Little good to say, so back to Ireland

Jack still doesn’t have a physics teacher so we’ve hired one (if that is not antithetical to the mission of public education…), I just watched a professional dog walker let four pups pee and crap all over my front garden (non-yard green space is EVERYWHERE around), a guy laid on his horn this morning when I stopped for a school bus letting elementary schoolers board, and I was nearly hit by another driver who seemed to feel it her right to turn left because she wanted to. Italy has elected a hard-core right-winger who cozies up to people like Steve Bannon, Berlusconi, and the other right-wing Italian political parties, trump is still not in jail, and high schoolers in VA are walking out en masse today because Gov Youngkin is trying to enact anti-transgender legislation. You go, students! I am totally with you!

I am really pretty sick of all this crap, and I am also sick of mosquitoes and still heartbroken over Federer’s retirement.

So, back to Ireland. We paused as I was about to share Day 6 of my Ring of Kerry tour. We began by driving through Cahersiveen, home of Monsignor O’Flaherty, a significant member of the Catholic resistance to Nazism during WWII. He was responsible for saving ~6,500 Allied soldiers and Jews! Thank you, Sir!

Then to Killorglin where, every August, the Puck Fair is held. As I learned, most Irish towns have annual festivals of which they are enormously proud. Killorglin’s is one of Ireland’s oldest festivals and involves men heading into the local mountains to capture (kindly) a wild goat and bring it back to town. There, a chosen girl anoints the goat king (King Puck), it is tied in the center of the festivities, and everyone drinks and celebrates (and cares for the goat) for three days. The goat is then returned to the spot it was found and released.

Signs were everywhere, for the Fair was quickly approaching. I was quite sorry to miss it, frankly, but maybe another time. As you can see in this article and the following photo from said article, it was extremely hot at this year’s festival and King Puck received hourly vet visits and plenty of cold water and shade. Delightful!

I do regularly wonder if the chosen goat is enormously confused during its three days away from its flock, if it is then happy to return, and if the others know and/or miss it during its absence. Hmm.

Netherlands PS + camp

I truly loved hearing from so many of you after my Netherlands post, and I apologize for not having replied yet; we have, in the meantime, gone to Maine to pick the boys up and drive us all home. Since arriving back in MD last night, I have done 9 loads of laundry (no live ticks or empty milk jugs this year; but, more silverware and some rocks, and we’re down three more towels), purchased groceries that filled the cart beyond full (as the evidence below shows), and prepped for a new driver’s license (for Jack) appointment tomorrow.

I am both astonished and delighted by the entrenchment of dirt in what were, six weeks ago, new socks for both boys. A hat tip to you, kiddos, for living big in nature. Some of these are not salvageable, but I’m giving most of them my best effort because they carried my kids through happiness and dirt, tough times and wild life. And all of that is good info to remember and become wiser by.

As the tenth load spins in the room abutting my office, I am thinking about how long ago Europe feels but also how my time there remains sustentative. Earlier this year, my dear friend Amanda said something to the effect of “alone travel is something to always make time for. I do it once a year.” Like me, A has two children. Hers are younger, so I really admire her commitment. But she’s right. Going alone when you are rarely alone is a great sort of challenge. It doesn’t appeal to or benefit all, but for those who crave growth and adventure, such travel can provide the best of both.

In Amsterdam, I came across a pair of shoes I’d been eyeing stateside and really wanted. They’re a Converse-Comme des Garçons collaboration that I just hadn’t managed to find/deal with/purchase before I left. I mentioned them to Tom, and because he is a weirdly good researcher, he naturally found them at a store on one of our favorite streets in Amsterdam: Prinsengracht.

The precise pair I wanted wasn’t available in my size, but I quite liked the available option so brought it up to the register. The solo employee was a typically-tall (tall!) Dutch woman who appeared effortlessly chic though wearing an oversized tee, oversized jeans, and many barrettes in her hair (that seemed unnecessary). At the counter I said, “what do you think?” referring to hip shoes that seemed at least a decade younger than I am.

With total sincerity, she looked at me and said, “It doesn’t matter at all what I think. It only matters if you like them.” Perhaps seeing my American whatever she said, “I love them; they’re very hip.” And I do love that so much about the Netherlands. Practical and honest and largely unconcerned with others’ opinions. It’s all downright aspirational, and I have since loved wearing those high-tops and embracing that spirit. It’s taken me 4 decades to really fly my own flag, and doing so is so GD fun and liberating.

Covid strikes, as does some malaise. So, random thoughts 'n funny shit to share

I gotta be honest: everything feels vastly stupid right now. Tom and Ol returned home Wednesday night from an extended family trip to the Grand Canyon; both had Covid. On Thursday, Jack’s last day of school, they decamped to WV while J and I kept everything crossed that we would not get sick. What that means is that we haven’t spent any real time together since then whilst in the same house. This is vaguely stressful and depressing. He feels fine. I do not. Where are my PCR results? I dunno.

What I do know is that my sister and her kids arrived on Wednesday, and Oliver has not seen them at all, I have seen them briefly behind a mask, and lucky negative Jack got to spend the day with them.

What I do know is that the boys and I are supposed to leave for Maine on Thursday, as camp move-in is Friday. Oliver has to test negative on both Thursday and Friday to get to move in. He tested positive, again, today.

What I do know is that the Texas state GOP just enshrined into its platform that Biden didn’t win the 2020 election. This is bullshit, but the largest state GOP has decided it’s fact. Just for fun! Because, “alternative facts!” Which is shorthand for, “we’re snowball racing into fascism and about 3 Republicans care.”

What I do know is that a weekend we were all looking forward to was spoiled by Covid and that the idea that this is now endemic could really blow. Endemic like the flu is totally doable. Endemic like unless you mask and distance you get sick 3+x/year and it could lead to long-Covid is absolute shit. It’s like NOT life. And really, I think that is further indication of everything just breaking completely apart at the seams.

Today, some assholes in Tennessee had a White Lives Matter rally, and someone in Baltimore wrote and distributed a neighborhood-wide letter accusing a neighbor of decorating their yard in “relentlessly gay” fashion. “There are Christian children” here. Have y’all ever met a child who didn’t love a rainbow and twinkly lights? Also, it is 2022, private property, and NOT EVERYONE IS CHRISTIAN or straight, thank god.
Jack asked if we could decorate our house in relentlessly gay fashion, and I said, yes, absolutely. Truly, America is so goddamned stupid and pathetic in so many ways.

Because I am frustrated, pissed, repulsed, and glum, I share with you variously funny things I seem to have saved over the past year.

I recognize that “fuck” is the common, and frequent, thread uniting these saves (see also: asshole), but really, is anything far off? Rand Paul is SUCH an asshole; that turkey has accosted MANY a person; crypto is both dumb and an enormous environmental degradation; Marj and BoBo are twats, at best; no one is fine; and honest to god, if one of my children tries to explain Magic the Gathering or one of several video games once more, I will either A) die a la Yoda, or B) ugly cry like ScarJo.

These are basic, unassailable facts, and I’m sticking to them.