I probably shouldn’t say “Day Two in Dublin” as most of it was spent in my apartment and the rest was airport and England! I woke up around 7 this morning which surprises me a bit because Donal and I were out until 12:30 or so and you know I didn’t sleep on the plane much yesterday. We had a good time last night. Donal drove us, although he said he wasn’t familiar with my part of town and we parked over on Dawson Street I believe. I suggested we go to the Porterhouse since it was near and neither of us really knew where else to go.
Apparently Donal doesn’t hang out near Trinity, he goes to Temple Bar a lot. I find that a bit strange because I’ve heard many people say that Temple Bar is not for locals. Anyway, we had several beers and chatted about a tone of crazy topics, just getting to know each other. Donal is 25, the youngest of 5 kids. It will be nice to meet his siblings if possible to have more contacts. His sister, Orla, and I have been emailing. She’s a primary teacher. Anyway, Donal has offered to take me horseback riding, hunting, to shows, and to borrow his car any time I want! That would be interesting. Not only is the traffic all on the opposite side of the road, which I’ve never driven on, but Donal’s car is a 5 speed, which I can’t drive. I guess I’ll have to learn. Donal goes to see his dad in America in a few weeks, but when he returns, perhaps he can give me driving lessons. A car would have been nice yesterday when I was buying all that stuff for the apartment. Donal said he’d take me out to IKEA to see about some furniture for the place. I need a chair at least! My little table just has two bar stools.
Back to this morning though, I woke up because I was worried about the luggage problem so I got up to call the airport but of course my phone has no more credit! I went on the cheap yesterday since I knew I’d only need it one day. In my new pjs I went to a new neighbor’s door (right next to mine) and knocked, and knocked, and knocked. I heard music so I knew someone was up but got no answer. I went back in my studio and paced a bit then returned to the door with a note, but ended up knocking one more time and finally got an answer. Mark, my neighbor, let me use his computer to check the status of my luggage, but the number they gave me for reference wouldn’t bring anything up, so I emailed instead with details. I was in panic mode most of the morning, but tried to keep myself occupied in an apartment with nothing to do…read a few chapters of A Place of Yes, by Bethenny Frankel, showered and put on some fresh undies and a new shirt but my same old jeans and cardigan. I thought about working on a lesson plan I have do for the grant I was working on back home, but no internet access so no research ability. I ended up playing my itunes (thought Dave could help me relax), drank a bunch of water to keep myself “full” since I haven’t and won’t buy groceries here, at least until I return from England, and began writing this blog!
My letting agent, Alan, came by at 9:30 to bring me the lease and to let me pay him the rest of my rent for the month of July (I didn’t have enough cash yesterday since I paid for my cab coming in). I borrowed his phone to call the airport and THANK GOD they had my luggage and said they would deliver it before noon so I could unpack a few things and then head back to the airport for my flight this afternoon!!! I don’t have any praise music here but was seriously singing praises. I have been so strong (those of you who know me well know I panic easily) and I have really just gone with the flow in my dirty clothes, but I was shaking I was so happy. God, yet again, has looked out for me. I think Alan thinks I’m crazy, but again, those of you who know me know I am!
The craziest thing happened after all that. Something so simple, a task you do all the time and probably have never once found joy in or stopped to think about. I took out the trash. It was my first time taking the trash from my new home and walking out to the drive to put my bag away, I looked around at the beautiful flowers my neighboring house has (look at the pics) and I thought, “I’m happy…I’m going to be happy here.” I literally skipped up the stairs back into my apartment. It may be hard, I’m sure I’ll question things and at some point, want to come home, but I’m really happy I took the chance to do this. I won’t regret it. I had to “celebrate” so I put on my favorite Dave Matthews song “Two Step,” and sang out loud “Celebrate we will, ‘cause life is short but sweet for certain.”
FYI...my luggage never came but I'll tell you more about that later.
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