July 15: Investigation of Place
The Forty Foot Bathing Place
I approached the changing area shyly. Jenny MacDonald had told me that there's kind of a fraternal, unspoken agreement at the Forty Foot that everyone avert their eyes when others change into their swim suits, but being an American, I wanted to confirm with today's bather's that I really could shimmy into my one piece in the open air.
A woman who looked to be about my mother's age, maybe early sixties or so, and her husband had just come out of the water looking energized. "Excuse me," I said. "I'm from the U.S. and I've never been here before. I wanted to ask -- where do I change?"
She chuckled as she toweled off her hair. "Anywhere you like," she said, gesturing at the white wall-like structures with hooks for towels on them, that I assume had been erected to give some semblance of privacy.
The Forty Foot is a public spot for sea swimming that I accessed by taking the DART train about 25 minutes south of Trinity College, then walking for 15 minutes along a rocky coastline that picturesque, pastel houses look out onto. They reminded me a bit of the pastel houses in San Francisco's Outer Sunset neighborhood, where everything looks a bit faded from constant exposure to salty sea air.
What struck me first about the Forty Foot is that public money has gone into making this rocky bathing spot more accessible and safe. There are bright blue railings at three different entry points to the sea, two offering ladders for bathers to climb in vertically. At the third entry point, the rocks have been carved into a gradual staircase, offering a more stable entry for less mobile bathers (which I quickly became once my body was enveloped in cold). It wasn't a sandy beach; it was very rocky. Behind the bathing area there were small tide pools through which two tiny terrier mixes were chasing each other. There was a clean public toilet and a modest shower. These amenities were different from the locals-only beach spots I'm used to frequenting in California, where storms will pull railings off of steep staircases and will go unfixed for months.
Jenny was also right about the respectful averting of eyes. There were two groups of teenage boys, the older group all wearing "coach" t-shirts and carrying cleats. There were also various pairs of teenage girls, some of whom bravely jumped from a high diving point. There were some flirtatious interactions once in the water, but there were no wolf whistles, no making fun of anyone's bodies, no attempts to embarrass anyone in the changing area. This was notable to me because it was a far cry from my locker room experiences before gym class when I was that age, and those were both gender segregated and indoors.
When I first jumped in the water, painful pins and needles enveloped my body. I forcefully whispered swear words under my breath because I read somewhere that doing so releases pain, but it wasn't helping. I did a few breaststrokes around the swimming area closest to the beach. I had optimistically turned on the "record outdoor swim" feature on my Apple Watch, so I know that I lasted about two and a half minutes. I got out of the water, teeth chattering. The woman who had first consulted me about where to change shouted, "Fantastic, isn't it?" as she and her husband headed back up the road.
She had told me that she and her husband had first started sea swimming during the first winter of COVID "for our mental health." If jumping in this freezing water in the dead of winter was an improvement upon their mental health, they must have been in a dark place indeed, I thought.
The 55-degree air felt warm and humid on my skin after the shock of the water. I walked around the rocky shore for a few minutes, then decided that I hadn't come all this way just for one two-point-five minute attempt. Could swimming longer make me feel better mentally, too? I got back in the water.
I decided to swim out farther to force myself to stay in longer. As I swam, my body began to feel warmer. I was no longer shivering. I felt my face breaking out into an elated grin.
A white-haired man swam by me. "You been comin' here all summer?" he asked. "No! I'm from California! I've never been in this body of water!" came my breathy reply. We began talking, I told him about what I was here for, and he was delighted. He had had a heart attack a year ago and had joined his local drama troupe immediately thereafter because he felt he had a second chance at life and had always wanted to perform. We bonded instantly. You can read the story for yourself, because he agreed to be my community interview.
Ever since I came back from the Forty Foot and have been regaling my everyone I meet with how elated I felt there, people have been asking me how I decided to go. My new Irish friend Sinead (whom you'll meet on my next page), asked me, "Did you know sea swimming such a thing among Irish people? Especially among the older generation?" I didn't, and I don't quite know how I decided to go. I do know that when I saw NYU Steinhardt's packing list suggested a bathing suit, I immediately threw one in my suitcase and felt resolved to jump in the sea. Maybe some part of the me that was packing my bag in California knew I would have a transformative experience.
St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin
On Friday, July 14, I attended the 5:30 Evensong service with my classmate Elise (or sung evening prayer) at St. Patrick's, an Anglican/Episcopalian church. I recorded the entire service using the Voice Memos app on my phone and have embedded it below should you like to listen to the service (the church was livestreaming the service online so I was hoping they would be okay with me recording this for educational purposes). The recording captures not just the angelic singing of the choir and echoing chords of the organ, but also the creaking of the chairs we sat on as we rose and were seated, the dinging of someone's phone going off, parents shushing their children, and the shuffling of soggy rain jackets. What I feel the recording captures best is how impenetrable the service felt to me. The acoustics of the vaulted, Gothic arches did wonders for the choir's voices and made their harmonies rich and celestial. However, the priest's sermon and other spoken remarks echoed so much off of the stone walls that I could barely understand any of what was said.
At first I attributed this illegibility of the service to my not understanding the order of a Catholic mass. When I attended the service, I was under the impression that St. Patrick's was a Catholic church due to something I had misinterpreted in my guide book. My fiancé grew up Catholic and my sister went to a Catholic college, so I had been to Catholic mass a handful of times and not understood the rites and rituals then either. But, it turns out St. Patrick's is Anglican. I know very little about the etiquette at Christian religious services, whether Anglican, Catholic, or anything else, so I tried to follow along when people stood, sang, and recited. Still, I felt lost even though we were given pamphlets showing the Order of Service because I simply couldn't comprehend what was being said!
On the St. Patrick's Cathedral website, they state that their mission is as follows: "As the National Cathedral of the Church of Ireland we strive to follow the path of Saint Patrick to witness the love and power of God made known in Jesus Christ. We do this through a ministry of worship & welcome, holiness & hospitality to all." I felt warmly welcomed as I first walked in the door. The guard (I'm not sure if this is the right word for him -- he was wearing a blue sport coat, lanyard, and walkie-talkie) who stood at the front door laughed me off when I asked if he needed to look inside my bag before I went inside. He gestured at me to walk forward and smiled as he said, "You're very welcome." In the U.S., this is a phrase I only ever hear in response to my thanking people for something they've done. Here, "you're very welcome" is a greeting at the start of an interaction. And it's effective -- it makes me feel very welcome indeed.
However, the service itself, as I've written, made me feel quite alienated. The musical elements of the songs (the melodies, chord progressions, resonance, and harmonies) were transportive and made me want to close my eyes and connect with some higher being. At the end of a long day, I just wanted to sit and listen to the music, but the social normed seemed to be standing. I felt that sitting through the songs would be disrespectful. Having spent the morning talking about performance accessibility, this ritual made the service feel quite inaccessible to me, to say nothing of the fact that I could barely understand the spoken English (the priest's Irish accent had nothing to do with it -- the acoustics were just so echoey). One effort in the direction of accessibility appeared to be the little prayer cushions hanging off the backs of chairs incase people want to kneel during prayer. They appeared to be hand embroidered and featured different items that are significant in Irish culture or the names of counties around the country. But Elise and I both felt like there wasn't room to kneel between rows even if we had wanted to avail ourselves of the cushions... Of course it is possible that we were misinterpreting what they were intended for.
My impression is that there were very few, if any, local Dubliners attending the Evensong service. Most people I heard chatting after the service either had American accents or were speaking European languages other than English or Irish. There was one man across the aisle from me who seemed to know exactly when to sit and stand, and it felt like everyone around him was looking to him for cues about when to do what. Partway through the service, I learned that not even the choir was local! The priest thanked the choir for visiting from San Antonio, TX. Apparently they were the guest choir for the week. I felt like at least on that evening, this was a building steeped in rich Irish history that now mostly hosts visitors rather than locals.
St. Patrick’s Cathedral Mass.m4aTextures & patterns in and around St. Patrick's Cathedral
A crest on the gate to the Cathedral gardens
St. Patrick's has a beautiful garden out back with verdant flowers
After the service: One of the Texan singers in his robes recesses
I loved the boldly patterned tiles with various textures. Some appeared to have stained glass elements in them.
A historic cemetery adjacent to the Cathedral.
The chairs all had these cross-stitched cushions to kneel on during prayer -- some had the names of different counties around Ireland.
View of stained glass windows from the outside.
Exiting the church
On the right as you enter the main doors to the Cathedral
Community Interview Transcript
I conducted my interview with a man who chose to go by his nickname, "Dunny," for this interview. Dunny is a 49-year old Irish man (ethnically and culturally) who works for a Japanese tobacco company, grew up by the Irish seaside, and still regularly goes sea swimming at the end of his work day. I have linked my interview transcript below (click to open in a new window). Dunny recently fell in love with theatre and performing and was absolutely delighted to be included in this our devising projects. I felt that he had so many vibrant anecdotes, so I ended up transcribing three sections. I hope you enjoy them!
