IRELAND: Commemoration & Remembering Spot's

Tipperary also has alot of war memorial's and commemoration spots.

Spots and stop's and remembrance stone's where men, mostly men, had died in those spot's or from those area part's.

I stopped off at so many.

Felt right to.

Say thanks.

I would be driving down the road and pass one, decorated simply and respectfully, and would have to circle back and stop off and get out and say thanks and give whoever's name was on the wall some acknowledgement.

Always a thanks.

Give the moment something to think about and appreciate.

That their love of Ireland and their locality and life was worth defending.

For me.

For us.

For our country.

For Irishness.

And because of them.

Because of them, I could stand there and continue to call myself Irish.

It wasn't just a grey/green tile or circular bunch of stone's on a roadside. 

I used to give them all acknowlegement & thanks.

Their sacrifice and contribution and bit.

More than a bit.

A life is not a bit.

A country like Ireland and our people aren't either.

So I had to say thanks & acknowledge them.

Some scenarios written on the plaques were tragic. Shocking.

And men seemed so grown up and young.

In comparison with today's babies, no offence.

It's not a judgement. Times were different and pressure's were pressure's.

Today's young might not have maturity but they do have pressure's.

But these men were so strong for men so young.

So in love with their own country.

So I used to follow the post signs and stop off at the stops not over look them.

Because of them my Irishness wasn't overlooked so I didn't and couldn't do the same when I was passing, these memory stone's and plaques not really, the cause and reason and reason to be Ireland and Irish.

What they were about, what they doing, why they did it, and how brave they all were!

Men with nothing mostly but a love for country and with full hearts.

A cause.

It was beyond true.

And I, as a Limerick girl, a woman, from a working class background, with a top level education, could stand there at a different time, and different era, and remember my Irishness because of them and connect to it.

Countrymen who were my country's men, and land men, and Irish men, and unworldly men, they might not have known about the Google World's of today, but some of the best men my country had ever made and could create, to protect her, for me, for a woman like me, so that I could stand there in front of those memory spots and remember them and their why, and feel and connect with that. 

That why.

For our country.

A country we share in love and celebration.

UNASHAMEDLY!

AS SHE IS!

And for our country not to be a nothing, misused thing.

I felt their Ireland.

Their times. Their dances. Their ceilí's. Their clothes. Their music. Their live's. 

And I loved it.

And I felt very young and new feeling it.

Their's had weight and tradition.

Lines of their face.

Hard-earned faces.

So much knowledge, and adventure's and experience's.

Live's earned and celebrated.

Light exercised out onto her land and her experience.

There was no shame.

No shame in being an Irish man.

It was a thing of celebration.

A cultural joy.

A joy.

I could feel their sunshine.

Their light.

Lives spend on land, morning until evening.

Wandering up and down land and hills in basking sun's. The smell of nature.

At young 20's age, they were men.

Grown-up men.

And there was no doubt in them protecting or defending their country.

Their first love.

Her.

These men were SO HUGE, to want to defend her and that and even at their own entireties cost.

Like she was worth investing in.

I was standing infront of the BEST'S men's memories I could think off and feel and experience.

And it made me answer to and call things inside of me doing that.

Thinking about stuff.

Me.

My country.

What it meant? 

What it meant to me?

Did it mean something to me?

Was it important to them so much some of them never even made it to my age?

How lucky I was because of these men before me!

Because of them.

Their Ireland was worth dying for, which in term, and because of them, 

made it my Ireland!

I was their inheriter!

And how was owning up to that?

These grown young men.

I was answering to them and me.

And my country and her identity and survival.

That they sacrificed for.

Defending and promoting her.

And I could feel their fun, agricultural live's.

Their joys.

And they stepped up.

For her and for me.

And I was there standing there. In my day and age. Because of them.

I had to stop of site's when I saw them.

Say my prayer of thanks.

Give them and the idea of them and what they did for me a think.

Standing there.

Because of them.

They were country men from small place's, but some of the biggest men I ever stopped to consider and acknowledge and take a moment to remember at their stops.

I can only imagine them now.

These simple but GIANT MEN!

No different to any Fianna or Fionn Mac Cumhaill or Oisin in old stories.

Nothing simple about it at all!

I can only imagine how Ireland and our line's received them! These men who were more than men at all!!

And how ready and supportive they still are for us, if we just have a moment to remember Her, and us, and them!

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