valeriesbookofme

Now that I am back from Ireland and no longer actually photographing cemeteries, I am still trying to add to genealogical research by transferring information on families and individuals from Irish headstones http://www.igp-web.com/IGPArchives/headstones.htm#gsc.tab=0 to familysearch.org. In the interest of maybe encouraging others to do this, here is an outline of the process: I pick a cemetery to work on. Currently I am working on Cavan Ballintemple, http://www.igp-web.com/IGPArchives/ire/cavan/photos/tombstones/1headstones/ballintemple.htm. I use the text part of the file, easier to read than the actual stone :) I call that screen up on my iPad.  I look for information that can be best researched. A good example would be text for Headstone No. 5: In | loving memory of | ALEXANDER ACHESON, Dillagh. | Called home 6th Feb. 1916, age 69. | Also his wife JANE, | Who entered into rest 25th Dec. 1942, age 87. | Also their son JAMES, | Who died 2nd Sep. 1948, age 56. | A...

"If I have freedom in my love,  And in my soul am free,   Angels alone that soar above,  Enjoy such liberty."  - Richard Lovelace I memorized this poem in high school. I remember our teacher emphasizing the idea of being free in our minds even when we aren't free in reality. That really touched me and I have often brought that poem to mind in the ensuing years, decades, whenever I was in a situation and wished to be in another. Yesterday some friends and I were talking about whether we ought to forget the past--as is often advised in Buddhist tradition--or whether we should remember it to learn from it. And, I would add this morning, to savor it. Not that I am currently in any kind of "prison." It's just that this morning I have been remembering, thanks to posts of photos of Dunmore East by my friend Erica. Ireland and the U.K. have been hit with two wild winter storms over the past two days. With the result that Dunmore is currently blan...

Just when I thought my great adventures were over--well regular adventures, we do have a one-week trip planned for Bermuda in April--a new one has appeared. After looking at several houses in Winterhaven, we have decided to build a house on an empty lot in the community. A big undertaking! While we have bought (and sold) many houses in our 20-year marriage, we have never actually custom built a house from the ground up. We have owned land a couple of times, once in Klamath Falls and once in Sechelt, British Columbia, but each time circumstances changed and we sold the land without building. This time, though, it looks very much like we will actually build. The houses we saw in Winterhaven needed a lot of remodeling. They were built between 1994 and 2004 and, apart from granite countertops here and there, have mainly remained untouched since then. And it is a seller's market here in Winterhaven right now so house prices are high. We figured that, for the price...

I was sick during the Christmas holidays with a chest cold. Having finally recovered, this Friday, as I was subbing in second grade, I suddenly felt a cold breeze go up my spine that sent me shivering, and funny tingling begin in my nose. Oh great, a head cold. I looked at all the little red noses sitting around my desk and thought, "Oh great...." By Friday night it was full flow.  Thank goodness for weekends though. I love weekends when I have subbed a lot during the week—Saturday to catch up on chores and Sunday to relax. And, with this cold, to recover because I am also subbing the next two days. I did finish a book yesterday. At least I think I did—I was walking around in a Dayquil-inspired haze. "Sweet Life in Paris," a culture-and-recipes journal written by a California pastry chef who has been living (at least at the time this book was written) in Paris for the past five years. I really enjoyed it because so much of what he wrote about Paris—the people, th...

When I first began my "valeriesbookofme" blog a few years ago it was in response to a journalizing group I belong to on Facebook. The group leader issues a prompt for us--in the past it was weekly, this year it is monthly--and we write away in whatever format we want. I chose to start a blog. I let the blog go after a few months but resurrected it last year when I had my Irish adventure. Now the adventure is over but the urge to blog is still there. So I was very happy when our Bookofme leader on Facebook posted some new prompts. This week's prompt is: "Who Am I? List 20 things that describe you." 1. I am a grandmother. It is this part of me that drove me to leave Ireland and return to the United States. I missed my grandchildren way too much. If they had been more interested in Skyping or Facetiming I might have continued the Irish Adventure but they weren't. So here I am back in the United States pondering what is next. And hugging my grandchildren, hav...

One year ago we said our farewells to Sierra Vista and were on our way to Scottsdale, thence to New York, the Queen Mary, England and, ultimately, Ireland. And today I am sitting in our sparsely furnished but comfortable rental house back in Sierra Vista, quite glad that I am not en route again. Not that we are by any means settled. The rental is for six months and one month of those six is already almost over. We have looked at houses to buy, houses to build. We have talked about the relative merits of Utah, Oregon, Phoenix, even back to Santa Fe. We actually still have a toehold in SF in the form of a condo that may or may not be reverting to us at end January. Another of life's complications. But nowhere strikes either of us as "home." Not that either of us knows quite what home looks like at 65 years old with our childhood homes forever changed and no place along our life's journey thus far having been able to lock us in. I was looking at a few "Home...

Over a month since we left Ireland. It's like a kind of dream now. I was showing some of my photos of our 10 months in Ireland to my 95 year old mother-in-law here in Alberta; so beautiful, such an experience. And finished. On to the next episode of life, whatever that may be. Although all of my grandparents uprooted their lives several times, emigrating from the "Old Country" to Canada, moving from place to place as their financial circumstances, job circumstances, prescribed, by today's standards the adventure that we undertook from Arizona to Ireland was an odd one. Not because of job, not because of family (although family had a strong influence on me on the decision to come back), why did we do it? A year later, I honestly can't remember. It was an adventure, just an adventure. We did it because we were able to do it. And now we are back because we were able to come back. But, in the words of a song,  So what happens now? Another suitc...