Not so long ago and not so far from this village and in all directions, the Black and Tans terrorized my neighbors' grandmas and grandpas and their parents for hurling, singing, dancing, speaking Irish, etc. No wonder that the publican of a certain pub in the village is rumored to encourage young men to "take home" certain people who loudly aired their anti-IRA opinions.

The movie made me think, among many other myriad things, about how I wanted to live in this world, bravely and with utter conviction. Many revolutions have died fruitlessly cuz it's easy to fight against something, but not necessarily for something.

. . .

Any room that has a ceiling higher than ten feet is vast for a country mouse like me. In the hotel where we had our first (ridiculously expensive) dirty martinis in ages, the ceiling was hung with silver balls that reflected the red and black coral over the mantelpiece and the creamy crushed velvet chairs strewn in intimate clusters. This tableau of minimalist luxury was a doppelganger of N___'s old bedroom in San Francisco. That's cuz she's bourgeois, Jimmy said.

I dunno. I just marveled at the ceiling. We used to live in a busy port, under a vast ceiling and overlooking the vast vista of industry: immense factories, giant cranes, trains that, at night, screamed vast speed. Now we have a bedroom with a low, curved ceiling, and underneath our bodies lie and dreams unfold, small and (somewhat) quiet and manageable.

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