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Arizona, Awesome Women, Books, Bridget Jones, Death and dying, Door into the Dark, Family, FInal wishes, Friendship, Grieving, Helen Fielding, Marriage, Memoir, Mourning, Northern Ireland, Ordinary Things, Poetry, saying goodbye, Seamus Heaney, The Devil Wears Prada, The Midnight Anvil, Wedding Anniversary, Wendy Cope, widowed
newly widowed ~ instructions not included
They tell me I am in a state of shock and to take one day at a time. They tell me he is in a far better place now. Really? How could any place be better than in our dining room next month to light sixteen candles on my daughter's birthday cake or in the audience to cheer our girl…
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Anahorish, Antrim, Arizona, Artisans, Being young, Belfast, Language matters, McClelland Irish Library, Memoir, Northern Ireland, Northern Ireland Culture, Ordinary Things, Phoenix, Phoenix Landmarks, Soundtracks of our Lives, Ted Hughes, The Diviner, The Forge, Writing
a cool whiskey for seamus heaney & me
No better way to end a night celebrating the poetry of Seamus Heaney than with a Powers whiskey and a bit of craic. The only thing missing was a turf fire, but this is Phoenix, Arizona, the weather still warm on the first Friday of October. No need yet for a hot whiskey, not the way my father makes it as a…
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Anahorish, California, Castledawson, grandmother, Memoir, Memoir, Mother Daughter Relationship, Ordinary Things, Poetry, Seamus Heaney, Seamus Heaney, Themes of Childhood
doing a dance for seamus heaney
Ironing shirts, folding sheets, the mundane tasks that Seamus Heaney transformed into magical spots of time that make me think of my mother back in Castledawson, County Derry a great armful of sheets rescued from the clothes-line before the rain begins to fall. Then, the folding, a precise ritual, my father her partner in a dance handed down from one generation…
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Belfast, Blogging, Brian Baird, cancer, Education, Fathers and sons, favorite teacher, Memoir, News, Northern Ireland, Seamus Heaney, Sectarianism, Social Media, television, The Diviner, The Forge, The Troubles, Themes of Childhood, Walter Kronkite, Writing
newsworthy: thank you, Brian Baird
Once upon a time, before news traveled at break-neck speed to our very smart phones and our Cable TV networks, we actually waited for it. We had no choice. When “the news” came on at teatime, it was serious business, and we paid attention. It wasn’t about a new animal born at the zoo or a wardrobe malfunction of someone famous. When…
