the beach, enjoying the bright blue sky and strong sun.  One woman was slinging a ball into the water, much to the delight of her spaniel dog.  A small child who was walking slightly ahead of us was amusing himself by grabbing a handful of small stones and half-spinning like a discus thrower before opening his hand to release them toward the sea.  I walked carefully around the boy, on the off-chance his hand didn't open at the correct time and we had to dodge any incoming rocks.  I had fully expected it to be quite windy by the water, but there wasn't much wind at all.

We drew closer to the water and began our stroll, waves rushing in and out, making that wonderful shoosh sound as the water dragged over rocks and sand.  (Sound on to hear the sea.)

I was kissed by the sea.  Or at least, my right foot was.  An aggressive wave snuck up on me, and with the slope, the wet rocks, and the wet sand beneath, I wasn't able to scramble back before the water sluiced over my shoe.

We stopped in an area that didn't have many people around, put our light jackets on the rocky ground, and planted ourselves.

I had fully expected that being by the water would make me cry, but it didn't.  I don't know if I weren't allowing myself to tap into my emotions, fearing a floodgate would open and I'd be sobbing on the beach.  Or if I just didn't feel connected.  Being near Lake Superior in Minnesota never failed to bring tears to my eyes and uncap wells of deep-seated feelings.  Maybe it's because Minnesota was home to me (still is, in some respects), and this place just hasn't sunk into my bones yet.  It was still pleasant being by the water, but it didn't have the emotional pull that I had expected.

As the waves began encroaching on our location, Eli and I got up and walked farther down the beach.  We encountered beached kelp, beautiful rocks, and I found a shell.  We also saw a crab leg and a pile of white feathers, signifying a bad end for a sea bird.  If I had my ruthers, I would've weighed down my backpack with all of the pretty stones I found but, as Eli said, it's better to just take memories/photos than objects.  I did, however, steal a small heart-shaped rock.  I felt like it was a sign telling me Lissa was near.

By this time, it was nearing lunchtime and we were hungry, so it was back aboard the DART to head for Dun Laoghaire.  Not knowing what restaurants were in the area, we started walking along the main drag.  We had passed a Nando's not long after getting off the train but, as we had been to Nando's once before, I thought we should perhaps try a new place.

Eventually, after many blocks, we decided to return to Nando's as nothing else looked promising.  At Nando's, you can either go up to the counter to place your order OR scan a QR code with your phone and do it online.  Eli entered our order on his phone, and we settled in to wait.  We had both requested pop - they have a soft drink station where you get your own drink, but you have to wait for a server to bring you a glass.

After a good 10 or 15 minutes, I finally got up and approached a server.  She apologized that no one had brought glasses to us yet and went to retrieve one for each of us.  And then we waited.  And waited.  And waited some more.  At one point, a server came over to let us know they were out of broccoli so Eli had to select a different side.

After what seemed like a weirdly elongated period of time, our food arrived.  I had ordered the butterfly chicken with medium-heat peri-peri spice, as well as peri-seasoned fries and garlic bread.  I was grateful that I'd only went with the medium heat because as it was, my lips were tingling from the spice.

Lunch complete, we walked up the street to the bus stop.  There was an ice cream shop just a few doors down from the stop, and I was tempted to get a cone.  They had soft-serve that looked just like Dairy Queen.  But our bus was only 10 minutes away, and you're not supposed to have food/drink on public transit (but people do) so I passed, not wanting to have to bolt down an ice cream cone.

The birds in the urban areas are fairly fearless.  They equate humans with food and, because humans are messy pigs, their reasoning is sound.  There were a couple pigeons strutting near us, looking for scraps.  They had just discovered a small piece of bread but before they could enjoy it, this large fellow swooped down and took it away, swallowing it in one gulp.

This church - St. Michael's - was right across the street from the bus stop.  I liked the look of the tower, so I snapped a photo.

Our bus was right on time again.  Between our recent jaunt to Stillorgan and this trip, I had the best bus-luck since I've been here.  [Sidenote: That luck ran out yesterday when we were trying to get to the grocery store in Ballybrack and our bus was delayed to the point of never showing up at all.]  The lower level of the bus was packed so we moved up the stairs to the second deck.  I had never been up on the second level, and it was harrowing to navigate the narrow stairwell and walk to a seat while the bus was in motion, especially when it made a turn while I was just getting to the top of the steps.

It was an interesting perspective to be so high above street level, eyesight even with the signage on stores and such.

After an unremarkable and quiet ride, we were home.  I'm sure we'll visit the sea again in the near future.

And I'm getting ice cream next time.

Cornerstone

As our current apartment lease expires in August, we've started looking into different places to live.  This apartment is fine, for the most part, but it's just not where we want to be.  There aren't many shops or restaurants around us, and it would be nice to live in an area with more options.

I pop into the Ireland real estate site every now and again to see what's out there.  I checked out an apartment complex called The Cornerstone, which is in Stillorgan.  Stillorgan is about 4 miles from us to the north.

We needed to take bus E1 to our destination, and the bus stop for this route is over by our veterinary clinic.  As the cats were nearly out of dry food, this was one of those "two birds with one stone" types of situations.  Eli went to pick up the food while I sat at the bus stop.  My ankle gives me trouble every now and again, so I thought I would save some steps where I could.

Just as Eli exited the vet clinic, our bus was headed toward us so that was great timing.  (The bus must not've known I was going to be there because otherwise, with my bus-luck, it would've either been late or not arrived at all.)

After a 15-20 minute ride, we got off the bus and had a short walk to the apartment complex.  We wanted to get the lay of the land around the building - see if there were anything that might pique the cats' interest (trees, people walking with pets, cars).  It's important to us that they have some kind of stimulation because they don't have much of that here.  Depending upon the apartment orientation, there was either some nature or a busy street.

Stillorgan Shopping Centre is right across the street from the apartment building, so we wandered over to see what stores were available.  There was a young couple with a pretty long-haired dachshund, so I started cooing at the dog and the couple stopped.

The dog (we failed to get his name) wasn't having it.  He went into protect mode, barking and lunging at us.  The woman squatted down to talk to the dog, and we chatted with the man.  I told him that I'd had a dachshund while growing up, and I said that Heidi was forever staring up at trees, hunting chipmunks.  Once, she was chasing a chipmunk, and it reversed course, plowing into her.  Neither animal seemed to know what to do and froze, before the chipper started running again toward the tree with Heidi in pursuit.

After these few minutes, the dog suddenly decided that we weren't a threat.  He came over and sniffed at our shoes, allowing pettings and licking our hands.

We walked around the mall (there are TWO bookstores, y'all, and the Stillorgan Library is temporarily housed on the second level).  At the mall and up and down the street, there were multiple restaurant options that would cater to Eli's vegetarian diet - and an Eddie Rockets (50's style diner) that would cater to mine.  Just down the hill was a vet clinic (interestingly, you'd take a street called The Hill to get there), about a 5-minute walk from the apartment.  The bus stops are very close so transport would be a breeze.

There are five separate buildings/wings to the complex and they're each named after an author/actor/artist with links to the area:  Maeve Binchy, Dermot Morgan, William Orpen, Eavan Boland, and Samuel Beckett.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we might be able to move there in a few months' time. The area seemed to check a lot of boxes for us.  We reached out to the management company but since we're not moving until August, they asked us to reach out to them again in June/July.

We walked to a bus stop across the street from the apartment so we could head towards Dundrum.  Each of us had a book holding at the Dundrum Library, and we were going to catch the tram back home.  We only had to wait a couple minutes before the L25 bus rumbled up.  Again, the bus must've been unaware of my presence because it was a painless transaction.

After a short trip, we collected our books from the library and made the quick walk to the Luas platform.

I don't want to get my hopes up.  There might not be an available apartment for us when it's time to move or they might reject our application.  So I'll keep looking at other options but Cornerstone is definitely at the top of the list.

In the Club

 A while ago, I found out about a club called American Women's Club of Dublin (AWCD).  As the name suggests, it's made up of transplanted women from North America, and they have monthly gatherings (girls' night out, book club, wine club) as well as special events (afternoon tea, 4th of July, Canadian thanksgiving, football tailgate).  They also participate in some philanthropic ventures and have health/wellness meetups for folks who want to go hiking, play tennis, collect sea glass.

For whatever reason, I kept dragging my heels when I thought about joining.  I don't know why.  The annual fee was only €95 which wasn't bad.  Since we don't have a vehicle, I reached out to the membership team to see if club activities were easily accessible via public transportation and was told that they were.

I have no support system here which I realized was a source of anxiety for me.  As much as I'm an introvert, I also find that I'm more comfortable when I have people close-by that I can reach out to if needed.  Someone I worked with at Sherburne County was on a vacation in the Dominican Republic with his family mid-March, and he tragically became ill and passed away.  That further heightened my anxiety because it further reinforced the idea that if something were to happen to Eli, I'm alone.

So I took the plunge and submitted my application.

There was a new member meeting scheduled to be held March 27 at a board member's home.  I like to be able to do a dry run when I'm traveling to an unfamiliar location; I didn't get a chance to make a practice run so come March 27, I was flying blind.  If you know anything about me, you know that I do NOT like uncertainty.  To quell my nerves, I tried to frame this as an exciting adventure.

The meeting was slated to begin at 10 a.m., and I had a one-hour bus ride ahead of me, so I was at the Brides Glen bus stop around 8:20 a.m.  I figured that would give me some wiggle room in case something unexpected happened.

The buses do not automatically halt at every stop.  You have to flag them down if you're at the stop; if you're on the bus, you hit the "stop" button to let the driver know you want to get off.

Brides Glen is the alpha and omega, the beginning and end, of the route for Bus 7.  When the bus drops off passengers at Brides Glen, it parks a few yards up the street from the actual bus stop.  And then it sits there, lurking, taunting the poor souls haunting the stop.  I'm not sure why this happens - if the driver takes a quick break or if s/he does a quick-clean of the bus or...I'm not sure.

Eventually, Bus 7 lurched down the street and halted at my wave.  Eli has ridden more buses than I have, and he suggested writing down the names of a few of the stops that came before the stop I wanted.  That way, I would know when my stop was approaching and could be prepared to signal the bus to pull over at the appropriate time.

When you get on the bus and you're paying your fare by using a Leap (transport) card, you put your card on a reader and let the driver know where you're headed.  S/he punches in some information, and this is what deducts the appropriate amount from your card.

I put my card on the reader and told the bus driver, "St. Mary's Road South, please."  He asked me to repeat it, and I did so.  And he said something about not being sure where that was.

An inauspicious beginning, to be sure.

Fortunately, I had my list of stops and I told him it was right after the stop at Landsdowne, and he appeared to know where that was.

We traveled through towns that were new to me, and I kept my head on a swivel, taking it all in.  I got my first glimpse of the Irish Sea which peeked between the buildings on our trip through Dun Laoghaire, saw lots of tulips and daffodils swaying in the road medians, noticed that many houses in the area had names like Eaglewood and Travelsea on plaques screwed to fences and doors.

About halfway through the route, the driver pulled over to a stop and shut off the engine.  He opened the doors, and I heard him say "Is she okay?"  I didn't see what had happened but apparently a woman at the stop had some type of medical issue.  I don't know if she passed out or what.  One of the passengers also got off the bus to offer assistance - I assume she was a medical professional of some kind.  After a delay, the afflicted woman boarded the bus and we continued on our way.

A few minutes and a few miles passed, and the passenger who had offered assistance asked the driver to stop as the ill woman wanted to get off.  Kindly, the passenger got off with the stricken person, not wanting her to be alone.  The driver ensured that it was okay for him to go on without her before pulling back into traffic.

It was around 9:45 a.m. when I stepped off the bus.  I had mapped the walking route from the bus stop to the member's house, but I have a lousy sense of direction and managed to get lost.  It doesn't help that streets here don't have signage so I was having trouble knowing exactly where I was.  I knocked on two doors, figuring I was not in the right place when no one answered.  I had jotted down the host's phone number so, trying not to panic, I gave her a call to let her know I was having trouble finding her house.  It didn't help that the CityMapper app I was using on my phone showed me the route from the bus stop to her house - but didn't have a "you are here" dot to show where *I* was.  Not helpful.

Fortunately, I wasn't too far afield and gratefully found my way to the correct house.

A handful of people were already there, chatting in groups of twos and threes.  I struck up a conversation with a gal named Meg.  She mentioned she was from Minnesota.  I asked her when she'd gotten to Ireland and what had brought her here.  She said her husband had been transferred, and they'd arrived in August.  I asked where her husband worked, and she said Element - which is where Eli works.  We laughed about the small-world serendipity of our meet-up.  I got her husband's name and when I talked with Eli later that evening, he said he did indeed know her husband.

One of the attendees owns a bakery/catering business, and she brought some delightful baked goods with her.  We all snagged some treats and settled down around the dining table.

Noreen, our host, welcomed us and talked a bit about the club.  Other board members explained their roles and gave more information about the club's mission and such.  Then it was time for everyone to introduce themselves.  And this is always my reaction:

I do not like being in the spotlight and, without fail, this situation triggers amnesia in me - I don't remember who I am, where I came from, or anything I've ever done.

They didn't start with me, which was good - and bad.  I followed a woman named Aimee, who said that her grandmother was a Holocaust survivor and that her (Aimee's) brother had written a book about her grandmother's experience.  Aimee is a member of SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild) and she narrated the audiobook.  Aimee followed a woman named Jennifer, who had been a homicide investigator as well as a judge in the violent crime division.  And Jennifer followed a woman named Caryna, who owned the bakery and had an interesting story to tell about living in Italy.

So Aimee wrapped up her tale, and everyone's eyes swung to me.  I laughed and said, "Yeah, after that?  I'm out."

But I managed to tell a bit about my life, although if you asked me to recount what I said, I would have no idea because I pretty much dissociated while speaking.

My return bus was supposed to arrive at the Haddington Road stop around 12:30 p.m. so at 12:20 p.m., I said my goodbyes and headed out.  I checked the transit information online, and it didn't show a bus scheduled for 12:30; instead, it was showing 1 p.m.

In the event that something went screwy with my return trip, I had written out some instructions for an alternate way to get back home.  I crossed the street to again wait for Bus 7 at the St. Mary's Road South stop, which was scheduled to arrive at 12:40 p.m.

I got off the bus at Clare Street and turned right.  My destination was the Luas tram station at Dawson Street, and I hoped I was heading in the right direction.  When I saw the sign for Costa Coffee, I relaxed as that was my landmark for turning left.  I knew when I saw Hodges Figgis (the bookstore), I was fine.

At this point, everyone reading along should clap for me.  You don't know how big a deal this was.  Eli is the type to just show up somewhere and calmly figure out how to get where he needs to be.  I am the type to curl up into a tight ball and sob if I have the slightest inkling that I'm lost.

My tram was due in 10 minutes so I stood and took in my surroundings.  It was very hard NOT to go across the street and disappear into the bookstore.  However, I was exhausted.  Two hours of interaction with a group of strangers drained all the energy from me, and I just wanted to be home.

There was a group of young schoolchildren in a flock just up the street from where I stood, and they were enthusiastically belting out a medley of unfamiliar tunes.  And then they started singing "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" - in Irish.

I boarded the tram and apparently, everyone else in City Centre had the same idea because the train was packed.  I was jammed back between the tram cockpit and the door - and then four or five more people got on at the next stop, so I was even more crowded than before. 

I have issues with claustrophobia.  If I know I can get to an escape route, it calms me but in this case, there was no escape route available.  The door I was standing by wasn't the door that was opening at each stop (there are exits on both sides of the tram, but the only door you can open is the one that leads to the platform).  I had to focus on deep breathing, looking out at the sky, telling myself that if there were an emergency both sets of doors would probably open automatically.

Thankfully, as we got further from City Centre, the train began to empty, and my nervous system calmed again.

I had been away for about six hours, so the cats had something to say when I walked into the apartment.  I got them something to eat and then wearily collapsed on the couch, glad that I went but doubly glad to be home.