It was after dark by the time the doctors let me go, and in desperation I decided to spend some of my last Euros at a B&B for a night, and try to figure something out the next day during business hours, maybe hobble down to the public library in the morning. LizAnne and Edmund ran a really nice place, and at least for one night, I had the comforts of a home. In the morning I was heading out to try and find a place to stay, when LizAnne told me she wanted to give me a free week’s stay. I was flabbergasted; humbled and moved nearly to tears. It was like a weight was lifted from my heart; a whole week to figure something out! Whoo! I got some good mothering that week, took a trip to Kilarney to see the castle, watched the famous Rose of Tralee “beauty” pageant, tried my first liver-and-onion meal(yeuch – it wasn’t easy, but I ate both huge liver steaks I was served), and had my first Irish potatoes, boiled until the skin falls off. They looked at me weird when I ate the skin. “But that’s where all the nutrients are!”

After a few days and only some dubious prospects for accomodation, I called James, the guy who had stored my broken bicycle for me after the crash, to arrange to pick up my stuff – more specifically, my tent. After giving me directions from Limerick, he asked, “C’mere Charlie, tell me, do ye have a place to stay, do ye?” Unfortunately I didn’t. “Now Charlie, c’mere tell me, do ye have much money, do ye?” Ah, no, most unfortunately, I didn’t have much money. “Well I know a woman who’d be able to put ye up for a week, if you can pay for food.” Wow, really?!? That would be great! Thank you! Food I could afford, maybe.

LizAnne took me to a big Catholic church in Limerick City, to solicit help from the priests. One father running the reception desk was obviously suspicious of me, and kept making sure I wasn’t wandering off without her. I guess I was looking pretty rough, with a cast and crutches, wearing a ragged beard and the same clothes I had crashed in a week earlier. He pretty much said “No, he can’t stay here,” even after LizAnne told him how much I look like Jesus. It was a bit embarrassing. Wasn’t Jesus black? Anyway… she also connected me with the Saint Vincent de Paul charity, who were able to kick me a few Euro to get me by, and eventually she drove me out to James’ farm in County Tipperary. It turned out that the “woman who can put you up for a week” was his wife Kathleen, and he had really been inviting me to stay on his dairy-and-potato farm! Funny guy, that James O’Leary.

When we arrived, I was forced to say a hasty goodbye to LizAnne and Edmund; James and Kathleen were rushing out to see a local hurling match. I shoved my stuff inside and climbed in, and off we went to the village hurling field.

Hurling is a very popular sport in Ireland, one of the true Gaelic sports. It’s one of the fastest field sports in the world, and quite brutal. Shoulder checks are allowed, helmets are optional, and every player wields a big flanged-end, tin-plated, ashwood stick called a hurlie. I got to watch Kilkenny sweep Waterford in the All-Ireland final on the tele, and learned that even these, the most famous and popular men in Ireland, don’t get paid to play – it’s an amateur league. Of course if a famous hurler goes into a pub in his home county, he won’t have to pay for his drinks, and probably gets other perks as well. James whole family was big into hurling, except Kathleen who would rather the kids learned to play music. But even little 2 yro grandson Timmy had his baby-sized hurlie, and his two favorite words were “hurlie” and “tractor.”

I stayed there with the family for two weeks, slowly recuperating, and helping out around the house as much as I could. I wish I had been well enough to learn how to drive the tractor. I attended my first-ever Catholic mass, with what they called a “cup of tea”(actually a huge party) afterwards. The priest was a riot at the party, telling jokes and singing with a tumbler of whiskey in his hand. There was another priest that would come by the house, chainsmoking in the kitchen the whole time. I also got to help with their potato crop, monitoring the big grading machine and packaging ten-kilo bags – that famous Irish spud, right at the source. I was exposed to a lot of rugby and hurling, and John, the farmhand living on the estate, took me out to a rural roadside pub called Kennedy’s in Killeen, for my first authentic Irish Guinness(and second, and third… and lets not forget Powers Irish whiskey) surrounded by old codgers and young farmhands. Once, they asked me to sing, and I told them “I only know one song by heart, the Star Spangled Banner… and you don’t want to hear that one, do you?” Well, they did want to hear it, and I secretly wanted to sing it, in fact I’ve been secretly singing it when no one is around, so I sang it as passionately as I could, and to rave reviews no less. Aah, some day I’ll be back, America. Some day.

James connected me with a Nenagh man who was able to weld my broken bike back together, in exchange for nothing more than going for a bike ride with his son, who’s living and cycling in Holland. Alright, no problem! The frame is stronger than ever.

After a week, Kathleen wouldn’t take any money from me for food, and wouldn’t hear of me leaving. They were all so generous, and it was a nice quiet place to take it easy and stay off my foot, but eventually I felt the urge to move my recovery to Galway.

James dropped me at the bus station, and I didn’t have to pay extra for the bike because the bus driver couldn’t figure out what to charge me. Nice. I spent an uncomfortable few hours on the bus, once again heading into the unknown; and this time with a broken foot.

* * *

That was a dark time, but every cloud has a silver lining. The Luck o’ the Irish is with me, I think – except for that whole high-speed crash thing. There are worse places to get stuck than Ireland, after all. I could be floating in a life raft in the Atlantic Ocean.
Since my release from the hospital I’ve kept my head above water – barely. I had envisioned, and indeed I was prepared for, digging in rubbish bins for food, and stealing dry places to rest my foot wherever I could – I even considered committing myself to the local jailhouse for three square meals a day.
My faith is as strong as ever: things will work out, somehow. My determination is grim, but unyielding. And things have been working out, through a bit of providence with which I’m not quite comfortable: charity. My pride is, admittedly, quite a mouthful, and I probably would’ve spent these past couple of weeks sleeping under a fly-over, if it hadn’t been for that touching charity of my fellow human beings. Sensitive, respectful, charity. I am realizing now more than ever before, that although I am riding my bicycle around the world by myself, solo, I can’t do it alone. I do need help, as much as it stings my pride to admit.
But I won’t give up. No, no… not for a mere compound fracture, not even for a frame that’s broken in two places and a wheel that looks like a taco. I can’t really imagine what it would take to stop me; all I know is that I haven’t encountered it yet.

Thanks to everyone that’s sent me messages or sheltered me during this painful delay in the tour. I’m not out of the dark yet(four weeks of recovery to go), and I really appreciate everyone’s good will. I’m leaving Co. Tipperary for Galway this weekend, I think, so please let me know if you can put me up for a day, a week, a month… or if you can offer any support at all.

Thank you.
Humbly,
Charles Brigham

PS. The Address Window in Amsterdam will be open for a while longer now…

A crash!! Oh s**t, a huge crash! My mind is stunned at first, but as the dust settles and my bike creaks to a twisted position of rest, I slowly start assessing the damage. My helmet is still on, no head pain… my back isn’t talking to me, good… some obvious scrapes and cuts, but my arms and legs feel okay… wait a minute, what’s that? I notice something wrong with the shape of my right foot. On closer inspection, I realize with a slight shudder that I’m looking at my glistening white bone, and that dark red stuff in the middle is the marrow. …biopsy; is that really my bone?!? anatomy class: compound fracture. I always thought a compound fracture would hurt more, but there was no pain. Shock. Warning. Shock. Blankets. I poke in disbelief at the bone protruding through the skin, disturbing the blood slowly starting to seep out around the edges. That IS my bone!! I should take a photograph, antibodies, this will take septic weeks to heal, hospital… wait a minute, what’s THAT? Glancing at my bike laying in a heap, I notice something wrong with the front wheel, like the handlebars have been turned 180 degrees… except the bars are still straight ahead…. Then I see the fractured steel of the top-tube, and just below that, the crumpled metal that used to be the down-tube. This is when I really start to panic. F*CK! F***CK!!!

“F*CK! F***CK!!! MAJOR DISASTER!! MAJOR DISASTER! F*CK!” I’m sort of stamping around, raving insanely at the top of my lungs to what’s left of the hilltop view, going between feverishly inspecting my bicycle for further damages and trying to pull my hair out with bloody fists, when an old man comes jogging up, shouting to be heard above my string of expletives. I feel quite justified in saying, “I don’t think so,” when asked if I am okay, but nevertheless I start to calm down a little. “I was out for a stroll, and I heard you yellin’. There’s usually nobody out this way.” After deciding I wasn’t in a proper state of mind to administer first aid to myself, I fish out my emergency world-phone from the depths of my bags, and pray the battery is still charged as I hold down the “on” button. After a tense couple of moments it turns on and locates the strongest signal in the area. First I dial the non-emergency number, and calmly explain to the operator that I’ve crashed and I can see the bone coming out of my foot. “If you can see the bone coming out of your foot, that is an emergency, and you need to dial 999.” Major disaster, confirmed. On the emergency line, the woman asks the inevitable “What’s your location?” I stall, with the phone on my shoulder, digging in my pocket for my map. “Uuhh… I was heading North on, uh, I don’t know which road, and I just passed Garyglass… you know Garyglass?” I ask, hoping. She has no idea. I try a couple other things written nearby, but I had nearly reached the end of that map, and the next one is still in my bags. I’m starting to panic a little again, worrying that the battery won’t last long enough to explain where exactly in the middle of nowhere I’ve crashed myself. Just as I am about to dig for my other maps, the lucky sumaritan asks, “Is the operator a Tipp man? Is he local?” and I pass the phone off to him. After a few minutes of giving directions, he hands the phone back and she tells me it’ll be thirty minutes before an ambulance can get there.

Cookies. I finally sit down, uncomfortably, on the side of the road, feeling calm but still worried that my foot doesn’t hurt more. The rest of my more minor injuries have all started to throb, but that wicked foot wound isn’t even bleeding. We make small talk and I answer questions about my bike tour, but with old answers, denying for the moment that some of them might be different now. “How long will you be here in Ireland? Where are you going next?” Both questions I don’t want to think about right this second. A car comes over the hill and parks in the narrow road; another local man heading home. “I usually don’t come this way, you’re lucky to have met anyone out here,” he informs me. I don’t feel particularly lucky, but I thank them for stopping to help me. Soon, in an apparent freak occurence, a second car comes around the bend and parks. The driver listens to the story about the crazy guy on the bike, then starts shootin’ the breeze, so-n-so married so-n-so’s cousin, an O’Malley lad, no the other O’Malley…. It’s the most Irish accent I’ve heard yet since arriving in Ireland. At one point he turns to me and says, “Six nights out of the week you won’t see a single car drive down this road. It’s a regular traffic jam here tonight!” After another little while, his father-in-law shows up in a big white van, and offers to store my broken bike and gear somewhere dry. As I read what he wrote for his phone number and address, I recognize it from my map – Ballyhane, just over the hill. Now I’m feeling a bit more lucky, and even more thankful. I absent-mindedly grab a few items from my gear, not really thinking that I should be packing for a two week vacation to the hospital, and off go my possessions in a motor vehicle. Nearly everything I own, my turtle’s house. My life. I am left with my camera, my raincoat, my camelbak pack with documents and journal stuff, my sheepskin, the shirt, shorts, and sandals I was wearing when I crashed, and a half-eaten double-row of boston creme chocolate cookies. By the time the ambulance arrives, we’ve finished off the cookies, and I say goodbye with many thanks to the roadside lads. I am checked out professionally and courteously, then lifted into the ambulance. It’s been over a month since I was even inside a car, and suddenly I’m laying in the back of a very special bus, like I’m being chauffeured. One of the paramedics is there to keep me company the whole bouncy ride, helping to keep my mind off the sterile surfaces and emergency medical storage around me, and distracting me from big questions like What is going to happen to me? He’s well trained in distracting fast-talk, I soon learn. “You ever hear that Irish people tell a lot of stories? Well, it’s true, we all have loads of stories. I remember responding to a call up here to the village of Kilcommon, now, the people up here don’t usually call us; they’d rather die than call the paramedics, but there was a funeral, and the boys had been fightin’….” I’m still laughing at his anecdotes as they pull me down to wheel me into the Accident & Emergency in the Nenagh hospital, fourty minutes later.

My first ambulance ride ever, and I only had to make it to Ireland to get it!

My first day in County Wexford, I met a trio of brothers decked out for bike touring, headed for the ferry back to Wales. Of course we discussed the weather, and neither of us were able to give a positive forecast… more rain on both sides of the Irish Sea. But they carried on, and so did I. I pedalled to Wexford City, and was searching the narrow streets for the public library. I was getting another “I don’t know” from a man on the street when a woman approached me and asked, “Are you looking for the library?” Her name was Saskia, and as she walked me to the library, she invited me to camp on the farm she lived on not far away. She gave me directions, pointed out the library, and disappeared. After a couple hours in the city, writing at the bench on the quayside and wandering around checking out some churches and graveyards, I headed out to Castlebridge and the road to her farm. As I arrive, Saskia is leaving, driving to Dublin to pick up a Dutch relative from the airport. “Just go in and ask for my sister.” With a bit of trepidation, I approached the barn where preparations for a huge party were under way. Saskia’s mother and father greeted me, and were very welcoming. But they weren’t sure where to let me camp: “Anywhere he pitches up, he’ll be washed away by the rain. Let’s put him in the castle…” Castle!? Sure enough, there was a 500 yro castle tower under renovation on the expansive dairy farm estate. I set up my tent on the second floor, up a steep, narrow, rough-hewn staircase, past windows and tiny views of the damp Irish countryside. My first night in Ireland, and I was already sleeping beneath the eerie rafters of a castle that’s older than the USA.

The next day Saskia told me about her parents’ wedding anniversary, and invited me to either A) get drunk and have fun or B) work behind the bar during the party. People continued to arrive from Holland all day, and after the lamb was on the spit, all their Irish friends showed up. Soon people were dancing and making merry, eating and drinking. I poured many a glass of booze, wines and mixers, and pint after pint after pint – Heineken. My fellow barman and I had to deal with drunken Dutch teenagers behind the bar, thinking they were helping out by filling pints of foam and pouring disgusting mistakes into innapropriate glasses for old ladies. After the third or fourth broken glass, as the queue for beer was growing, a drunken Irishman(holding his alcohol like a pro) told me to “Get him offa that tap! You pour ‘em!” I learned how much head on their beer they like in Holland versus how much an Irishman expects. It was a great success, loads of fun, and a bit of cash in my pocket as well.

During the party, the woman who owns the land, “The Duchess,” approached me behind the bar and asked me to call over to her mansion for a visit tomorrow. “I’d be happy to,” I told her. The next day, after a wet walk to a gorgeous waterfall, I went over and had our visit. I felt a bit out of place in the luxury surroundings, and she didn’t offer me tea or anything, so after I wrote in her guestbook I went back to the farmhouse.

It wasn’t easy to leave my new friends, and pedal away into the rain again, but I gritted my teeth and said goodbye. Off then, through Co. Kilkenny and into Co. Tipperary. I had asked around, wondering which direction to go, and the common answer was Galway. “Dublin is Dublin,” most people said, “but Galway is totally class.” The most bohemian city in Ireland? The youngest average age in Europe? Sounds right up my alley. I had a few wet days and nights out on the nameless rural tracks, meandering my way on back roads, camping in treacherous bog, muddy pasture or squishy pine forest. My plan was to hook around Loch Derg and head North through Co. Clare to Galway, but somewhere on the back roads of Tipp, my plans changed.