Two things have surprised me during my first two days in Ireland, of the three weeks I will spend here helping with the Woodlands Academy Summer Camp. The first was when I arrived to the Dublin airport and all the signs were in Irish and English.
The part that surprised me wasn´t the Irish—it was the English.
To be honest, it started a little before that. On my Ryan Air flight, I kept responding to people in Spanish out of habit. After a minute I would realize that they were Irish, and that I do in fact still speak English. So I spent the flight clumsily replacing gracias with thank you.
That´s why the English was what surprised me in the airport. I hadn´t left Spain for my entire first year (actually this Monday was my second time in the Madrid airport, the first being when I arrived last August), so I think I had a few hours of culture shock realizing that I should respond to people in English again.
As the priest started Mass the next morning “In the name of the Father” and not “En el nombre del Padre”, I realized I´d be going to Mass in English for the next six weeks. I actually did have to think twice about when to kneel and stand.
But at the same time, I´m around a lot of Spanish speakers…and when they ask me if I speak Spanish, I surprise myself by answering “yes”. It´s reminiscent of what they call being out-of-body, when I´m watching someone who can´t possibly be me, not being scared of the conversation switching to Spanish, and clumsily re-adjusting to English.
Besides switching my mind back to English, the other thing that surprised me was how at home I feel in this new place. Besides the practical level of not knowing where everything is, how things work, and not having been outside the house since I got here (mostly because of the rain), there is another level on which I´ve found myself very much at home from the first night I arrived. I feel at home praying and eating and working with the consecrated who I´ve never met, I feel at home walking around the academy, I feel at home in my room that is not mine… and most of all I feel at home in the chapel. I´m in the home of a missionary, which is wherever the mission takes me. I´m in the home of my Spouse, which is wherever he is and wherever he leads me (which is one in the same). I´m in the home of a spiritual mother, which is wherever souls are entrusted to her. I´m in the home of a consecrated soul, which is not a place you can see and touch…it´s the very Heart of Christ.
Your reflections are always so beautiful, thank you for sharing. Im praying for you and your whole class. Miss you guys!