"Oh, I wanted/ to be easy/ in the peopled kingdoms,/ to take my place there,/ but there was none/ that I could find/ shaped like me."--from "Trilliums", Mary Olivier

I'm in Connemara for a family reunion. The hotel is a short walk from the beach. Our startlingly cavernous apartment has huge windows on three sides, with expansive views of the sea, fields dotted with lone houses and ruins, and the craggy blue silhouette of the Twelve Bens. In the morning there is so much sunlight, it's almost overwhelming.

Last night the husband and I bickered, unsettled by the new settings. How stupid of us, "us" being poorly defined, possibly intentionally. Exposed to all of this light, it's hard to look at everything--blithe beachcombers, golden labradors and brilliant gorse, a cloudless blue sky stitched with birdsong--while there's me, determined to be unhappy. (This, though, will pass.)

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