Lost in Trans-Caitlin: A Semester Abroad in Ireland

Friends! Gather round and bear witness to my triumphant return! Or...just go about your lives and ignore me in order to teach me a lesson for my near semester's worth of silence. Actually, that might make me feel a little more comfortable, come to think of it. If you'll all be kind enough to avert your eyes and let your memories of me fade into oblivion, this blog can finally blossom into the free-flowing feeling-fest it's always wanted to be. Let's not talk about Ireland right now, lets talk about the depth of my emotions! Especially towards Zach Effron! And let's do away with punctuation (excepting exclamation points and emoticons) as it is a cage that squelches the flickering fire our beautiful words!!!!!!!!!!! :-) ;-( (Yeah that's right, a winky FROWNY face! Try wrapping your heads around THAT one, bitches!) Hey, now that I have a web cam, the videos I post of me singing heartfelt renditions of "Breaking Free" will be all the punctuation I need! You know what? Screw you, old fans of wit and "turn of phrase." I don't need you anymore. Instead, I will be embraced by all the Youtube fangirls with tears, bangs, Livejournals and OPEN ARMS!

Sorry. You know I could never really do it. I have made these idle threats too often to be taken seriously anymore. You know as well as I do that, with or without you, I'll just be here making my "jokes" and token efforts toward thinly veiling my desperation to be loved by all. Well, all except those Youtube girls I just mentioned. Because a life lived without completely alienating at least one whole group of people is a life half lived.


Moving on! where were we...My apologies? My promises to write more often now that I have no social life? Your wary disbelief, tendered by months and months of my empty broken promises?

Um...Ireland it is!

I have been studying in the Emerald Isle for over two whole weeks now. So far, it feels a whole lot like Freshman orientation, but with cooler accents and no mac and cheese. I know you're thinking to yourself, "Wow. Sounds right up Caitlin's alley!" And you're so right. Because the only reason anyone would put themselves through all of this THREE TIMES would be that she is the sort of person who enjoys adventure and making friends. Either that, or she enjoys self masochism. You know, one of the two. A girl's gotta have hobbies.

It's OK though. The upside of having been through it all before is that I know I'll get used to it eventually. Right now though, it's hard to imagine overcoming my numerous social handicaps in just four to five month's time. Sure, getting from day to day is easy enough when the sun is shining. I have managed to find all my classes on time, feed, clothe and bathe myself without any major mishaps. Come nightfall though, it's a different story. It's like Irish college pub scene is a blacklight, and all my irrational social un-endearing foibles are the ketchup stain that you and maybe a few close friends knew was on your white shirt before you went extreme bowling; but now, since the techno music and the neon strobe lights have been flipped on, everyone in the bowling alley knows. And trust me, nothing flips that seizure inducing disco switch like a game of "never have I ever" with a bunch of strangers who are wearing more expensive shoes than I am. Except maybe the orange game...

...Anyway, though I have since had a few (slightly) more relaxing pub experiences since my Dublin orientation, none have imprinted me so deeply as my very first forays into Irish nightlife. In a half hearted final attempt to make this sad, roaming post worth the space it's taking up on my hard drive, I will now close by regaling you with my favorite exchange from one of those fateful nights. Maybe it will give you a glimpse of what I'm dealing with here.

The scene: A crowded Dublin pub on New Year's eve. My Hostel-mates are doing shots at the bar and licking each other's faces or something. I am surveying the room for some broken glass I can chew on so as to make my evening a little more fun. A good-natured looking, red-cheeked English man taps me on the shoulder and offers to buy me a pint. Though I refuse, he still begins a conversation with me, not knowing that I already dislike him on the grounds of his pulse, opposable thumbs and sentience. He introduces his friends as three of the Backstreet Boys and David Beckham, respectively. He then points at my heavily eye-shadowed, affectionate traveling companions and asks, very Britishly,

"Are they lesbian Americans?"

I answer, "um...yep."

Stay tuned next week when, if nothing exciting happens, I will post multiple pictures of myself making pouty lips at the web-cam and crying tears of IRELAND DOESN'T GET ME rage. Bet you can't wait.

P.S. Please, keep writing to me and praying for me or sending good thoughts in a generally Eastern direction as . I can't tell you how much I love hearing from you guys. I really miss the people who knew about the ketchup stain all along and liked me anyway.