E J Carr > that stands for Edward James Carr: February 2010

Tuesday, February 23, 2010

I sit here tonight after a day of sideways rain, wind, and the smell of a peat fire. Turf. The fire from turf is warm, fragrant, and lasting. Oh, it smokes quite a bit as well. It's well dark in Ireland at 6:30 pm,(half 6) but the days are growing longer. February 23rd and the daffodils will be breaking into bloom any day now. The fields around my village are beginning to come alive with spring even as the winds howl and the frost continues. This is the first spring since we have lived here and there has been so much frost in the mornings. "Not too usual out wescht" as they say in the west Cork accent. West is the last bit of peninsula to the west of my house in this village. The reason it's "not too usual" is because of the Gulf Stream moving up the globe and crashing into the western side of Ireland and the British Isles. The climate is rather temperate and is evident by the variety of palm tree that grows all around southwest Ireland. Looking out of my window to the view of mine, west is to the right. If you follow the road in front of my house to the right about 10km you come to its end, and the end of Ireland. The body of water I see every day from my window is Dunmanus Bay.
I live on the Sheepshead Peninsula in Co. Cork Ireland. The village is Kilcrohane and the townland is Faramanagh. Across the bay to the southwest is the next peninsula on the Isle of Green; The Mizen. The Mizen peninsula with Mizen head at the extreme western end and beyond that, the North Atlantic and eventually America. I have looked at this view from one point or another for the last 3 years. I have seen the weather come with gales and wind and waves. I've also seen it so warm and clear and calm that it might be French or Italian. I've felt at times like there would never be any reason to live anywhere else but right here. I also wondered how long I would feel that way.