Has this online journal become a Monday-night special? It’s possible. It’s a good excuse to sit and write a post while I listen to what Spotify’s Discover Weekly might have to offer me. Sometimes not much, sometimes surprisingly many songs that catch my ear.
I’m sitting here sweating because I just folded all the laundry, and then went outside to water the garden, and then I came in and did my knee exercises. You wouldn’t think that standing up from a sitting position 30 times in a row without using your arms would be strenuous, but you’d be wrong.
Some time ago, I wrote about my dithering regarding plans for my upcoming birthday trip. Anders really seemed to want to drive down to the coast of France, even though I was having major mixed feelings about it. I really want to visit St. Malo and Mont St. Michel, but I wasn’t particularly keen on going in August, when most of Europe is also on vacation. And nothing was happening and then suddenly one evening, he said, let’s go to Ireland. I was a bit surprised but it certainly helped make up my mind, haha!
So this weekend, he very kindly became our travel agent and one evening he booked our flight, and booked Airbnbs after we planned the dates and route. We’ll be going to Dublin, Galway, and Belfast. One week, so a quick trip, but I am very excited to finally be getting to Ireland after 10 years of wishing! I’ve been looking up things to do besides the few things I already had on my list. Here’s what I have so far:
Dublin: The Book of Kells at Trinity College and the library, National History Museum (it has glass animals by the Blaschkas!), The Little Museum, the dragon gates, and possibly a Guiness brewery tour (for the rest of my family while I go see the Book of Kells, possibly)
Galway: Daytrip to the cliffs of Moher, Wild Atlantic Way, Quay Street, CLaddagh Ring Museum, Galway Cathedral, and a really good restaurant for my actual birthday
Belfast: the Titanic Museum, daytrip to the Giant’s Causeway, C.S. Lewis Square, The Salmon of Knowledge, and Glass of Thrones
That’s a lot to pack into a week, right? If you read this and have any tips, I’ll take them gladly!
Most of my mom’s family on her mom’s side is from Germany, if I remember correctly, and the vast majority of her dad’s family is mostly from Scotland (by way of Canada), with a couple of English and Dutch thrown in. But one set of great-great-great-grandparents were from Ennis, County Clare, in Ireland. We aren’t going there, but it’s still cool to consider.
John Noonan, born approximately 1818 in Ennis, married Mary McLaughlin. She was born in August 1817. WHen they were young, they heard the call of the New World. After a long, slow journey over the Atlantic, they arrived at By-Town near the mouth of the Ottawa River, just across from Ottawa, the capital of Canada. They were Protestants and spoke English without an Irish accent, as they were descendants of the English people who were sent by an English King to make their homes in Ireland, in Ennis, County Clare.
In By-Town, Mary opened a little school in their home, where she taught reading, writing, and arithmetic. From By-Town, they moved to Kincardin on the eastern shore of Lake Huron, in Ontario. It was there that they began a family of 9. The younger children were born in Michigan. Their fourth daughter Mary Ann, was born August 4, 1848 in Kincarden. She moved to Michigan with her family in 1859, and on January 22, 1866, she married my great-great-grandfather Henry Pangborn.
John Noonan committed suicide on Octoer 11, 1875. Afterwards, the family would often visit Mary. In June of 1881, Mary went to visit her daughter Albina Fraser in Waukesha, Wisconsin. While there, a devastating fire swept through the thumb of Michigan, and her home was destroyed. She came back to Michigan, then returned to Wisconsin to her daughter’s. After returning again to Michigan, she sold her land to her neighbors, the Murrays, and built a home in Bad Axe. Because of ill health, she lived there only for a few years. She then moved in with yet another daughter before her death on October 1, 1887.
Mary Ann and Henry had 8 children. My great-grandfather Samuel Henry Pangborn was the fifth child and second son, born June 29, 1874. My mom remembers him and his wife Jessie Ann née McAllister. They married in 1900, and they had 11 children. 9 survived, and my grandfather Wallace Samuel was the fifth child and second son, born March 13, 1907. He and his second wife, Bernice née McNally, had my mom Linda on July 28, 1941.
So it’s a long ways back and a thin connection but a connection nonetheless. I’m grateful to my mom’s cousin, the late Anne West, and Ina Scott Lowry, who compiled the info I have on my ancestors. Ennis isn’t actually all that far from Galway, but we won’t have time to visit, and really, it’s a stretch, innit?
Mood: nostalgic
Music: Emmy Rossum—Slow Me Down
🍀