It’s with O’Leary in the grave? I beg to differ, William Butler Yeats. There are plenty of romantics left on this fair isle. My husband is one such romantic.
One evening a few weeks ago, he arrived home from work with a bunch of flowers, a box of chocolates, a bottle of wine and this slide show:
The funny thing is that he thought, just because circumstances dictated that I needed to know in advance, that he hadn’t gotten it one hundred percent right. But in my book he got everything right. The slide show and the fact that I had a few weeks to look forward to it more than made up for the fact that he hadn’t been able to keep it a secret until the day of the trip. And like I said, it was circumstances that dictated that – I needed to advertise for more business, so therefore I needed to know before I took any more children in to mind that I was taking a few days off at the end of November, beginning of December.
Needless to say, I was quite blown away by the whole thing.
And the trip?
Well, what can I say? I enjoyed every last moment of it. And since a picture is worth a thousand words, maybe some pictures will best sum up the whole experience.
My Affair to Remember moment at the top of the Empire State Building ‘because it’s the closest thing to Heaven… in New York.’
Ice-skating in Central Park has been ticked off my bucket list.
The Christmas Tree outside Rockefeller Center.
The John Lennon Memorial in Central Park.
My Miracle on 34th Street moment outside Macy’s. I Believe.
Macy’s and the Empire State Building.
The Sir Walter Scott Memorial on Literary Walk in Central Park.
Strolling down Literary Walk in Central Park.
A romantic moment in Central Park.
Hanging in an Irish Pub with my good friend Jessica Kong, author of ‘A Lost Kitten.’
All that’s left of the Hot Chocolate Lava Cake in the Chart House Restaurant, New Jersey.
The Manhattan skyline from the Jersey Shore – the photo doesn’t do it justice.
Times Square
Descending the steps of the New York Library.
Macy’s believe meter shooting straight up as I post my letter to Santa.
Grand Central Station.
Wicked on Broadway.
And the romance didn’t end there. As I spent my birthday and our anniversary ice-skating in Central Park, followed by a delicious lunch and cocktail in Bubba Gump’s and finished up with dinner in a classy restaurant, when we arrived home to Ireland Matt gave me a birthday card and a box of chocolates and I gave him this card that I bought from my good friend Fiona Scoble of Church Mouse Press:
with this poem written in calligrapy:
Where Would I Be Now?
What if I hadn’t repeated,
Had taken my bad grades
And back-packed around the world,
Waiting tables, tending bar, cleaning rooms?
*
What if I’d done my learning
In the University of Life,
Discovering all the world had to offer,
Each new place a new adventure?
*
The slopes in Austria,
The Great Wall of China,
The Inca Trail in the Andes,
I’d know them all.
*
Safari in Kenya,
Surfing in Hawaii,
Diving on the Great Barrier Reef,
I’d have done it all.
*
Where would I be now?
I’d have settled in Africa maybe,
Making her beautiful sunsets,
Her wildlife, my own.
*
Maybe I’d have lived in Paris
With a saxophone player,
Walked along by the moonlit Seine
Hand in hand with him.
*
Maybe I’d have found a hideaway
In an island paradise,
A waterfall outside my window
The soundtrack to my writing.
*
I’d have come home to visit,
Would have met you
Because somehow I know
All roads lead back to you.
yvonnemcevaddy 