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I don't have much to write about this evening. This is Ballybunion, Ireland (County Kerry) and the beach where my great-grandmother played as a child. In this picture, the water looks a LOT bluer than it did on that cold day when I decided to brave the waves. I just love the ruin overlooking the sand and water.

Ireland felt so much like home, it was eerie. The countryside is so incredibly beautiful and the people are kind, generous and damn funny. I loved the pace--though much slower than the States. I felt a connection with the land, the people and the culture...plus, seafood, meat and potatoes?! Who doesn't love that diet? ;)

If I could spend an afternoon having tea with my great-grandmother, I'd do it in a heartbeat. What a fascinating life. She lost her mother, then her father--an orphan at 12. Her step-mother then chose to protect her own children's inheritance, shipping my great-grandmother and her siblings to New York by boat. What did she hope to find here? What did she dream her life would be like? Did she dream of the family she created? The legacy she left?

Several years later, she met John Ferris, himself an immigrant from the shores of Kerry. Together, they raised four daughters who went on to marry handsome, strong and kind men. Between them, fourteen grandchildren ran amok. My mother and her cousins were raised more as siblings than cousins. They adored their grandparents and relished stories of their childhood land of Eire. The fourteen cousins grew up in New York, sometimes going to the same schools, even in the same classrooms. Though some traveled far and wide, in the end, most settled back here on the East Coast, staring over the Atlantic towards Ireland. There are 24 of us now...two generations removed from Anna and John Ferris. We've heard the stories of our great-grandparents--their childhoods in Ireland, their journeys to the States and the family and life they created here. To this day, they remain the type of couple with the type of marriage that we all want. The newest generation has begun...Yasmin, Minty, Ned and William are the first. I wonder what their great-great-grandparents would think of the world they live in...

All I know is that Nana and Gaga (as my mom and her cousins called them) must have done something right. They raised four daughters who raised 14 children who raised 24 children who are raising 4 more...and we're all close--we know each other. We all celebrate together...and cry and grieve together. When we're in trouble, we don't have to look very far for help. I'm in awe of our family sometimes...there are more differences than similarities and yet, when we're together, there is no where else I'd rather be. We're proud of the family Anna and John Ferris created--and though I detested it as a child, I couldn't be more honored to carry the name Ferris in the middle of my own.

Random ramble!

have turned their hands to labor, sound out the trumpet (hey ho, tracy grammer)