ireland

Dublin, the Blarney Stone, and the Cliffs of Moher are all spots in Ireland that everyone knows they need to go to. However, one place you should add to your itinerary is the Burren Perfumery.

I was twelve when my parents took me to Washington, DC for the first time. It was the first stop on a family vacation where we would be attending the funerals of two of my grandparents. Washington, DC, was the first major historical place any of us had visited. My father connected easily with the heritage we found there. I wouldn’t have a similar connection with history until a decade later.

Photo by Rolf Heinrich; Köln. cc

First Place

Dirt was never on the menu for Kristjana Green and Alexis Hiatt as they planned their summer excursions. But though the dirt wasn’t completely washed out of their well-earned, self-produced meals, they didn’t seem to mind.

“Hey, lady, you get around!” exclaimed the man next to her at passport control. Darley Newman looked down at her passport, filled to the brim with stamps, and laughed. That is kind of funny, she thought to herself, appreciating the man’s humor and taking a moment to acknowledge the fact herself. She has been around—all around the world. And if the man had asked whether the nature of her travels was business or pleasure, she would have had a hard time giving him an answer. “It’s a mix,” she would reply. “It doesn’t feel like a vacation, really. But it’s such rewarding work that I wouldn’t really call it work either.”

The Irish Troubles were worse this year than they had been for decades. Even though the Tuckfields lived in a mixed Catholic and Protestant neighborhood, the roads were barred by police barricades. When the roads would open again after a day or so, the family would go to the grocery store to stock up. On the way they might pass protesters, or a tank might weave as delicately as possible around them.

Kristin Hatch, like many others, has always wanted to run a marathon. It has been part of her bucket list since she returned from serving a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 2008. She wanted the chance to prove to herself that she could aim high, persevere, and see it through—a chance to prove that she wouldn’t give up. So you can imagine the shock when her doctor told her she couldn’t run because of arthritis in her knee. Yet, true to her character, she did it anyway.