We had some car trouble tonight. A fierce storm came in off the Atlantic with gusts of wind and buckets of rain. Somehow that all upset Bessie (the car) and she didn’t want to work right. We did get her going again and she works fine as long as you are driving forward. Reversing is the problem.
We eventually made it to Sylvia and Edie’s house for dinner. Gearoidín was already there. Three men from the house, Brian, Seán and Rick were also having dinner with us. Brian and Seán are in my Irish class. We had a great dinner.
After dinner there was conversation. Rick talked about his parents from Mayo and the difficult life they had when they went to England. Brian and Seán made great efforts to speak in Irish and Gearoidín, in that wonderful quiet way of hers, encouraged them.
Myself and Treasa began singing the “Maighdean Mhara”. Gearoidín continued with two verses we didn’t have. Then she told the story behind the song, the story of how the man fell in love with the mermaid and stole her cloak to prevent her from going back to the sea. He hid it under the thatch until the day that her children found it. At that moment her longing for the old world of the sea overwhelmed her. She said goodbye to little Máire and Pádraig and went back into the ocean leaving them behind her, crying on the beach.
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