My wonderful, delightful landlady, Josephine, her daughters, Sarah and Sheila and their children.
in the backyard of her Salthill home.
They invited me over last night for drinks, “to get acquainted”, and to help me locate my missing link McCarthy family.
Josephine is from Lauragh, the very same area where I had stayed in the Bothy in the woods a couple of weeks ago while on the McCarthy trail. Faster than I could finish my drink, they were on the phone with a parish priest in Kerry and I now have his number to call for help searching the local records.
We all connected so easily that it just turned into a great, long, positive evening of women sharing with women.
Josephine went back to school at 60 or 61 after her husband’s death to get her degree in archaeology. I am really impressed by her life-force, generosity and her adventurous spirit. She’s also got a wonderful singing voice and after a few gin and tonics she can be coaxed into sharing a very funny Irish song or two.
Sheila has lived and worked in Cambodia for 16 years with her Cambodian partner. They lead specialized tours for a variety of types of people. Her website is
http://www.hiddencambodia.com Check them out.
She is an intelligent,aware woman who balances her interesting career with the demands of being the mother of an active five year old. She spent years in hotel management before giving it up to pursue her much more interesting career sharing her love of Cambodia with others. She’s warm and so easy to hang out with that I know her tours will be fascinating and fun. I want to go on one.
Sarah is a professional photographer. She also has a lovely singing voice, even after midnight. Smile. She delighted with an a’cappella version of Fly Me to the Moon. Sarah has two young children and I have no idea how she manages to stay so graceful and positive and keep up with it all. I did see her husband entertaining them from time to time with affection and great patience. Bravo, good man!
Here we are looking at the map of known Sheela na Gig locations throughout Ireland which I found in an antiquities shop on the Dingle peninsula.
We had gone outside to admire Josephine’s Sheela, which may or may not be a reproduction. Josephine is a devoted caretaker of this Goddess. I felt lucky to be sharing drink, songs, ideas
and friendship out in the garden with both the stone Goddess and the three Irish O’Sullivan goddesses who took me in so generously. 
As our evening progressed we all shared songs, stories, laughter, and pondered this and that. We ended up discussing the concept of The Goddess and Ireland’s evolution to a patriarchal country, huddled around the Aga in the kitchen until 2:00 am.
I haven’t done that sort of thing in a great long while and I will confess that I felt it when I woke up this morning. But I wouldn’t change a thing.
Here’s the link to Josephine’s airbnb outside of Galway.
http://https://www.airbnb.ie/rooms/4975128?eluid=1&euid=3b3242d6-75ea-91f0-7a98-ffc6261221b9#host-profile
Stay with her. You’ll be glad you did.