In Song and in Story

We are wonderful here in Ireland for commemorating disasters. We celebrate them in great fashion. We're commemorating/celebrating 100 years since the torpeoding of the  Lusitania at the moment. Next year it's the 100th anniversary of 1916, when we will commemorate/celebrate the loss of our heroes who died in the fight for Irish freedom. A few years ago we commerated/celebrated the loss of the Titanic. I hope i live to see the 200th anniversary of the Great famine in 2045.

I read a great poem recently by Desmond Egan.

Famine, a sequence (Desmond Egan)

the stink of famine
hangs in the bushes still
in the sad celtic hedges
you can catch it
down the line of our landscape
get its taste on every meal
listen
there is famine in our music
famine behind our faces
it is only a field away
has made us all immigrants
guilty for having survived
has separated us from language
cut us from our culture
built blocks around belief
left us on our own
ashamed to be seen
walking out beauty so
honoured by our ancestors
but fostered now to peasants
the drivers of motorway diggers
unearthing bones by accident
under the disappearing hills

We love doom and gloom, we thrive on it. At my daughter's wedding recently we had the customary sing song which started approx 3am. Nearly every song that was sung was about a death, or a broken heart. Himself sang A Weila Weila Waila, listen to it here. You will be absolutely horrified. It's about a mother who kills her child with a pen knife. It was categorised in the 1800's as a childs nursery rhyme. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuUanDlD9vg  

I have to admit to be a lover of the Ballads about our heroes though, I know the words of the ballad of Wolfe Tone, Michael Collins, James Connolly, Terence Mc Swiney (Shall my soul pass through old Ireland), James Plunkett (Grace) and a few more, i sing them to myself all the time so i won't forget the words. I love the sheer poetry of them without hanging on to the history of them, because if we hang on we are never free.

These photographs were taken in a famine graveyard in Coachford, Co Cork known as Magourney Cemetry. A large stone marks the mass grave where the famine victims were buried and some smaller ones jutting out at different angles acknowledge the fact that there are several un-named bodies there. An Gorta Mór inscribed on the stone is "The Great Famine" in Irish. 

 Camera Settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Canon 17-55mm@17mm, exp 1/640sec, f5, ISO100

 Camera Settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Canon 17-55@17mm, exp 1/320sec, f8, ISO 100

 Camera Settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Canon 17-55mm@17mm, exp 1/320sec, f5, ISO 100

 Camera Settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Canon 17-55mm@33mm, exp 1/320sec, f5, ISO 100

 Camera Settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens 17-55mm@17mm, exp 1/200sec, f9, ISO 100

 Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Canon 17-55mm@17mm, exp 1/200sec, f9, ISO 100

 Camera Settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Canon 17-55mm@17mm, exp 1/200sec, f3.5, ISO 100

 Camera Settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Canon 17-55mm@17mm, exp 1/200sec, f3.5, ISO 100

Show me your friend's and I'll tell you who you are.

This is an unusual title for a blog about the morning of my daughter's wedding. However I was gobsmacked by the love and support my daughter Frances and we as a family got from her friends in the lead up to the big occasion.

It was one of my mother's favourite quotes and God knows growing up, myself and my siblings heard it often enough. "Show me your friends and I'll tell you who you are". It comes from the Bible, Proverbs 13:20 "He who walks with wise men will be wise, But the companion of fools will suffer harm". Most of us have enjoyed the company of a bad influence at some stage in our lives but this is a tribute to the good influences. 

There was the friend who arrived with boxes of home made cakes a few days before, lovingly baked just for us as we would be inundated with visitors. Little did she know that I ate most of them but it's the thought that counts. I still fitted into my dress, no thanks to Áine.

There were the lads who arranged the music for the wedding, Alan and George who roped in two other hunks to form a Bachelor quartet. Thanks a million guys. I was really holding things together until yee started singing. They had us all in tears with the entrance song, Glen Hansard's 'Falling Slowly".

Then there's Rosie who doubles up as a cousin who did our make up and made us all beautiful for the photographs and Lilly her sister (check her out http://lillyhiggins.ie ) who made the cake.

I could go on and on but the point is we all benefited greatly from the love and support showered on Frances from all her friends, siblings and relations. We were inundated with flowers, it was like daffodil day without having to contribute to the charity.

These photos are of wedding morning moments, captured by myself and my daughter Marie. The morning went by in such a blur that it's great to have the photographs to relive it all.

All photos were taken with Canon 70D Camera and my new toy - Canon Lens 17-55 2.8mm

A Bird in the hand...

Did you ever get a sign when someone belonging to you has died? Something that tells you they are trying to make contact with you from the Spirit world?
I have on a few occasions. Sometimes it's a smell, sometimes it's a bird. A number of years ago a really good friend died tragically. He was in his 30's at the time and left a wife and 2 young children behind. We had been friends since childhood and he was a character, always in trouble for nonsense things and great fun to hang out with. His death shattered the wide community and left such a void in our lives.
About 2 months after he died we stayed with his wife and kids for the night. At 5am we were woken by a knocking, tap tap tap. Himself thinking it was at the bedroom door shouted "Come in". It came again, tap tap tap. Being a little more awake we realised it was coming not from the door but from the bedroom window. As we were on the first floor this was weird.
I lifted the curtain and peeped out hesitantly to see a big black crow on the ledge and as i did he tapped on the window again, tap tap tap. It was so strange and we both felt it was just like something my friend would have done.
The first time i experienced something like this was when we bought our first house back in the '80s.
The house had been owned by an old lady who apparently had become very cranky in her old age. She had died a year before we bought the house. We settled in and were very happy in our new home. One day I was hanging out the clothes on the line in the back garden, when the scruffiest female black bird started squaking at me from the top of the lawn near the shed. She was staring right at me with her beady little eyes and she gave me goosebumps. The old lady popped straight into my mind, i'm not sure what she was trying to say but we went on to spend several happy years in that house.
The best of all was the bird my dearly departed father in law sent but i'll tell you about that another time .

I took the photographs below in Cork City last week. I was passing the Peace Park when i spotted this man feeding the pigeons. I always think there's something special about someone who can get that close to be trusted by birds. I hope they aren't the spirits of his dearly departed as there are so many of them. I don't know anything about him as he wouldn't speak to me just nodded when i asked him if i could take a few photographs.

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Canon 50mm, exp 1/320sec, f2.5, ISO 100

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Canon 50mm, exp 1/320sec, f2.5, ISO 100

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Canon 50mm, exp 1/320sec, f2.5, ISO 100

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Canon 50mm, exp 1/160 sec, f4, ISO 100

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Canon 50mm, exp 1/160sec, f4, ISO 100

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Canon 50mm, exp 1/320sec, f2.5, ISO 100

Guess what? I know where Heaven is.

I found out where Heaven is a few months back thanks to my 5 year old niece Eva. Eva and Adam are twins and they should know.
This is how it came about. Last October 12 months our faithful 13 year old dog Gypsy died. Any dog lover out there will understand how awfully sad it is to lose such a beloved animal.
We buried Gypsy in the garden of our holiday cottage in Ring Co. Waterford beside Misty. (an earlier tragedy)
Adam and Eva were only 4 at the time and they loved her dearly. She in turn was very gentle with them. After she died their mother Karina told them that Gypsy had died and gone to Heaven.  They got over it as children do and when we got Bonnie a few months later they fell in love with her too.

The following summer Karina brought the children to Ring for an afternoon to visit us. While playing in the garden they came across the stone slab covering the burial spot. Himself was gardening at the time and they asked him why it was there. He told them that Gypsy was buried beneath it. He thought no more about it and carried on gardening but the pair were amazed. They ran into their mother with the great news that they knew where Heaven was. It was in Maurice and cha cha Mary's (they are half Polish) house in Ring.

That's all very fine though until grandma or someone else dies and all of a sudden I could become the grim reaper.

These photographs were taken in the garden in Ring on a cold February afternoon last week. They were taken with an old lens i got a present of. It's a Tamrom 28mm 2.5 Adaptall lens. It doesn't communicate with the camera so it only has manual focus which is fine if you have good eyesight. The lovely thing about the 2.5 aperture is that it throws the background out of focus and gives fab bokeh effect.

Crocus

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Tamron 28mm. exp 1/800sec, f2.5, ISO 100

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Tamron 28mm, exp 1,250sec, f2.5, ISO 200

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Tamron 28mm, exp 1/160sec, f2.5, ISO 200

Camera settings - Canon 70D, lens Tamron 28mm, exp 1/1600, f2.5, ISO 200

Fig tree

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Tamron 28mm, Exp 1/1000 sec, f2.5, ISO 100

Honey Suckle

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Tamron 28mm, exp 1/500sec, f2.5, ISO 100

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Tamron 28mm, exp 1/1000, f2.5, ISO 100

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, lens Tamron 28mm, exp 1/3200 sec, f2.5, ISO 100

Primrose

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D lens Tamron 28mm, exp 1/800 sec, f2.5, ISO 200

A Little Birdie told me...................

Ecclesiastes 10:20  Even in your thoughts do not make light of the king, nor in the privacy of your bedroom revile the rich, because the birds of the air may carry your voice, a winged creature may tell what you say.

I think this is possibly where the saying "A little birdie told me..." came from. I could have killed that little birdie when I was a child. He got us kids into so much trouble. I think my mother was well in with the little tell-tale.

In spite of all the trouble they got me into i love the little feathered creatures. Only today I was standing in the square in town talking to a friend. He was talking to me about something quite serious and while i was trying to give him my undivided attention i was getting distracted by the antics of a crow.

We were standing chatting near a cafe. There were some tables outside for the smokers and a man was sitting at one with his little dog, he was finishing his coffee while reading a book. A crow arrived and landed with aplomb on the back of the chair next to the man who was totally oblivious to him. The bird was gazing longingly at a crust of bread on the table. He hopped onto the back of the next chair but found he was further away from his goal so he hopped back again. I was trying to ignore him while  wishing i had my camera to capture the scene and listening intently to my friend.

The crow didn't achieve his goal while I was there but he kept me entertained with his hilarious balancing act, over-reaching, trying to get to the bread and nearly falling off his perch. I'm not sure whether i was easily entertained, easily distracted or just not in the right environment  for serious conversation.

The Wagtail

 Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, LensCanon 70-300mm@300mm, exp 1/320sec, f5.6, ISO 400

Young Blackbird

 Camera settings - Camera Canon 500D, Lens Canon 55-250mm@250mm, exp 1/64sec, f5.6, ISO200

The Magpie

 Camera settings - Camera Canon 500D, Lens 55-250mm@250mm, exp 1/1000sec, f5.6, ISO 100

The Pigeon

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Canon 70-300mm@110mm, exp 1/250sec, f6.3, ISO 100

The Sparrow

 Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Canon70-300mm@300mm, exp 1/640sec, f6.3, ISO100

Young Sparrow

 Camera settings - Camera Canon70D, Lens Canon 70-300mm@300mm, exp 1/400sec, f6.3, ISO 125

Young Blackbird

 Camera settings - Camera Canon500D, Lens Canon 55-250mm@250mm, exp 1/250sec, f5.6,ISO100

Robin

Camera settings - Camera Canon 70D, Lens Canon70-300mm@300mm, exp 1/320sec, f11, ISO320