Dublin 4

October 8, 2013

Most of the National Gallery was blocked off, so that didn’t take long. Saw some old friends. Bought a ticket for tonight’s show at the Phoenix. Hung out at the Flowing Tide with Colm, the only bartender there not named Dave. When he and his friends were in New York, their vow was never to pass a bar bearing one of their names or the word Guinness. Walked all day, returned, exhausted and in need of various kinds of relief. I had been gone for six hours, was back three minutes and literally had just sat down on the toilet when the maid knocked to fix my room. I was furious. I scolded her, realizing that to some degree it was unfair, but also that it was not even conceivably a coincidence that she should show up just then (the halls were empty in every direction when I unlocked the door) and that the same thing should have happened every day of my stay. I hope she is terrified. Went grudgingly to the basement bar, had a yellow concoction, and chatted with a couple from Chicago who had just had “the trip of a lifetime.” She was chatty, he taciturn, very old with very many aches and pains, but helping each other down the hall as they must have done for time out of mind. It was sweet to see them.

To the Abbey to see McGuinness’ The Hanging Gardens. Met in the bar another couple from Chicago, who also have a home in Kerry. Linda was there, too, and we formed an expatriot cadre in one corner, with our drinks and flat accents. The Hanging Gardens was really quite horrible. The acting was good–that hardly needs to be said-- but the play itself was the worse for being written by a professional who knew what buttons to hit to make people think, for a while, that his work was the real thing. It’s a family drama where there is strained poetry and buried secrets and awful revelations from the very first moment, before you have any idea who these people are or why you should care. He has stolen from every dysfunctional family from the House of Atreus down to George and Martha and in all directions around, and the effect, to me, was totally, bottomless false. Borrowed finery, worn like a whore. Chatted with Linda at the interval, and she noticed the same thing, but didn’t hate it, calling it “Appropriation” and “Appropriative Theater,” and finding it “interesting.” I did in fact see her point, but didn’t like it any better for the understanding. The second act made everything jolly and they sang a song together, and then dad went madder still, lest McGuinness be accused of veering off from wailing profundity at the end.  Linda hated the second act, so I felt vindicated. We shared a taxi home, but the driver missed both places and we each had to walk a little through the night. I stopped at Foley’s and heard the fine singer again, and then walked a little (I was drunk by then) to a bar set far back in a building, where I had the best time yet, and I tried to buy the band a round, but they were drinking water, as it would not have been in days of yore.

My last trip to Ireland was dark. This one is light, and I am grateful. Have barely thought of my life back home. Have barely thought of anything but what I am doing. The night rain is yellowing toward morning.