Ireland is for Lovers

Chapter 4

On Thursday, we took the 30-ish minute drive outside of the city, and went to the Hill of Tara, and St. Patrick's Church. Having been raised in the South, as well as being raised on Gone with the Wind, and also having a bit of a semi-morbid fascination with old cemeteries, this excursion was going to satisfy a long-standing fan-girl dream of mine.

We started at St. Patrick's, because the site is relatively small,and makes for a good lead-in to seeing the Hill. We wandered through the small church, which was built in the early 1800's, on the site of an earlier one*.

After taking a quick peek inside (as well as taking a few pictures of the huge stained-glass window), we took a walk through the graveyard. My love and fascination with old cemeteries hit an all-time high here. It's so old, whatever was engraved on the headstones has long been worn away with time and weather.

We moved on to Tara. The Hill of Tara was, according to tradition, the seat of the High Kings of Ireland*. But my interest in it is a little more, shall we say, literary?

As I said, I was raised in the South, and was thus raised on Gone with the Wind. We all know that the plantation that serves as sort of the centerpiece of the book, as well as the movie, was called Tara; it was given that name by Scarlett O'Hara's Irish-immigrant father. There was also a made-for-tv mini-series called 'Scarlett', that sees Scarlett arrive in Ireland after being caught in a bit of a scandal. After connecting with her father's family, one of her relatives takes her to see the namesake of her family's plantation, and she has a bit of a 'moment'.

As we climbed to the top of the hill, I was kind of imagining myself as Scarlett. I stood there and let the breeze whip around me, and soaked it in as best as I could. At one point, I sat down on the ground, and closed my eyes for a minute. Max gives me a questioning look, and says "You alright, Love?"

I looked up at him, and laughed as I said "Yeah, I'm just having a Scarlett O'Hara moment..." (I made him watch both Gone with the Wind and Scarlett one time, so he should hopefully get the reference)

He snorted a laugh, rolled his eyes, and offered me his hand as I went to stand up again. After my Scarlett moment, we decided to take the tours of the archaeological sites.

We got back to the city late in the afternoon, and right as we were walking in the apartment, Thomas called to ask if we would like to join him and Aileen in the Temple Bar district for dinner, as sort of a double-date. We accepted, and immediately started making moves to get ready to go out again.

While we were at dinner, I got a chance to really talk to both of them. Thomas works in IT, and Aileen is a dental hygienist. They share a small house on the west end of town, near Phoenix Park, they've been together for about five years, and they don't have any kids--yet.

Then they turned the conversation around on me; they wanted to know all the basics: where I grew up, where I currently live, the full story of how Max and I met, if I was seeing anyone back home, etc. I told them I had been casually seeing someone when Max came to visit a while back, and I ended it shortly after he went back home, but presently, I wasn't seeing anyone.

Of course, Aileen wanted to know about the guy I had been seeing, so I gave her the nutshell version of my and Matt's history, as well as why it ended. As I was telling her about it, that night replayed in my mind:

".....I've been thinking...." I said as I paused the movie and shifted to face him.

"Uh-oh, this can't be good if you're pausing James Dean...." he said with concern in his voice.

"....I can't do this anymore. Max's visit brought up a lot of old feelings, and reminded me of what I really want in a relationship. I want a whole relationship, not just half of one....."

Max had been chatting with Thomas, but suddenly started listening in on my and Aileen's conversation, because even though I had told him I had ended things with Matt shortly after he left,I didn't give him very many details.

After dinner, the four of us went up the street for drinks. When we got in the bar, and sat down, Aileen asked us what our plans for the weekend were. Max cocked his head toward me and said, "My mum has insisted that I bring her up to visit....."

Then to me, he says, "Oh, Sophia called while you were in the shower. She heard you were here, and she wants you and her to hang out."

I half-nodded and said that I would love to see his sister.

We only stayed at the bar for about an hour or so before heading home, on account of us planning to leave kind of early the next morning.

*a/n: per Wikipedia