Dublin, Ireland

The time has finally come to finish off that story I began to tell, I think I began to tell it about 21 months ago. I continued it in bits and pieces, little snippets of my ordinary and extraordinary days. Now it seems like a dream, a very good dream but a dream all the same. I search desperately for concrete evidence that it was much more than that. The proof is in the friends I have kept from all over the world, in the little books of memories, in the songs I hear that remind me of a certain place and a certain person and in the way my eyes now look at the world in a different light from before.
The last few weeks after the wedding were filled with small Mexican towns, beautiful ruins and a lot more tacos. I travelled with Stefano, Claudia and Livia to Guanajuato, St. Miguel and Queritaro. When the girls flew back to Italy Stefano and I continued our journey to Puebla and Cuetzalan, which was one of my favourite places in Mexico. Cuetzalan is a small town in the mountains of Puebla filled with the smells of hot food and the rain washing over the cobbled streets.
It’s over two weeks ago now since I sat in the lounge at LA airport for what seemed like a ridiculously long time, security measures of our age give plenty of thinking time for the weary traveller to draw conclusions about their mobile life. I tried to sum it up, to think about where I had been for the past 21 months, how I’ve danced in the Flavellas of Rio de Janeiro, I’ve dived with Sharks and giant green sea turtles on the great barrier reef, I’ve watched the mist rise up on Machu Piichu and the rain pour down on Valparaiso. I wanted to process it all in my head to think about the way all this has changed me and had such a huge impact on my life but my subconscious had other plans. It knew that this conclusion was far too big for one little head, it turned on that virtual walkman full blast and played over and over again a song I hadn’t heard in a very long time, I think it was by ‘the Stunning’ although feel free to correct me if I’m wrong, it went like this…..“Celebrate, this party’s over, I’m going home” (mind you it was only that one line of the chorus stuck on repeat due to a dodgy download).
I had the sneaky little celebratory smile the whole journey knowing that my parents and most of my friends had no idea I was on my way back to Dublin. It was a surprise indeed and even though it took Dad a few moments to realise he wasn’t dreaming (afraid to say anything in case they all thought he was mad), a word from Louise reassured him that it was true, his little girl was home to torment them all once again.
As a coming home present I brought the scorching sunshine of Mexico the cheer up the last of this Irish summer. I’ve spent the past 2 weeks feeling as if I had never left, meeting friends and Ma for coffees like I always did, Playing football with the dog (he’s lost some ball control skills but I’ll soon have him back in shape) and going for pints in the many ‘smoke free’ pubs of Dublin.
So that’s it, that’s the end of it, this travel blog has officially come to a close, thanks for reading and thanks for following this little journey with me. If you liked it you can buy me a pint when you see me if not you should probably buy me a pint anyway in sympathy. I’ll probably continue blogging, sometimes even the ‘home bird’ has a few things to say.