Ireland... on the other side of the rainbow.

Every half hour I check the Internet waiting for Irene to rear her ugly head. After all she is looking quite ugly after she stole the last two days of my vacation as well as my husband's Ironman event. We woke up on Friday in Killarney and many many miles later, we pulled into our driveway in Connecticut. Wearily we fell into bed after midnight. Peter marveled at the fact that you could wake up in one part of the world and go to sleep across an ocean all in a day. In many ways this trip has given us so much while never letting us forget  how so easily things can be taken away. The entire experience was parenthesized by a beginning marred by poor health and hospital visits and in the end, a mad rush to make it on the last plane out of Ireland for days. The good and bad are inevitably what would make our time in Ireland permanently etched into our memories. This sandwich is filled with enough nutrition for our soul that should last for much time to come.  Before I even had my passport stamped at Kennedy Airport, I was longing to return to Ireland. I long for the simplicity of the place. I long for the sense of community and the warmth of it's people. I long for the maritime sky where within the frame of a photo, you can see brilliant blues and greens blended perfectly with shades of rainy grey. I long for natural beauty thats comes in 360 degree views.  I have no doubt that this longing will bring me back someday and hopefully my children will remember the magic of the place. Until then, Irene lurks in the shadows of the dead calm of Connecticut and reality has once again come knocking.  But this storm will pass and at the end of it's rainbow, Ireland will be calling.