Day 38: The Long Journey Home

 

After my only meltdown of the entire holiday, I finally arrived home.

Every night during my trip, tucked up in bed, I checked the status of my return flight scheduled for the 12th. It always said the same thing: “On time.” I didn’t entirely trust it. Given everything that was happening in the region, I half expected it would be cancelled at the last minute. Still, I reassured myself that at least I was in the system—if it was cancelled, the airline would have to reschedule me or issue a refund.

One night, however, my heart nearly stopped when I opened the flight status page.

Instead of the familiar message, the screen simply read: “You have no upcoming trips.”

What?

Where had my flight gone?

Panic set in immediately. I began frantically searching through my emails for any correspondence. That’s when the true horror began to unfold. It turned out that I had actually booked the flight through a third-party company called Flight Network. Normally I’m extremely careful about avoiding this, but somehow their name had been hidden in very small print. At the time of booking, it looked as though I was dealing directly with Etihad.

I quickly searched for the company’s website and entered my booking reference.

“Error: incorrect number.”

I tried again.
And again.
And again.

Nothing.

That was the moment reality truly struck me. I was in a war zone with no flight out.

Under normal circumstances you would phone the airline and see what the hell was going on. But people had spent eight hours trying to get through to Etihad's Chat Bot for help and then been cutoff.

I immediately started searching for alternative flights. My heart sank when I saw the prices. Flights out of Oman were coming in at around €6,000. Etihad had no flights to Dublin available for at least a week. Emirates had nothing to Dublin either.

That night I didn’t sleep at all. My mind kept running through every worst-case scenario imaginable.

The next morning when I walked into the kitchen, Jen took one look at me and asked what on earth had happened. I immediately burst into tears—even though I had promised myself I wouldn’t alarm her.

I should have known better.

Jen is one of the calmest people I have ever met. She handed me a cup of tea and calmly opened her laptop to start searching for flights. Before long she was just as horrified as I had been by the prices. Emirates only had Business Class seats available. When we looked at flights to London they were coming in at nearly €10,000.

That simply wasn’t an option.

Just as another panic attack threatened to arrive, Jen—being Scottish—had a very practical thought.

“Why not check flights to Edinburgh or Glasgow?”

Sure enough, there it was: a flight leaving the following day to Glasgow for €4,000.

It was a bargain under the circumstances.

I snapped it up.

My next worry was actually getting to Dubai Airport. I had heard horror stories about people making it all the way there only to have their flights cancelled, leaving them stranded again.

Thankfully, Emirates provides a chauffeur service for Business Class passengers. Once you’re in that car seat, getting you to the airport on time becomes their responsibility.

Happy days.

At 1:30 on Monday morning, a sleek black BMW pulled up outside the apartment building. Finally, I was on my way home.

“This is stress-free,” I thought to myself.

That thought lasted about five minutes.

A short distance from the apartment, the driver pulled over, rolled down his window, and asked a parked taxi driver:

“Which way to Dubai?”

No.

No, no, no. This cannot be happening to me.

Thankfully the taxi driver gave directions, and we were soon back on the road.

At the airport, another Business Class perk kicked in. There’s a completely separate entrance with plenty of check-in counters and no queues. I sailed straight through and headed for the Business Class lounge, fully determined to eat and drink €4,000 worth of food.

I did my best.

The relief when my flight was finally called for boarding was enormous. It wasn’t cancelled.

The seat converted into a bed, complete with mattress, pillow, and blanket. For someone who hadn’t slept in two days, it almost made the price worthwhile.

The final hurdle was leaving UAE airspace. I cannot describe the relief when we crossed into Omani territory. For the first time in days, I felt like I could breathe properly.

When I arrived in Glasgow, I was greeted by the news that a vape shop at the airport had gone up in flames.

At this stage I had to wonder—am I jinxed?

After about an hour’s delay, I boarded the final flight of my journey.

When I eventually stepped onto the tarmac at Dublin Airport, I honestly felt like doing my best Pope John Paul II impression and kissing the ground.

Inside arrivals, the best moment of all was seeing my brother Finian waiting for me. Ten days earlier I had driven myself to the airport and parked my car, fully expecting to return in two weeks.

Ah, the innocence.

Finian and Marese had decided there was no way I was coming home to an empty airport. Even better, Finian insisted on driving my car home while I sat in the passenger seat. Despite my sleep on the plane, I was still in no fit state to drive.

And that was the end of my long journey home.

After the best night’s sleep I’ve had in over a week, I’m only now beginning to process the full extent of what just happened.

One thing is certain.

It’s a trip I will never forget.

Day 26: You can't make new Old Friends

 

Childhood friends really are the best, aren’t they? They’re the ones who knew you before life got complicated — before careers, mortgages, responsibilities, and the slow creep of adulthood started rearranging priorities. They knew you when your biggest worry was homework, your greatest joy was a sunny day, and your most pressing drama was who fancied whom this week.

We’ve known each other since primary school. We played camogie together, and somehow ended up as runners-up in the All-Ireland set dancing competition — an achievement that still makes us proud. We were there for each other through teenage heartbreaks too, offering sympathy, outrage, and occasionally very questionable advice when some fecker inevitably let one of us down.

And now? Decades later, we’re still here.

Life has taken us in different directions — different countries even — but whenever we find ourselves in the same place at the same time, we make it happen. Dinner is arranged. Drinks are ordered. The laughter starts before the starters even arrive. It’s like no time has passed at all.

Or so we like to think.

This week, we managed one of those long-overdue reunions. About an hour into the conversation — somewhere between the starter and the dessert— I was suddenly struck by a very sobering realisation.

“Women,” I announced dramatically. “Do you realise that for the past hour we have been talking about retirement… pension plans… and hip replacements?”

There was a brief silence.

And then absolute howling laughter.

Because it was true.

It only feels like yesterday we were gossiping about who was shifting who off the hurling team, dissecting teenage romances with forensic intensity, convinced that every emotion was the biggest emotion that had ever existed in the history of humanity. Now we’re comparing notes on joint pain and financial planning.

What has happened to us?

Time. That’s what has happened.

Time — that strange, slippery thing that moves so slowly when you’re young and accelerates without warning when you’re older. The years that once felt endless now seem to collapse into each other. School feels recent. Our twenties feel like last week. Yet somehow, we’re talking about pensions.

But here’s the thing that really hit me as I sat there watching my friends laugh until they cried: while time has changed the details of our conversations, it hasn’t changed the foundation underneath them.

We’re still the same people.

We still tease each other mercilessly. We still share the same shorthand language that only decades of friendship can create. We still show up for each other — whether that’s for heartbreak at 17 or life stress at 57. The topics evolve, but the connection doesn’t.

If anything, it deepens.

There’s something profoundly comforting about friendships that have survived entire lifetimes of change. We’ve seen each other at our most awkward, our most confident, our most heartbroken, and our most triumphant. We’ve watched each other grow into adults — sometimes gracefully, sometimes kicking and screaming — and yet the bond remains intact.

Maybe that’s the real magic of childhood friends.

They carry pieces of your history that nobody else can fully understand. They remind you who you were before the world told you who you should be. And when you’re with them, no matter how many decades have passed, you can still access that younger version of yourself — the one who believed life was wide open and full of possibility.

So yes, we may be discussing retirement funds now instead of teenage crushes. We may compare aches and pains rather than exam results. We may need reading glasses to see the menu.

But the laughter? Still the same.

The loyalty? Still the same.

The craic? Absolutely still the same.

And if we’re lucky, we’ll still be sitting together years from now — possibly in a nursing home, possibly arguing over whose turn it is to make the tea — still laughing about life, still supporting each other, still friends.

Here’s to childhood friends.

And here’s to still having the craic, no matter how old we get.

Day 16: Cupid owes me a Refund

 

Looking at the calendar this morning to check what day it was, I was mildly amused to discover it’s Singles Awareness Day. I’ve made my views on this very clear before. Nowadays, practically every type of relationship is accepted and celebrated… except the relationship status of being single!

Have you ever seen the dreaded single supplement added to holidays? I can practically pay the same price for one person as a couple pays for two. Romantic sunsets apparently cost extra if you’re watching them alone. Then there was the time I tried to book a room for a music weekend and the hotel refused to give me one because I was travelling solo — despite the fact I was willing to pay their exorbitant “single tax.” Can you imagine if they refused me because I was gay, Black, or a member of the Travelling community? It would be all over the news (and rightly so). But refusing me because I’m single? Apparently grand altogether.

And don’t get me started on theatres that won’t sell a single ticket. I understand the economics if there are only two seats left — buy one and they might struggle to sell the other. Fair enough. But when there are five or six seats available and they still refuse? That’s not economics — that’s just anti-single discrimination!

Anyway, rant over.

Yesterday, of course, was Hallmark’s annual money-spinner — St Valentine’s Day. I saw a great meme that said: “Don’t be sad about not getting a Valentine’s card today… no one loves you on the other 364 days of the year either!” Brutal… but funny.

However, I am delighted to report that I did receive a Valentine’s card this year! I sponsor a dog through Dogs Trust… and the little bitch sent me one.

Finally - unconditional love...without being too taxing!

Day 11: The Day my Clothes Begged for Mercy

 

This time every year, without fail, I take the bull by the horns and edit my wardrobe(s). Note the plural. One wardrobe simply wouldn’t be sufficient to house all the versions of me I have been over the years.

I approach the task with military precision. Section by section. No skipping. No mercy. Everything must be tried on — which is an act of bravery in itself. If it still fits, it moves on to test number two: can it be paired with at least three other items in my wardrobe? If the answer is no, or if I know deep down that I will never wear it again, it’s relegated to the donate pile.

In theory, this is a very sensible system.
In practice, it’s emotional carnage.

Because the moment I open the wardrobe door, I swear my clothes look back at me with pleading eyes. That dress whispers, “But remember that night?” The jacket hisses, “You’ll regret this when it comes back into fashion.” The top that hasn’t fit since the Celtic Tiger was roaring insists, “You might need me for motivation.”

And suddenly I’m not decluttering — I’m negotiating hostage releases.

Some items are easy to part with. The itchy jumper that I hated the moment I bought it. The jeans that looked great in the shop mirror and terrible in every other mirror since. Off you go. Godspeed.

But then there are the tricky ones. The outfit worn to a big event. The dress you bought for a holiday that didn’t quite live up to expectations, but the dress itself still holds promise. The coat that makes you feel vaguely competent and put-together, even if your life is anything but.

And then there’s a tee-shirt, that looks at me with pleading eyes, silently begging me not to cast them out into the cold, wide world — abandoned, unloved, and probably destined for a charity shop rack beside a sequinned top from 2007?

What I eventually realise, every single year, is that I’m not really sorting clothes. I’m sorting memories. Phases. Aspirations. The person I was, the person I thought I might become, and the person I am now — all hanging side by side on plastic hangers.

Letting go feels oddly personal. Like admitting that certain chapters are closed. That some versions of myself have served their purpose and can be thanked and released.

So I compromise. I always do.

The donate pile grows respectably, but not heroically. A few “maybe” items are granted another year’s reprieve. I close the wardrobe doors feeling lighter, slightly virtuous, and quietly smug… until next year, when the whole cycle begins again.

Because wardrobes, like life, need editing now and then.
And sometimes, it’s okay to keep one or two pieces — just because they still know too much about you.

Day 9: I guess no luck this Valentine's Day either!

 

I awoke this morning to a bright clear sky. The dull, rain filled clouds of the past few weeks were nowhere to be seen. Knowing how quickly our Irish weather can change I decided to get a much needed walk in as soon as possible.

Deciding to live dangerously, I turned right at my gate instead of my usual left.

 God, I'm such a dare devil!

As it turns out, I couldn't have made a better decision. If I hadn't, I would have missed this most beautiful sight - a glade of snowdrops. I caught a glimpse of them from the roadside. It really did look like there had been a fall of snow.

After a quick glance around to make sure there was no angry farmer ready to scold or shoot me, I clambered over a rickety gate to get a better look. It was worth the risk.

You know the way there are "triggers" that immediately put you on edge and make you anxious or angry. Well this was definitely a "glimmer", that calms your nerves and puts you in a good mood.

I was tempted to pick some to bring home with me to keep up my high spirits. But I resisted, as I figured they were meant to be left growing in their natural habitat.

Again a very good decision on my behalf.

I googled "snowdrops" to get a nice quote about them and came across this gem.

According to folklore it is bad luck to bring snowdrops into a house before Valentine's Day as any unmarried women residing there will remain a spinster! I obviously brought in a bucketful of them in a previous life!!!

Mystery solved. It wasn’t bad luck, poor timing, or high standards… it was the snowdrops.

Day 7 of 90 Days of Spring....The Director's Cut.

 

It’s been a very damp squib of a start to both spring and my “Get Active” 90 Day Challenge. We were lucky here in the Midlands to escape the worst of Storm Chandra’s fury, but we’ve had relentless rain for the past week. Not the dramatic, biblical downpour that batters you into submission and then clears off. No — this is that miserable, light, sideways rain that lulls you into thinking “Ah sure, it’s grand”… while quietly soaking you through to the soul.

As a result, I’ve continued to hibernate indoors. Doing what, I hear you ask?
No? Just the voices in my head again? Right so.

Well, I’ve binged the first half of Bridgerton season four — because you really can’t beat a bit of dramatic bodice-ripping to warm the cockles of your heart! I’ve also watched the slow and painful demise of the glory days of the Irish rugby team. (Character-building, apparently.) And I’ve returned to the comforting clickety-clack of my trusty knitting needles, which feel like therapy you can wear.

I have Rita Tighe to thank for my very appropriate mug — a daily reminder that while spring may be technically here, motivation is still negotiating its arrival.

At this rate, my 90 Days of Spring will be sponsored by Netflix, wool, and denial.

Day 2: Proof that Panto Season isn't Over Yet....Oh No Its Not!

 Today is a very special day in Ireland. It marks Imbolg, the ancient Celtic festival celebrating the midway point between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox—the beginning of the end of winter. Light is returning, slowly but surely.

It’s also St Brigid’s Day, in honour of one of our patron saints. And after the long, strange years of Covid lockdowns, the government gifted us an extra bank holiday, wisely choosing St Brigid’s weekend. A fine decision, in my humble opinion.

I marked the day by heading off to Leixlip to see their panto, Oz. Quite a few people were surprised that panto season is still alive and kicking in late January. But honestly, most were just delighted to have something magical, colourful and fun to escape to during these grey, post-Christmas weeks. And it didn’t disappoint—far from it.

Being there made me feel unexpectedly nostalgic. Leixlip is where I first fell in love with live theatre, where the spark was lit all those years ago. Oh yes it is!

And who knows… with Imbolg stirring new beginnings and all that creative energy in the air, maybe I’ve been inspired to tread the boards once more.