On Sunday, June 7th, Barry and I went to Belvedere House and Gardens near Mullingar. The year Carol and Mike Kearney were here, we went twice and loved it both times, so I was excited to go again.
We’d seen signs during our travels the previous days advertising a home and garden show at Belvedere the weekend of the 5th, 6th, and 7th. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I surely wasn’t prepared for what we got. There were thousands of people there, and dozens and dozens of booths. It was as big as the Mill Avenue Fair. Due no doubt to Barry’s bold driving, we were lucky to get a parking spot quite near the gates. We pushed our way through the crowds to the walled flower garden, and voila – there were very few people there. We had a quick stroll around. We didn’t stay too long, because it turns out himself doesn’t care for formal gardens.
We left the walled garden to walk along the forested path that eventually curves around to Lough Ennel. Along the way we walked across a meadow to a stone façade built in 1787. Looking at the picture of it now, I see it looks very clearly like a face. We met an Irish couple there that we talked to for some time. The woman asked me, “What do you think of Ireland? I mean the government. Do you not find it corrupt?” They were both interested in what we thought of Obama, too. They told us about their upcoming trip to Boston and queried us as to the feasibility of making a quick side trip to the Grand Canyon.
It was a beautiful day, and away from all the booths, we didn’t encounter that many people, so the walk wasn’t unpleasant at all. If I hadn’t been with Barry, I probably would have cruised the booths. But if I hadn’t been with Barry I wouldn’t have seen Durrow, which was what actually made the day special.
Once we extracted ourselves from the melee, Barry asked if I wanted to see Durrow on the way back to Athlone. He’d told me earlier about St. Colum Cille’s holy well there, plus a high cross he thought we might be able to glimpse in the small church.
He parked the car outside ornate gates, and we walked down a long tree-lined roadway to the little church. It was surrounded by a tall chain-link fence, but there was a breach in the fence and we slipped in. The church yard was covered with gravestones at all sorts of angles between vertical and horizontal. The church is still being re-modeled, but there was a small square hole in the piece of plywood covering the entrance. I could see the high cross inside. It used to be in the yard, but will be kept inside now to preserve it. I wished I could get closer. I was actually able to see it in more detail when I got the pictures on my computer and could enlarge the image.
Barry was wandering somewhere, so I started down to St. Colum Cille’s well by myself. As I approached, I saw two red deer. They watched me for several moments as I snapped their pictures. When I started to walk again they turned for the wood, but they didn’t bolt. They turned to look at me two or three times.
I thought of all the Celtic folktales and myths which start out with someone chasing a deer; a symbol of following nature into the unknown, or unconscious where a transformative adventure will occur. I didn’t follow them, though upon reflection I wished I had, or maybe wondered if I should have. On the other hand, the Celtic heroes are always on horseback, which makes it a lot more likely that they can catch the beckoning adventure.
Instead I took the monk’s path to the well which is in a little clearing, the edges of which were dense with wild iris the Irish call “yellow flags”. The water in the well was low, but alive with hundreds of squirming tadpoles doing the hard work of turning into frogs.
Leave a Reply