We arrived in Dublin at about 7:30 am local time, about an hour ahead of our scheduled arrival. A wheelchair was waiting for me on the ramp to the terminal. Our lovely young special assistant with a lilting Dublin accent guided my chair through airport, waiting while we collected our luggage, then got us to the head of the taxi line for a cab to our small hotel in the heart of one of Dubin’s most beautiful neighborhoods.

         Kilronan House was set among a row of elegant homes on Adelaide Street, a stone’s throw from St. Stephens Green. Two columns and a black-and-white tile floor graced the entrance where welcoming light drew us in to the cozy interior. Just ahead, the manger sat a desk in the parlor-like lobby. He was a small, handsome man in a starched white shirt. He stood as we entered and greeted us warmly. It felt like being welcomed by family into their home.

         Vio, whom I had corresponded with by email, had the accent and features of a Middle Eastern, and his hospitality reminded me of the people I had met in Palestine. No more gracious hosts anywhere. We would find that all of the staff seemed to be of the same nationality and all were blessed with the gift of hospitality.

         We arrived at Kilronan House at about 9:30 am after driving straight through Dublin’s inner city traffic for nearly an hour. We had booked our room for the previous night (thanks to Jane Grady for that tip) so we could have a good rest before setting out to sese Dublin. Vio gestured towards the dining room, just through a door off the lobby, and invited us to get settled and then come down for breakfast. He would not let us touch our bags, and carried them himself up the one flight to our room. The room was very bright with a skylight over the bed and in the bathroom. We had a king-sized bed (two beds pushed together in European fashion), window seat, desk and chair (lucky for Santo who loves to sit and write at a desk as he makes notes and records our travels).

         The breakfast room was like a dining room in an elegant home: white table cloths, tall ceilings, large mirrors on the walls, stunning wallpaper. The menu offered a two-course breakfast, which came with our room. You could order yogurt, porridge, fruit, etc. as your first course, then follow that with pancakes or various egg dishes, including Santo’s favorite eggs benedict. The coffee was strong and hot, the food delicious and beautifully served. We felt so pampered as we enjoyed our breakfast knowing a much-needed rest awaited us upstairs.

         We were able to darken the room with heavy shades on skylights and windows and managed to sleep until about 2 pm. We were ready for Dublin!

         We mapped out our first day walk, with Vio’s help, which would take us through St. Stephen’s Green, down Grafton Street, and on to Trinity College, where I had done my junior year abroad and first met Alison.

         St. Stephen’s Green is a large city park, noted for the Georgian homes (of the famous door of Dublin) as much as the park itself. We enjoyed the meandering paths leading to a central circle and floral displays that were less manicured, but also less vibrant, than the parks we so love in Paris. We crossed the park diagonally, bringing us to the top of Grafton Street.

         During my time in Dublin in 1978-79, Grafton Street was a busy commercial street and the bus we took from our dorm in the suburbs of Dublin drove down the street and dropped us nearly in front of Trinity. Now, Grafton is closed to traffic and the street has been cobbled over to become a lovely pedestrian way. Sadly, though, the small, local Irish stores and restaurants that were there in the 70s had been replaced by large, international, high-end brands like Tommy Hilfiger, Victoria’s Secret, Lego, and Disney. All that remained that was familiar was the posh department store, Marks & Spencer, and my beloved Bewley’s Oriental Cafes Ltd., affectionally known simply as Bewley’s.

         As a twenty-year-old at Trinity I had so often gone with my friends to Bewley’s for a cup of tea or coffee and some pastries. The storefronts on either side of the main entrance were framed in gleaming dark wood with beautiful displays of the oriental teas served there. Inside was more gleaming wood, and decorating many of the walls were elaborate art nouveau stained glass windows. Small wooden tables with café chairs dotted the room. We would just go in, seat ourselves at an open table, sometimes moving several together if there was a group of us. When the server came over to take our drink order, she would bring a three-tiered tray filled with gorgeous array of tempting pastries. We just chose what we wanted, and when we were ready to leave, just told the server what we had eaten.

         When we reached Bewley’s I wanted to take a closer look, so we stepped inside. It was little changed, except for the addition of a glass counter displaying the pastries and a hostess stand displaying a sign that said, “Please wait to be seated.” We would have sat down for a cup of coffee, but they were just closing. We would find a time in our schedule to come back tomorrow.

         We walked through the drizzle that had accompanied us all day on to Trinity. The massive gray stone entrance gate loomed before us. So familiar. And yet not. It’s not that I don’t remember the time I was very young student here, but if feels like that was someone else. It was, really. It was a girl from Dunmore, Pennsylvania, whose only experience outside of Dunmore was two years at Bard College, a very rural college less than an hour from home. There was one visit to NYC on a bus excursion from Scranton with my family. I was about twelve years old and spent the whole time bumping into things because I kept looking up at the tall buildings.

Here I was in a large city, in another country over 3000 miles away, committed to spending one full school year at Trinity College. I was housed in a Trinity College dorm about a 20-minute bus ride from campus. I was amazed at how quickly I made friends in the dorm. The boys were on the first floor, girls on the second in the old mansion that had been converted to a dorm. Ten girls each shared a small kitchen. We would make tea, fix breakfast, and some meals in that kitchen. I remember a red-haired girl names Hazel teaching me how to make croissants from scratch in that kitchen. And fixing a Thanksgiving dinner for friends held in the formal dining room of the mansion. The turkey had to be ordered from some farm and we needed to go to Marks & Spenser’s gourmet department to get canned pumpkin!

My closest friends were roommates Alison, who was a Protestant from a suburb of Belfast, and Josephine, a Catholic from central Belfast. They had asked to room together after meeting at a camp to bring Protestant and Catholic young people together in the midst of “the troubles.” I remember one time when we were on O’Connell Street just over the bridge from Trinity. There was a loud bang that made me jump. “That sounded like a gunshot,” I said. “Oh, no,” came back Josephine, “gunshots are much higher pitched.” Another time on a train ride north to Belfast for a Bank Holiday, Josephine suddenly looked agitated and calmly said to us, “Let’s move to the next car. NOW.” She had seen someone put a backpack on the ground in the space between two cars and feared the worst. Nothing happened, but I was shaken.

I might not have known it at the time, but I think I grew up a lot during that year. I certainly became more independent, though I did have some very good and their families to lean on. On weekends, I travelled alone by train to other parts of Ireland, with no reservations nor any idea of where I would stay once I got there. Walking around these new cities, sometimes villages, with my overnight bag, each time I managed to find a Bed & Breakfast (I think the concept originated in Ireland). Once I met a girl on the train who was going to visit her boyfriend in Cork. When she heard I didn’t have a place to stay, she insisted I stay with them. When her boyfriend picked her up at the train station, she asked if I could stay. He smiled warmly. “Indeed she can.” The girl and I slept at her boyfriend’s sister’s house, and he would bring us back there after each night of laughs and good cheer at one of his favorite pubs. I met some of his friends, and some of them would come to visit my in Dublin later that semester.

         One of my weekend excursions was to the remote Aran Islands off the coast of Galway. It was in March and the ferries were not running, but I was determined to get there. I took the train the Galway, then asked someone at the train station how I could get to the Aran Islands. He told me I could take the bus to Rossaveal Pier, and try to hitch a ride on a fishing boat. I made it to the pier, a small strip of cement in the middle of nowhere, and stood there in the cold drizzle alone under the single lamppost and waited. After about 90 minutes, I saw a group of men carrying packages walking towards the pier. They were surprised to find me there and asked, first in Irish then in English when I looked confused, what I wanted. “I want to get to one of the islands. Can you take me?” “Well, we’re going to Inishmore. You’re welcome to come along.” The youngest of the men, Coley Donahue, led me to the small galley on the boat and offered me a cup of tea. As he heated the water on a small cooktop, we chatted. I wish now  had a recording of that conversation. I can’t remember and have trouble imagining what was said.

         When we got to Inishmore, Coley asked me where I was staying. There were no bed & breakfasts or other accommodations on the island. What had I been thinking? He knew of a woman who sometimes let rooms, and walked me to her thatched cottage not far from the pier. I remember that first night in the small cold room, huddled in the narrow bed with all my clothes, including my coat, and the covers up over my head. The next morning, the old woman made wonderful homemade scones with jam and a very welcome cup of hot tea. It turned out that there was a young German man also staying there.  We met over breakfast. He did not speak English, and did not yet know German. Somehow we communicated. He was planning to tour the island by bike and invited me to come with him. So we went to another cottage where a man rented us two bicycles. That evening I visited the only pub on the island ironically called The American Bar. Everyone spoke Irish. Of course Coley was there and sat next to me at the bar. I gradually became better able to understand his halting English. I was smitten, imaging myself in a thatched cottage mending his fishing nets. I drank Guiness because I had had no food since breakfast and had heart that Guiness had some nutritional value. When Coley found out I had not eaten, he insisted on taking me to his house—at 2 am in the morning. By Irish law the pub should have closed at midnight, but as it go later I asked Coley why they were still open. “You see that man over there,” he said, pointing to a man at the end of the bar.. “That the constable.” His own thatched cottage was dark when we got there, so we quietly entered. He told me wait in the small living room. I could hear him in the next room speaking to his sister. The only words I could make out was her saying, “Well who is she anyway?” But she got up and proceeded to cook me dinner—a fried pork chop and boiled potatoes, in the tiny kitchen. At one point, she was asking me something but I couldn’t understand. After asking her to repeat a few times, I finally just said, “Yes.” She proceed to pull a bottle out from under the sink and pour me a glass. Wild Turkey!

         The next day, Coley was supposed to pick me up to take me around the island. I waited at the house where I was staying, watching TV on an old black-and-white tv. For hours I waited, occasionally looking out the window. I couldn’t believe he wouldn’t come. He has seemed so eager and sincere. I’m not sure how long I waited before I gave up, but I finally did. After a long walk, I waited for the pub to open so I could get my Guiness dinner. Coley was there. He approached me awkwardly. I don’t know who spoke first, but eventually we discovered that he HAD come by for me at the appointed time and had a waited for a bit. But didn’t think it was proper to come to the door, so he thought I was standing him up! I was leaving the next day, and as he walk me home that night in the pitch black, he begged me to stay another day. I told him I didn’t have the money and he offered to pay for me. Some old adage came to my mind that I shouldn’t take money from a man. So I said no. A decision I regretted for a long time.

Five years later I was able to visit Ireland. This time there was a ferry to Inishmore. I looked for Coley in the pub, but he wasn’t there. At the time, I was brave enough to ask about him. I was told he was in Galway having his boat repaired. So my trip to the island had been a waste. I wanted to just return to the mainland, but the weather had turned since I arrived and no ferries, or fishermen, we running. Eventually I managed to get a small biplane to get me off the island. In Galway, it was pouring rain and both me and my bag were soaked to the bone. I hitched a ride to the boatyard to look for Coley and waked along the boatyard pier asking each fisherman if they knew where Coley Donahue was. I finally found him. We recognized me right away and was truly shocked. He was more difficult to recognize. He looked much older, more ragged, but the worst was that one side of his face had been badly burned and was quite scarred. “You probably wouldn’t know me, would you” he asked sheepishly. His motor had blown up in his face when he was trying to repair it several years ago. Even worse, his sister, who make me pork chops and Wild Turkey, had died of leukemia. I felt unspeakably sad. I met Coley that night at a pub in Galway. We drank. We talked. We even danced. But I could no longer imagine myself mending anyone’s fishing nets. Perhaps I had been cruel to look him up, because it got his hopes up. I still feel guilty about that.

Back at Trinity, Santo and I walked through the gate into the quad. Of course, it was unchanged. The school had been founded in 1592 but most of the current building dates from the 18^th century. Outside the quad was a different sorry. There were several modern buiding housing various schools and departments of the college. Santo took my picture. I tried to remember actually walking these cobble stones, running to classes, crossing over to the cafeteria. But I couldn’t. I knew they had happened, but they had happened to that young girl brave enough to hitch a ride on a fishing boat at Rossaveal Pier. Now I panic if I don’t have a confirmed reservation wherever I go.

After Trinity, we were ready for supper and found a nearby pub that had been recommended by ChatGPT, called Donaghues. It was small and dark but lovely and a great escape from the steady drizzle. We had Guiness stew and Guiness. Met a young couple with a baby from St. Louis. The bartender and waitress could not have been friendlier or more accommodating. It was a great find.

I had one more stop I wanted to make on the way back to Kilronan house. I wanted to stop for a drink at the lounge at the Shelbourne Hote, an elegant old hotel right on St. Stephen’s green. That 20-year-old girl had sat with college friends in that lounge feeling very posh and grown-up. After taking a few wrong twists and turns, we found the hotel. The lounge was as sumptuous as I remembered it, in shades of pale yellow and green, with magnificent mirrors and some heavy lacquered Chinese furniture. It was empty so we took the two comfy chairs right in front of the fireplace. I had cappuccino, Santo had a mocha, and I ordered a bread pudding with rum raisin ice cream that was about the best dessert I had ever tasted. What a splurge.

Our day compete, we returned to the comfort of our room, ready for a true night’s sleep.