Slán abhaile means "safe home." A lovely farewell, and not one we were ready to hear...

We're sitting in the Oslo, Norway airport waiting to make our connection to fly back to Orlando.  It's hard to figure out a way to summarize my feelings at the moment.  I'm, of course, sad to be leaving Ireland.  Our experiences there are so very different from our experiences at home.  Much of this is of our making.  It's easy to overlook what's special in your own backyard - we have beautiful ocean beaches minutes away - which we probably visit 3 or 4 times a year.  We have an amazing amount of sunny weather - so in contrast with much of Irish weather.  We have a comfortable familiarity with our surroundings at home - but much of Ireland, its culture, social interaction, verbal patois - remains new, interesting, and amusing - "How are you keeping?" would be the most common greeting.    A hearty compliment extended about fantastic food, beautiful flowers, breathtaking scenery would be most likely greeted with "Not too bad" or "Coming along."  An endearing deflection of recognition and flattery.

There's a pretty much universal pride in being Irish and the Irish are very well aware of the great affection with which they are held throughout the world.  Ireland has always been home to one of the most caring and generous peoples.  The country has always provided well past its share of missionaries and aid workers and charitable contributions.  And there's a great commitment to fairness in the country.  Sometimes to a degree that stretches reasonable bounds and asks all to give well past their fair share.  But, somehow, it doesn't generate the ill-will, anger, recriminations, and, frankly, hatred that have become so common in America.  The Irish bear their international responsibilities as well.  But as peacekeepers, not as a people who think they can plunder the world's great resources without reaction.  And to engage in wars so willingly and with such arrogant disregard for the consequences to others.

I must say that we had taken to quickly answering the unstated questions as we've met new Irish acquaintances - No, we don't own guns, and No, we don't support Donald Trump.  These are defining questions and we would be clear on where we stand in this regard.  While we so often hear a reverential devotion to the 2nd amendment at home, it's hard to try to explain why, in the face of the Pulse nightclub massacre or the murder of the Dallas policemen or the murder of 26 innocents in Sandy Hook, why it would be important to own assault weapons. You want to tell a person here how they'll keep the government from coming to take your guns and your freedom?  They'll laugh at you.  And quite rightly.  You know, the Irish just don't get it.  So yes, there is certainly a political dimension included in our feelings as we, as the Irish would say, "get sorted."  But it's about more than just politics.  It's about the social environment, a caring about fellow citizens, a commitment to the virtues that we've always valued  - the Boy Scout Code, the Golden Rule, the American Ideal - things that seem so sorely absent in our current America.  These things weigh heavily as we get blessedly thin information about the political conventions - the current anger we'll face as we return.

More important than these things perhaps is how Candee would say that she feels some deep, almost genetic and ancestral, connection here and I wouldn't doubt or be skeptical about her feelings in the matter at all.  I, too, feel more at home in the physical environment here.  Whether it's that the air, the grass, the trees, the hills, make me remember, on some deep level, growing up in the Northeast, or if there's some other dynamic at play, it's beyond argument that I derive a sense of comfort, of familiarity, that makes the pulse slow and breaths seem deeper.

And, most important of all, are these sweet and generous people we visit - smart, interesting, curious, affectionate, authentic.  What a blessing in our lives.

Marion and Padraic

Conor, Darren, Niamh, and Maria

Pawel Sadowski

Mary Sheridan