My Collections

Fifth in a series.......

 

 

Natural Beauty

A Series of Short Stories

By: Jacqueline E. Hughes


I always bring back a stone or good sized rock from all of my travels.....as long as it doesn't weigh down the suitcase too much!  In a way, I feel as though just a tiny piece of the place comes home to live with us.  We can touch it, hold it in the palm of our hands or, just look at it and we are instantly swept back in time; living within our memories.

Down the Lane

I remember doing this as a kid on all of our family vacations with a stone from the Blue Ridge Mountains, Lake of the Ozark's, Upper Peninsula of Michigan and the foothills of Pikes Peak in Colorado.  I say foothills because once out there, my Dad refused to ruin the brakes on our car by climbing and descending this rocky behemoth with an elevation of over 14,000 feet!  Eventually, each 'unmarked' rock was put in a small box to mingle together throughout time and space.

This is the same way I feel about the images, usually in the hundreds (thank you digital cameras), brought home and uploaded to the computer.  Should I dare to wonder why the PC is so slow?  Note to Self: Finally use that 'external hard drive' to store your pics, OK?

One year, on a trip to Normandy in the north of France, I smuggled home a few scoops of soil.  I'm outed now!!  Having purchased flower seeds from a small nursery and garden shop along the Right Bank of the Seine in Paris, I nurtured those seeds in the Normandy soil within a pretty cobalt blue pot and witnessed the beauty of the seedlings as they matured into a profusion of color and fragrance on our lanai.

During that same visit to France, we went over knowing that our youngest daughter was engaged to be married.  Seeking what we believed to be a perfect engagement gift, led us on a series of interesting adventures among the locals of a small village near Mont-St.-Michel.  We came home with the prize: antique, monogrammed French linen sheets.  Sheets that only improve with time.  However, the unique stories we returned home with while looking for the sheets were nothing short of priceless.

People, places, fantastic memories and a few natural things.....these are the souvenirs of Joy and Happiness that constantly feed us until our next adventure begins.  This is what life is all about whether the experience is a shopping trip to the local Publix store for groceries or a pre-planned excursion to parts unknown.  Life itself is the adventure.....!

Once again I sit at my desk going through the pictures from Galway and Connemara thinking about the story behind each one.  The stories come seeping out around the edges of a picture like the bubbling juices of an apple pie recently extracted from a hot oven.  Yummy, delicious stories made from many letters and emotions mixed and infused to create a whole, at least, in my mind.

It is so enjoyable sharing these sweet thoughts with you, in story and picture form.  I am uncertain as to whether my goal is to entice you to visit where we've been or, create the essence of you having already been there via my stories.  Whichever works for you, my readers.  My stories and pictures are combined with you in mind.  Also, I really enjoy the travel, writing and photography!!

Today I am introducing 'My Collections' segment.  Before leaving for places yet to be discovered by my camera's lens, I create a list of ideas to focus on.  It may be a collection of 'lace curtain' windows, colorful Dublin Georgian doors, or children in Paris walking home from school.  Opening my imagination to any and all suggestions, it's amazing what collections are added to the list once we arrive at our destination.  This is a major part of the excitement of travel for me.  The photos that come home with us are the basis for all of the stories I write and they serve to remind me of things leading up to, as well as what transpired after each was taken.

In addition to my photo collection, potential rock-garden from around the world and agricultural transgression (singular, I might add!), the books by French and Irish authors brought back to fill our minds and spirits with great stories have become an essential part of my life.  Eason's Bookstore and WH Smith Books, my Irish counterparts to Barnes and Noble, are a must stop each trip.  My husband and I never wonder why our check-in luggage sports a bright red tag for 'excessive weight' on returning flights!

I made my virgin visit to the Eason's, located at Lower O'Connell Street, Dublin City, back in 1990, bringing home books by Michael Farrell, Brinsley MacNamara, J. G. Farrell and a 1988 paperback edition of a book entitled The Lilac Bus by Maeve Binchy.  This was still quite early in her career and she had yet to be picked-up by her U.S. publisher, Anchor Books.  Consequently, I had no earthly clue as to the future importance of this little gem of a book or the brilliant impact this author would soon have on the literary world.

Today I bring home talented U.K. authors the likes of Cathy Kelly, Edna O'Brien and the talented Kate Mosse who, with her well written trilogy that revolves around Carcassonne, a fortified French town in the province of Languedoc-Roussillon, has one foot in the U.K. publishing market and the other in the U.S.  She lives between England and France.  And, yes, I may covet her life to a certain degree.....

Anyway, the point is that as I've been writing this piece, my initial 'Collection' has been following me down the page.  Have you noticed?  Ever since checking into our sweet little cottage in Oughterard that was surrounded by the most charming dry-stacked stone wall, I've been captivated by them.  Of course, they are everywhere you look in Ireland.  They were stacked with hard work, pain and absolute attention to detail and some remain totally naked of vegetation while others are tenderly wrapped like exquisite Christmas packages in tendrils of ivy and soft, soft moss.  Everywhere we turned these beautiful dividers of working fields, homes and barns, and emerald green pastures provided a local art form passed down from one generation to another.  I felt so privileged to have had an opportunity to preserve them in my own way.

What feeds your desire to travel to a certain place and then, perhaps, return there again and again and again......?