The west village.

There’s a corner of Inis Meáin that stands that little bit apart from the rest of the island, apart enough that few have reason to come up here. It’s nearly eighty metres above sea level and named for how far out it juts into the Atlantic. It lies beyond a bend, a sharp bend, as if keeping itself out of the way, or hidden. Its hills are its gateway, ensuring that all who enter earn their prize.  

That prize is front row seats to the edge. A panorama that stretches from Árainn in the west around to the west of Clare. Patchwork fields, limestone layered over millenia. The sea, the sea, the sea. Endless sky. Silent nights, unholy nights, stars as many as droplets in driving rain.

And me in it. And it in me.

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It was luck that landed me up here. The landlord’s number was the second or third I got, and the day after a call in nervous Irish from a Tesco carpark, he picked me up at the pier. From there, it was incline nearly all the way; every bend and turn-off revealed yet another hill, and when the car shifted into second gear, it stayed in it. At the top, he nodded to a neat chalet on the left-hand side, ‘sin é. Áit deas í, chaith an cailín deireanach dhá bhliain….’ I scarcely heard him, I wasn’t listening, it didn’t matter; the house could’ve been a tent, or a clochán with no floor. I was sold on what lay the other side .

To the west, to my left, the yellowed sand and tough grass of Cill Éinne on Inis Mór and further over, the mouth of Cill Rónán, and the gleam of the boats hasting to Doolin. The Twelve Bens across the water, indigo and jagged, and before them the specks of houses stretching back to Lettermullen. Galway Bay, sapphire at this distance. The west coast of Clare rising from the sea; the Burren a heather glow. The glint of the Black Head Lighthouse, the Cliffs of Moher painted in evening sun. From the front door, the sight of places as far flung as Liscannor, Lahinch and Loop Head – flecks of colour; towns, houses, pubs and hotels. No sign of County Kerry that day, and no harm, for I soon learned the sight of Kerry meant the coming of rain.

Aye, I’d take the house. Put me down for a year.

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It’s a tough cycle up from the lower village. It’s a tougher one again to the upper village. Gales and storms congregate up here, and there’s little we’re not exposed to. Winds lash off back windows so hard that imaginations are wont to wander. Few visit us. It’s a long walk home of a Friday night.

But, up on this height, on a good day – and on many bad – the universal blue pierces; it’s the perfect complement to the island’s ruggedness. The famous stone walls squiggle through the island like veins, each a story in itself for styles vary according to tribe. Will this evening be an evening they are warmed pink by the dying sun?

Today – or should I say, right now – the sea is royal blue to the east, steel blue this side. Always breathing, always in motion, whether licking the shore of Trácht Each or crashing off it – on the really grey days, the brilliant white of that foam is the only vivid colour I see.

I might go running later, on the lower road, it runs the length of the setting sun; her silver rays will make diamonds of the sea and these will be my running partner. Down there I’ll see the gap between the islands, where there is no land, just horizon – and, well, forever. I’ll feel the sea’s spray. A bulwark of rock will rise up one side of me, layers of limestone and grass and limestone again. The other side, a wall keeping me from a treacherous drop to the sea. I’ll sit there a while, and spend time with my surrounds.

And then later, at home, the night show; complete darkness, and a star-lit sky.

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It is a special place. But ‘special’ is subjective, and places aren’t just pictures; this corner, this village is home – well, a home. It’s where friends are and were, with neighbours of the finest kind. It’s a village full of accidental Irish teachers who daily gift me words and phrases, often with a satisfied seo focal nua duit. It’s where I walk the garden barefoot. Yes, here is sea and mountains and endless sky, but this village too is where I sit out as twilight falls around me like a blanket softly draped. It’s where we sat out in actual blankets, passing wine, talking until sun’s rise silenced us. It’s wind’s howl and sun’s glow, sea’s tumult and sky’s peace. It’s to where doubters came and said, ‘I get it now, I get why you’re here.’  

It’s the end of the island and those who neither farm or live here have much reason to come up. Sometimes though, I see locals passing by, up for an evening spin. Up to sit and watch, and maybe to feel. I feel this place, like some feel faith. It’s wonder, I guess, respite from all that’s material; soul and spirit alight, in flight.

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I don’t really have a conclusion to this; it’s merely a rambling meditation on my good fortune. For even in the weeks when it’s grey and silent as the grave, or wild and pitch-black but for the lights across the way, even when my thighs are burning from them damned hills, I thank my lucky stars that I ended up here.

That among all that has shaped me, made and influenced me, the beauty of the west village can claim its share.

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