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In a pub in a small town, for lunch. What surrounds me is the quiet murmur of Cork voices, three groups of men, a dozen total. It is something beyond language, this patter of pinched vowels. There’s two common sounds, a short "e" as in "bed", and the "oo" as in "pool." These apparently stand in for all the necessary vowel sounds. Consonants are barely whispered. The effect is a binary "eh" and "ooh," too fast to be speech. The ambient pub voice is more that of a small burbling brook. The real water sound, however, is from the cascade pouring from the rainspout outside, a harsh splatter onto stone.

I’ve been hydroplaning across Ireland the past few days. The storm cycle has been compressed. It’s been one continuous drench now for days, with a couple hours off a day for good behaviour. I didn’t receive even that today. The locals are remarking on the weather even more than usual. Weather is always remarkable by the locals in every place, of course, but the scale of inclemency is starting to make news. The roads, bad as they are, are ever the more white knuckle with the amount of standing water I encounter.

I had to detour back to the site of last night’s ceili to retrieve my vest. It’s generally the mark of a good time when it involves lost clothing. Which it largely was last night. This was a big event though, a dozen sets of eight people each, and if you weren't in one of the "good" sets toward the front (jealously guarded by their occupants), the dancing got a mite untidy. I’m a good dancer when I’m with good dancers. If it falls on me to know what to do next, however, I choke. It wasn’t all my fault, of course, but more than once a figure collapsed and I wasn’t able to rescue it; half the time I was responsible for the crash.

So the goal this afternoon is to finish last night’s sleep before heading out to Knocknagree for tonight’s dance. I didn’t make it home until half one, and I left shortly after the break. Alas, I’m a hard-wired morning person. These late hours don’t agree with me. It works for a few days if I just don’t change time zones when I arrive—the 8 hour shift is close to right. But I’m afraid my clock has reset itself to the default tab, and I can’t help it.

 29 October 2000

Outside of Killarney, Co. Kerry