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9/11, Belfast, Boston Marathon 2013, Damian Gorman, Facebook, Health Activist Writer's Challenge 2013, Memoir, Northern Ireland, Poetry, Seamus Heaney, Seamus Heaney, Seamus Heaney, Soundtracks of our Lives, television, The Troubles, The Troubles
boston 2013 . . . without warning
Until September 11th 2001, I had taken for granted the sense of security I felt as a woman who had traded in Northern Ireland for America. Foolishly, I had too quickly dropped my guard, almost forgetting anything can happen. I grew complacent and smug, confident that – unlike her mother – my American daughter would never have to look twice at…
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Belfast, Bullying, Damian Gorman, Eleventh Night Bonfires, Family, Friendships, Jilly Cooper, Memoir, Northern Ireland Culture, Sectarianism, Soundtracks of our Lives, The Troubles, Themes of Childhood
skipping out of northern ireland – an incendiary subject
“On yonder hill there stands a lady Who she is, I do not know. All she wants is gold and silver, All she wants is a handsome beau . . .” My breath quickens with every tentative jump over the skipping rope, its ends twirled by two girls who are singing about the lady standing on the hill. I am wearing…
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Art, Belfast, Breast Cancer Treatment, Cancer Language, Culture of breast cancer, Damian Gorman, Damian Gorman, Memoir, Poetry, Seamus Heaney, Seamus Heaney, Survivorship, The Troubles, The Troubles, Themes of childhood, Writing
Please don’t call me a cancer survivor . . .
“He not being busy born, is busy dying.” ~ Bob Dylan it is the first Sunday in June, a day set aside to celebrate cancer survivorship. Did you know this “treasured worldwide celebration of life” has been on the calendar for twenty-six years? I wonder would I have been any the wiser had I not been diagnosed myself. So who…
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9/11, Belfast, Boston Marathon 2013, Damian Gorman, Facebook, Health Activist Writer's Challenge 2013, Memoir, Northern Ireland, Poetry, Seamus Heaney, Seamus Heaney, Seamus Heaney, Soundtracks of our Lives, television, The Troubles, The Troubles
boston . . . without warning
Until September 11th, I had taken for granted the sense of security I felt as a woman who had traded in Northern Ireland for America. Foolishly, I had too quickly dropped my guard, almost forgetting anything can happen. I grew complacent and smug, confident that – unlike her mother – my American daughter would never have to look twice at an…