It was over – but not for long
The Certificate in English Language Teaching to Adults training course is over, the General Elections are over, the appointment of a new Government is over – even the good weather is over, at least temporarily.
It’s a soft grey day today, and it feels like the beginning of a weekend in November, rather than the middle of June.
Since my last April post right up to General Election day in Ireland (which also happened to be the final night of our CELTA course), I was so busy that stories of a changing Ireland just got squeezed out of my schedule. Then, in the immediate aftermath of the Elections/course, I went on an ‘after-school’ binge of being out of doors in the sunshine and air I’d missed so much in the previous weeks.
I’ve climbed Bray Head in the evening, absorbing air, beauty, and bird-song in a heart-gladdening mixture, and gardened at the weekends, with dollops of talk and laughter and catching-up with house-family and family of origin and friends in between. That the end of all this busy-ness coincided with the return to our house of a beloved ’son’ – Jan from the Czech Republic – added to the contentment.
Our ‘family’ seems to be going through one of those patches where it gathers other people up as well – Alba’s parents from Spain, briefly, and her Irish boyfriend, more long-term; Kasia’s friends from Poland, also briefly; now Jan’s girlfriend, Letti, who has come to stay in Ireland (not in our house, but hopefully nearby) for a few months; while Gint, our longest resident, has been increasingly busy in his new career laying timber floors.
For me these past few weeks have been a quiet ‘honeymoon’ period in a very busy life, but already things are moving again. I was lucky enough to do well in the CELTA course, and luckier again to be offered two nights a week teaching English in International House, where I did the course. It started last Monday, and it’s nervewracking, stimulating, and fun!
With the election of a new Government, and the appointment of new Ministers, it’s time again to pick up the battle to keep our floodplain free of high density building. With the Green Party going into coalition with Fianna Fail, and a Green Minister for the Environment, we need to make the most of these few weeks before the Government goes into its summer recess.
…Especially as the otherwise excellent flood defence proposals being put forward seem to suggest that, with these in place, there is no need for the floodplain to be preserved… With the news of drought and flood from Australia over this past week, and the extreme flooding much nearer to home in Donegal in the past few days, it’s hard to believe that anyone can seriously moot this argument any longer – but they do.
So, on with the warpaint again and out with the English language text books, but in between there will be some time for working in the garden, walking in the hills, and coming home to Gint, Kasia, Alba, and Jan in this changing Ireland of ours…