When I brought this website back to life last year, I thought, “This is the year I write.”
I had grand plans of a monthly (if not bi-monthly!) posting schedule. I was going to talk about my oh so thrilling life in D.C. and try to frame it in a way so that someone other than my mom would care about reading it. I was going to finally find and take the time to write for myself, dammit, because I deserved to invest that time in myself!
The last blog I posted is from uh…March 2018.
Somewhere along the way, I got so focused on living my life, that I forgot to write about it. And for months, I’d take embarrassed peeks at this website, telling myself that this weekend would be the weekend that I’d finally start to write again. So I guess you could say despite my best intentions, it was a new year, but same me.
But here’s the thing – I was writing. I was writing at my day-job as a social media manager, communications manager, and assistant editor (yes, I performed ALL THREE JOBS in one place of employment) and I was writing multiple freelance articles a month. I was writing letters to friends, letters mailed across the country or across the world, letters that I’ve kept and never sent. I was writing an absurdly stupid amount of Instagram captions about all the food I was eating.
And most importantly, I was writing cover letter upon cover letter. I was editing minuscule details on my resume as much as possible within severely-adjusted margins that squeezed all of my qualifications onto one page. I was writing emails explaining exactly why I was perfect for the job, thanks so much for the phone interview, please let me know if I can provide you with any more information to help you with your decision.
Searching for a job while working full-time AND working two freelance gigs on the side is exhausting, to say the least. And amidst all that writing, I was also balancing a somewhat aggressive social life, exploring new hobbies, and hiking plenty of mountains. It’s honestly a miracle that in July, I did get a new job – one that offers me new and more extensive opportunities to learn and grow and finally, finally, finally work in the fields that I really love: writing and editing. I am one of The Writers on staff, and that is thrilling to me.
So here I am, writing again. Writing at work, and at home. But for the first time in a long time, I feel like the writing I’m doing at work actually matters, and for the first time in nearly a year, I’m finally back to writing here on this website.
People make all sorts of lists and goals and resolutions this time of year, right? I tend to shy away from those, as I don’t always stick to them, and then end up feeling like the first half of my year has been a failure because I didn’t manage to lose fifteen pounds or learn to spatchcock a chicken.
But this year, I want to live with intention. I think it’s all too easy to settle into a safe routine when you’ve gotten a better job and are cycling through a schedule of happy hours and historic pub lectures and fun days out. Comfort, in many ways, keeps you from going after what you really want. So this year will be a year of living with intention, of not just cruising and letting things happen to me. This year will be a year of making choices that matter.
I started typing this list the summer after I graduated from the University of Mary Washington, in May 2014. Back then, it was full of melodramatic tropes along the lines of, “You will never be as free as you are now, with all your dreams ahead of you!” Or, “Your life will never be as fun as it was when you were pulling all-nighters at the library with your friends, hyped up on 7 cups of coffee and Red Bull!” But that’s not true. I still have plenty of dreams, and I only had a handful of fun all-nighters in the library in college.
For the most part, my all-nighters were just that: long nights of essay-writing, textbook-reading, formula-memorizing nightmares, in which I was hyped up on pure sugar (I hadn’t yet developed a taste for coffee, and relied on Dr. Pepper and M&M’s to keep me awake) and my friends were nowhere to be found and were possibly off getting tattoos. They, presumably, had not procrastinated on their theses like I did (to be fair, I had THREE theses to contend with).
College was undoubtedly wonderful. I often miss parts of it, but I don’t ever find myself wishing I was still there. But now, three years out and at the age of 25, I’m in that odd in-between stage. Not a college student, not yet a full-grown adult (eat your heart out, Britney Spears).
The first year out of college can be a bit of a shock, but in a way, you’re still cushioned by a safety net. You still have the same friends who you can text (“Ugh, I just wish I could have late-night Vocelli’s pizza right now, you know?”), the campus homecoming events, and that shared sense of “we’re all figuring it out together and tweeting about it aggressively.” But three years down the road is different. Three years down the road, I can still remember what it’s like to pull one of those all-nighters, but my life has undeniably changed. So I might be generalizing here, but these are the 5 Things They Didn’t Tell You About Life After Graduation (and I really wish they had):
1. Money is everything
Ok, not everything. But when I first graduated, I proudly proclaimed to my parents: “I don’t need money to be happy!” They were engineering and business majors, what did they know? (A lot. They know a lot.) I was ready to pack up my bags and jump on the next Working Holiday Visa to Ireland, Australia, or New Zealand, and figure out my job when I got there. I assured my mom that I could probably support myself as a temp office worker during the day, and a waitress at night. “Maybe some tutoring in Italian language on the side!” I said excitedly. For some reason, this patient woman let me continue to research this lifestyle option for months. To be fair, lots of people successfully lead this kind of lifestyle! But it’s important to note that I had convinced myself this would be my livelihood in a foreign country, despite having absolutely zero office temp or waitressing experience.
Looking and acting professional at a professional event.For me, money wasn’t a concern like it is now. After all, immediately after graduation, my incredibly generous parents accepted their not-yet-employed daughter back into their home, no questions asked, until I figured out what I was going to do. I had very little concept of rent costs, insurance costs, or even grocery costs (I like expensive cheese, ok?). For me, the adventure was the important part, and money would work itself out later.
For you college students and recent grads who actually had to deal with real life before they got a Big Kid Job, you already know the struggles of money. You know what it’s like to be out here onyour own with real life costs and that student loan debt looming over your shoulder, and you’re probably rolling your eyes at me. Look, I was blissfully unaware then, but now, having spent my first 6 months in D.C. as a struggling intern and the past two years working at a nonprofit organization, I know money is important.
I admit it – 2014 Danielle was kind of an idiot. I like fancy food, I love to travel, and I have a bad habit of impulse-buying beautiful journals and then never writing in them. To compensate, I end up eating cans of beans for dinner and trying to flirt with men so they’ll buy my drinks for me (I’m terrible at flirting, so this very rarely works).
Being three years out of college has taught me the importance of balance. Knowing when something is important to spend money on and when it isn’t. How to combine your passions and your need for a steady paycheck. I’m still figuring it out (I have had a Postmates delivery robot bring Popeyes to my office three too many times), but I’ve finally had to admit that I would be a terrible waitress. I can’t balance more than two plates at a time, and I run into tables and walls regularly.
2. You have to feed yourself
My dad is an incredible cook. Since I was a little kid, he has always been the one in the kitchen, masterfully whipping up something that had caught his eye in a Bon Appetit magazine, or any of his famous pastas. I’d help, of course, but a sous-chef is not the same as a head chef. I lived in southern Italy as a child, where fresh buffalo mozzarella reigned supreme, and plump tomatoes burst off the vine. In summary: I have spent a great deal of my life surrounded by really good food, all of it made by someone other than myself.
My Dad’s famous summer pestoI can’t say that the University of Mary Washington’s food was anything close to my dad’s amazing cooking, but hey – it was made for me. At dining halls, I didn’t have to worry about whether or not I had remembered to buy yogurt for the week, or if I’d have enough time to cook dinner before that meeting tonight. Dinner was cooked! It was waiting for me in large vats of lukewarm, lumpy mashed potatoes alongside something that I think was supposed to be meatloaf. It wasn’t life-changing food by any means, but it was there and someone else was cooking it.
Now…I have to cook for myself. And I’ve realized that despite my passion for charcuterie, my snobbiness about “authentic Neapolitan pizza,” and a pretty decent knowledge of all the hip places to eat in the district, my actual skills in the kitchen are pretty basic. I’m a whiz at pasta, and I have a tendency to make a full pound of it after I’ve had a few drinks (it doesn’t matter if I’m alone or have friends, I must make a full pound of pasta for some inexplicable reason). I can make maybe…5 or 6 other things, which are pretty good. Good, not stellar. I like the food I cook (because I’m cooking it for myself) but I’m definitely not planning a lavish dinner party anytime soon.
After a long, long day at the office, when you’re so worn out from stress and exhaustion and the never-ending to-do list running through your head as you metro home, you suddenly realize: I still have to feed myself. If I don’t drag myself out of bed, still wearing my work clothes and makeup, and force myself to go into the kitchen and turn those vegetables into something that looks like dinner, I won’t eat. No one is coming to feed me. I’LL STARVE.
As a result, I tend to eat a lot of ramen. No, not that fancy, $15-per-bowl with homemade, pickled onions-ramen that you got in the “up and coming” part of town. I’m talking .99 cent ramen that I bought in a 12-pack from Safeway just in case of “an emergency.” That emergency is me being too lazy to actually feed myself anything nutritious, and is probably why at my last appointment, my doctor looked at me and said, “Your test results show that you’re very healthy…except your sodium levels are a little high.” I neglected to inform her that I regularly eat noodles out of a styrofoam cup with 960 mg of salt per serving.
On the upside, I’m learning to cook and I love it! I’m nowhere near my dad’s skills and I don’t knowif I ever will be, but I’ve found that after a day of staring at a screen, I like taking a break from the ever-present glow of my iPhone and actually making something with my hands. It feels good to create something tangible that tastes good, fills you up, and ensures that you don’t find yourself ordering delivery Thai food late at night because you forgot to make time to buy groceries. Again.
Being an adult = cooking with onion goggles
Pancetta and pasta are my two great loves.
Even better? You no longer have to scramble at the end of the semester, rationing out your meal plan to make sure you can make it through exam week. Now, we call that “the week before payday.”
3. Your friends won’t stay the same
If you had the most badass, ride-or-die, cohesive friend groups in college that have somehow miraculously managed to stay intact three years after graduation: congratulations. You’re one of the lucky ones. Balancing friendships after college can be hard, and people inevitably grow apart.
My friends in college were a diverse bunch! I had my group of gal pals, the friends I made when living at the International Living Community – a.k.a., Framar House – and the people I befriended in clubs, dining halls, or because we shared a love of the same academic subject (or Harry Potter book). They were (and still are) all wonderful people, and they made my four years at Mary Washington absolutely incredible.
That being said, things are different once you no longer live on a campus. Gone are the days when almost every single one of your friends lived within 1.5 miles of you, and you could grab dinner with any of them, on any day of the week. It takes dedication and hard work to keep some of these friendships alive, and the truth is: not all of them survive. Friends grow, they change, their lives become different. They find boyfriends, girlfriends, fiancees, husbands, wives. Friends get dogs, which is wonderful, and you should exploit those friendships as much as possible so you can pet those dogs. But the truth of it is: friends grow apart. Your very best friends will move across the country, or across the world, and you’ll have to rely on the sole power of social media to keep in touch.
Life out here, three years down the road, is not the same as college, and it can be lonely. You have to learn how to be alone, and that’s okay. There is honestly nothing better than sitting by yourself on a park bench with a book, or going on a solo hike and not having to make light chit-chat with someone when you’re completely out of breath after reaching the summit.
I’ve found that I’m not the only one who feels this way. D.C. is a city of transplants from the U.S. and all over the world, and so I get the feeling that there are a lot of people here who are still figuring out how to call this place “home.” I’ve started a kind of direct approach: I chat to someone in a bar, realize that they’re a relatively interesting, cool person who will withstand me gushing about how much I love dogs and isn’t afraid of eating carbs. I talk about how even though I’ve been living here for 2+ years, everything still feels so new, and it’s hard to meet people and just make friends. When they say, “I know, me too!” I fully embrace my creepiness and tell them that we should be friends and hang out immediately. Like, what are you doing next Thursday? Pull out your calendar. Let’s make plans.
Does this sound aggressive? Well guess what – this has worked on a number of occasions, and I have at least 3 pretty solid friendships that began with me rather intensely leaning in and saying something along the lines of, “Hey, I just met you, and this is crazy, but here’s my number – so call me maybe and we can go to that really awesome happy hour with free guacamole or check out this nifty after-hours museum party I heard about.”
Pseudo-adults, young adults, young professionals – we’re all the same. We’re all trying to figure out how to pretend to be grown ups, letting go of some friends and trying to find new ones. The best way to get through it all is to be sincere, outgoing, and willing to look like a crazy person when asking a complete stranger to be your new best friend. I have made amazing friends since graduation – the kind of friends who will, without a doubt, be there right beside me in a rocking chair, just as wrinkly and cranky as me as we scream at the neighborhood children for running across my lawn. It’s not as easy to make these friends – you have to try a little harder to make plans, and you don’t have the luxury of eating at the same dining hall as them every night – but they have been wonderful all the same. They, too, will move. Grow apart. Travel to different states, different countries. But it’s all a part of that post-grad, always-moving life.
And those friendships from college? If they’re a real friend, it won’t matter if they live over a thousand miles away. Put in some time to keep in touch, be sure to ask about their family, and try to visit them every now and then. Strong friendships can withstand a little distance.
4. It’s cool to care
In college, I cared about academics. I worked extremely hard all four years in college and have the results to prove it. It did not come easy: my math and science courses were definitely an attempt by the university to literally kill me, and writing a full thesis in a foreign language about the ramifications of rebel groups in Italy in World War II made me want to rip my hair out. I spent many Saturday nights in my apartment in pajamas, slaving over footnotes and annotations.
And I loved it! I still do. I love learning, and pushing myself, and getting into intellectual discussions with my peers and professors. I very rarely skipped class and I all-too-eagerly attended after-hours lectures on history, art, and writing. Although this is definitely an accepted way to cruise through college, there’s always that lingering pressure to be cool. I didn’t party that much, and thus, didn’t feel like I fit in with a lot of my peers – and sometimes, even my friends – who were binge-drinking and raging all weekend.
Three years post-graduation, people still binge-drink and rage all weekend. But guess what? Living in the capital of the United States, where some of the greatest minds live in just 68.34 square miles, means that I am surrounded by innovative art, weekend-long embassy events, a thriving culinary scene, activism, and people who care. People who are so passionate about their work and the causes they stand for that they have decided to build their lives around it.
I am endlessly lucky to live a life in which it is now cool to care. It’s okay to turn down a party because you’re volunteering at the crack of dawn the next morning. It’s cool that you won’t be at the happy hour because you’re attending a social media workshop in the former residence of the Spanish Ambassador. It’s fun to go to after-hours museum parties, where you can combine cocktails and a love for history exhibits. And hopefully, if you land a good job, you’ll be surrounded by coworkers who are very much the same. You won’t have a boss who brags about how he skimmed by on that one class by reading SparkNotes and using someone else’s essay. You will be working with people who love the same things you do, and are trying to make the world better for it. You’ll realize that you weren’t the only one staying home on a Saturday night – all those people are here, right beside you, creating beautiful art and making big changes in the world.
An Instagram workshop with local D.C. influencers, hosted in the former Spanish ambassador’s residence.
A presentation on the role of food in Italian cinema, hosted by the Embassy of Italy (with lots of prosciutto samples)
The over-Instagrammed Renwick Museum rainbow exhibit.
We wore patriotic clothes and crashed a Republican “Never Trump” party, where we laughed and enjoyed lively political debates until the election results rolled in and we stopped laughing.
5. Nobody has it all figured out (and if they say they do – they’re lying)
Social media is the worst. I work in social media and communications, and I love it, but social media is the worst. According to social media, everyone on my news feed has completely figured out their lives, and is going on vacation to far-off locales every other weekend. They also eat out a lot. Have you noticed that? How is everyone eating out all the time? Who is secretly funding your tapas diet? Tapas ain’t cheap. I know this. I eat a lot of tapas, and thus, have not been able to afford a new purse in six years.
Your early-to-mid-twenties are a horribly confusing time. You can be perfectly happy with your single life, celebrating the fact that you don’t have to put up with infuriating pet names like “babe,” or with someone who gets pouty because you stayed out all night with your gal pals, but then you see it: seven consecutive engagement photos, all in a row, on Instagram. And you don’t want to be engaged, but you immediately wonder – Oh God. Is this what we’re all doing? Are we supposed to be getting engaged? The engaged people seem to always have their shit together. Their outfits always match the background of their photo perfectly. How do they do that? I’m mostly interested in the perfect outfits – the ring is superfluous to me.
Worse than that are the people that are somehow traveling the world but also getting paid to do it. Or the friends who live in a much cheaper city than you, and can afford hardwood floors, exposed brick walls, and vaulted ceilings in their new apartment. Or the people that graduated and just immediately knew what career path they wanted – and landed the dream job. I’m endlessly perplexed by these people. Before graduation, I had many career aspirations: dolphin trainer, veterinarian, full-time explorer, famous author a la J.K. Rowling, dolphin trainer (again), a Spanish translator, an Italian translator, university employee, social media manager, and then that whole debacle with wanting to be a waitress and office temp in New Zealand.
Nowadays, I work in social media, marketing, and communications. I love it. I think my work allows me to be a modern-day storyteller, and I love sharing a mission and a message through my work. But the reality is, I’m still trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up. There are hundreds of things I’d like to do, cities I’d like to live in, and dogs I’d like to own before I die. When the rest of the world seems to be moving on without you at an alarming speed, your life suddenly pales in comparison. We’re always told we could be doing more, trying harder, swiping left for one more chance at the perfect first date. Life feels both inexplicably short and long at the same time.
It took me way too long to realize that no one has it all figured out. And if they tell you they do, they’re lying to you because they don’t want to admit how much they regret their Masters in Basket-Weaving even though, at the time, starting an artisanal basket-weaving business in Vermont with their matching-plaid fiancee seemed like a really good idea. I am happy for the people who are happy – the people who are making strides to improve their lives, and explore the world, and love the ones they love. I want to see my friends succeed. But it’s so important not to compare yourself to them, and to think that just because someone posted a seemingly-perfect picture on Instagram, that they must know what they’re doing.
You have to step back and take a second to look at your friends, family, the roof over your head, the trees lining your street, and realize: you might not be exactly where you want to be, but right here isn’t so bad either.
No one knows what they’re doing, and that’s the beauty of it. It’s okay to be lost and confused and broke. Three years after graduation, I am still figuring it all out, and I feel only slightly less lost, confused, and broke as 2014 Danielle did, right after graduation. But I have so much more time to become the Secretary-General of the United Nations while owning my own pet-sitting business (no cats allowed) and eating extremely expensive pasta every night. We’ll all get to where we’re going – the important thing is to not worry about it so much in the meantime.
A classic example of social media looking better than reality: I was surrounded by bees and absolutely terrified.
I have a crippling fear of being bored. Thanks to my dad’s work, I moved around a lot as a kid, and I was lucky enough to travel through most of Europe. It was a whirlwind, never-in-one-place kind of childhood and, coupled with a love of books taking place in far-off kingdoms, it’s probably the reason why I get antsy if I haven’t boarded a plane in a couple of months. I can’t think of anything worse than living a life of perpetual boredom, which is why I cram my days full of trying new restaurants, hiking, sharing beers with friends, reading, and – of course – traveling.
I like to travel and I like to do it often. It’s a big, big, world out there and I probably only have another six decades (seven, if I’m lucky) to see all of it, so I’ve developed a habit of impulsively buying plane tickets. Of course, it’s important to remember that travel isn’t always an easy decision for everyone – money, personal obligations, and health restrictions can all limit those #wanderlust dreams. I myself am funding this travel obsession of mine on a nonprofit employee salary, so budget airlines, a steady diet of .89 cent ramen cups, and a wardrobe that hasn’t been updated in two years is quite literally the only way I manage to go anywhere. I am also lucky enough to have a family that knows I prefer travel money to wrapped birthday presents (thanks mom and dad!), but even with their generosity, I take spending money on travel pretty seriously.
So as my big 25th birthday rolled around in February, I started to get the itch – that one that comes after a few months stuck in the same city and seeing the same faces every day on my walk to work. I was about to turn a quarter of a century and as I tried to think of something I’d really like to do for my birthday – maybe dinner out, drinks, a trip to a Smithsonian museum I had already seen 10 times? – I realized the only thing I actually wanted to do was just go somewhere.
Pro tip: if you like to spend your life savings on travel, make friends who manage their finances the same way. After an exchange of a grand total of 5 text messages in mid-January, my pal Patrick agreed to buy a cheap round-trip flight to Dublin with me on the weekend before my birthday just a month later, in mid-February. Thanks Wow Airlines! (Not a paid promotion – I’m just a sucker for Icelandic budget airlines).
One overnight flight later, we left balmy, sunny D.C., cruising over patchwork fields of green, and landed in rainy, chilly Dublin. Opting for an Airbnb rather than a hostel for pretty much the same price (or, as Patrick called it, our boutique), we quickly checked in with our hosts, who were a pleasant, soft-spoken Irish couple with what sounded like riotous toddlers playing in the back room. Although the idea of wasting time napping and not immediately jumping out the front door was a difficult one to roll with, so too was the idea of having to explore my first day in Dublin on less than 4 hours of sleep. I had conveniently developed a hacking cough just one day before leaving on the trip, so I hadn’t slept much on the flight, much to my dismay (and the dismay of the French girl sitting one row ahead of me, who kept up a steady glare in my direction every time I so much as cleared my throat).
We power-napped and then power-walked right to our first pub: The Stag’s Head Pub. Built in 1770 and still looking pretty much the same since it was remodeled in 1895, it was covered in dark wood paneling and full of absurdly short stools encircling low tables, as well as grizzly old men reading the newspaper at the bar. An enormous stag’s head (aptly named) loomed over the large collection of whiskey, but we opted for local lagers and some food instead. Pretty soon, the quiet of the Stag’s Head got to be too much for our jet-lagged exhaustion – we zipped up our raincoats and stepped out into the torrential drizzle.
Dublin is different from the other capitals of Europe. Of course, it has its winding alleyways, scenic canals, gardens, and brightly-painted doors. But many of the streets are gritty, grey, and puddle-strewn. Walk through the touristy, historic center and you’ll be waylaid by crowds of American college students rushing to snag their picture in front of Temple Bar, or a Snapchat with the large man dressed up as a leprechaun. It’s an odd combination of locals, who push through the crowds with the kind of mild disdain and patience that only a European can master, and foreigners on a desperate search for that perfect Irish experience. But you won’t find a charming Irish village or the rolling green hills of the Éire in Dublin. We emerged from the stillness of the Stag’s Head into a slew of traffic, crowds of sorority girls lining up outside of a crowded bar (it was about 1 p.m. in the afternoon), and that ever-present, perplexing rain.
I wish I could tell you that after stepping out into that bright grey sky, we spent all afternoon touring a museum, visiting an old Victorian palace, or sifting through the pews of an ancient Cathedral. But to be perfectly honest, I was tired. Patrick, it seems, is always tired. After about thirty of minutes of walking around the city in the rain and pretending to enjoy it, we did the obvious: we found another pub.
Just to clarify: this was not a drinking trip. I’ve never traveled abroad with the sole intention of getting wasted and hitting up as many clubs as I can until 6 a.m. My favorite parts of traveling usually include exploring some scraggly old castles and trying the most authentic food I can find. But pubs are such an intrinsic part of Irish culture – its very own institution – that it felt wrong not to hit up a few. Although not quite the village meeting place they once were “back in the day,” pubs are still the centerpiece of Irish social life. Case in point: in just 44 square miles of Dublin’s city limits, there are 751 pubs. That’s a lot of beer…and also a lot of options when trying to narrow down which pubs to visit in just a 72-hour trip. We settled on what has now easily become one of my favorite drinking establishments in the world: The Long Hall Pub.
Founded 10 years before the U.S. of A. had even declared its independence, the Long Hall Pub is looking pretty good for its age. It’s a classic, Victorian pub, with lush, red carpets, low-hanging chandeliers, and ridiculously short tables and stools that were definitely made for hobbit-sized humans. They only served beer and whiskey, and it was perfect.
Patrick and I stumbled in soaking wet from the rain and perched ourselves on some stools in a corner. We spent the next couple of hours chatting and occasionally falling into a comfortable silence, watching locals and poorly-dressed tourists bump into one another under dark wooden arches, decorated with golden filigree. I usually feel an antsy sort of need to constantly move when traveling. Sitting still can sometimes feel like I’m missing out on something. But in that dark, warm pub, and the lilt of Irish accents rising and falling around us, I felt absolutely no desire to leave.
After a while, we bundled up and headed back into the rain, settling on some mediocre Italian food for dinner (because what else would you eat in Ireland, I guess?) and then tracked down a punk-themed pub that Patrick had been determined to visit. Its ceilings were low, the bathrooms vaguely terrifying, and there wasn’t a tourist in sight. We watched three extremely intoxicated locals try to have a very serious discussion at the bar (involving a lot of hand gestures) before slipping out onto the quiet streets and back to our Airbnb.
The next morning we woke up bright and early to go…drink more beer. Actually, we went to the Guinness Storehouse factory, which was the one really touristy thing I had insisted on doing.
The factory was surprisingly large, and we got to learn how Guinness was made, the history of the drink (and its surrounding cult of Guinness-lovers), and even did a taste-test. The taste-test portion was easily my favorite – they had separate rooms set up with varying levels of light to either dull or shock your senses while trying the Guinness, which was trippy (especially when still jet-lagged). This was the freshest Guinness, they reminded us, that you’ll ever have, as it was being poured right there, from the factory. I’ll say that I tasted a difference, but honestly, any freshly-poured Guinness at 11 a.m. would have tasted good to me at that point. We also received official training on how to do a true Guinness pour, which was way more intricate than I’ve ever seen a bartender pour for me here in the U.S. I am officially a certified Guinness pourer though, with a printed certificate, so you could say I had a true academic experience while abroad.
The final stage of the tour ended at the top of the Guinness Storehouse in the Gravity Bar, which offers a 360 degree panoramic view of Dublin with ceiling-to-floor windows. You could see all the way to the mountains while sipping your freshly-poured brew and it was beautiful, but also, as always, grey and raining.
After a morning of drinking beer (this was not a drinking trip, this was not a drinking
trip, this was not a drinking trip), we went to fulfill Patrick’s one true dream of the weekend: a real chippy. Having lived in England as a kid, and having spent most summers in Scotland thanks to being half-Scottish, Patrick’s love of fish & chips is on par with my obsession with real mozzarella.
We got our little cardboard boxes filled with greasy, battered fish and thick-cut potatoes, all coated in a dusting of salt, and camped out on the lawn of Dublin Castle. Patrick inhaled his food in about five minutes, but I struggled through mine. As a self-proclaimed lover of food, I have one, major flaw: I don’t like fish. I’m trying to learn to like it. Apparently, as a toddler, I used to suck down clams faster than any adults at the table, but I’m convinced that watching The Little Mermaid so often as a child traumatized me, and now the idea of fish still makes me a little queasy. I’m game to try anything though (I ate fermented shark meat in Iceland, so nothing can really phase me) and so I picked my way through about half of the fish before handing it over to Patrick and filling up on chips. It started to rain, as it usually does in Ireland, so we headed to Kilmainham Gaol, an infamous Dublin prison and one of the most important monuments of Irish independence, as it held a majority of the leaders of Irish rebellions dating back to 1798…all the way up to the famous Easter Uprising of 1916. The museum was great, and the jail itself appropriately ominous. There’s a constant undercurrent of rebellion in Irish culture, which I love, and it was very apparent in that jail.
From there we went to uh…another pub. But this one, at least, had cultural context. I had done quite a bit of research on trad sessions (traditional Irish music played in a pub) and had settled on Devitt’s Pub as one of the best places to hear some old-school jigs. I was embarrassingly excited when we arrived almost an hour early. I had also only eaten half of a fried fish and some chips all day, and the pub’s kitchen was closed, so in a desperate attempt to quell the hunger, I started drinking ciders with great gusto. This may or may not have had an effect on how charming I thought the pub was.
But in all honesty, Devitt’s was incredibly charming. It was basic: wood walls, floors, chairs, and tables; but the lights were dim, it was warm, and the people were friendly. We camped out at the bar, where the bartender Tom quickly found out we were American and began calling us “Trump’s bitches.” This was my first experience being an American abroad after the 2016 election! How exciting! I assured Tom that I hadn’t voted for the “orange fella” but he continued to call us “Trump’s bitches” until some Canadians rolled up and revealed that – in an odd twist of fate – they were actually big fans of Trump. It was a strange, parallel universe. Tom proceeded to make fun of the Canadians instead, who were – for some reason – planting trees in England for a living, employed by a random company I had never heard of. As the musicians began to set up for the trad session, Tom told us stories about working in pubs, the meaning of all of his tattoos (none of them particularly good), and where we should have gone for the best fish & chips in Dublin county.
But then the music started and oh boy, I was in love. The group set up just a few feet away, all circled around a long table. In between songs, they all chatted among themselves, taking swigs of their beers and waving hello to friends they recognized in the crowd. Pretty soon, the bar was packed and we couldn’t even move off our barstools. The music was jaunty and fun and alive, but there were the slow songs too – the haunting ones about the boys who never came home from war, and love long gone. I could have stayed there forever.
And stayed there forever we did! Or, at the very least, until the band packed up and the bar shut down at 2 a.m. At this point I was absolutely starving and maybe a wee bit drunk, so I began demanding if Tom knew of any good late-night food spots. The guitarist of the trad session group overheard and took pity on me, promising that he could lead us to “hands down, the best chicken wings in the world.” When in Ireland…
So we followed this unnamed guitarist down a few dark, shady alleyways and then out onto a wide street packed with boisterous crowds of drunk university students. He led us to a kebab shop but emphasized again: get the chicken wings. We ordered one set of wings and some chips. And lemme tell ya, he was right: these were, by far, the absolute best chicken wings in the entire world. There is no photo or video evidence of these wings. We ate the first round so quickly that there wasn’t time to document it. Grease from the fryer ran down our hands and faces in the most attractive way. We immediately put in two more orders of wings, and ate those in record time while talking to an American study abroad student who had had far too many whiskeys. We convinced him that we were Canadian and that he was absolutely mistaken, we were not one of his countrymen, before heading out the door, back to our Airbnb once again. The only bad part of Airbnbs is this: coming home after a night at the pub and having to take special care not to wake up Esther, Ed, and their adorable little toddlers. Luckily, we got in nice and quietly.
The next day was our last day in Dublin so, of course, it was the only day that it really rained. Poured, actually. We trekked across the city in our squelching shoes to see Trinity College, the Book of Kells, and – of course – the Trinity College Library, which was absolutely stunning. Gimme a library, especially an old, dusty library, and I’m a happy English major.
We explored both sides of the River Liffey, trudging through the rain to see a statue of my least favorite author, James Joyce, as well as the many twisting, cobblestoned alleys of Dublin. For some reason, we decided to have Chinese food for lunch, and actually stumbled upon some of the best Chinese food I’ve ever had. The place was called M&L Chinese Restaurant, and it’s known for serving up incredibly authentic Cantonese-style cuisine. The inside was basic: sparse, white walls, faded blue tablecloths, and fluorescent lighting. It was nearly empty when we first walked in, and accompanied by an eerie sort of silence. The “Are we going to get food poisoning from this place?” kind of silence. But by the time we left, the place was packed and the food was amazing. All I can say is: get the dumplings.
We spent the rest of the day watching the Ireland vs. Italy rugby match and then returned to my now favorite bar, the Long Hall Pub, for a few more hours of ciders and people-watching. Later, we tried to squeeze into O’Donoghue’s Pub for their trad music session but ultimately failed – there was barely room to breathe in there, let alone see the musicians playing. I was a little disappointed about that one, since O’Donoghue’s is especially known for its traditional music and is where The Dubliners got their start in the 1960’s.
Since this was technically my “birthday trip,” we splurged on yet another Italian dinner – this one pretty fancy – at a restaurant called The Unicorn, which was incredible (real mozzarella di bufala!). We were also easily the youngest and most underdressed people there, but we held our own, and I got to practice my Italian with the waiters. We ended the night in the outside courtyard of O’Donoghue’s Pub, sharing our last pints of Guinness before an early 5 a.m. wakeup call to the airport the next morning (the airplane ride would include getting more hot dogs at the Iceland airport, and accidentally spending a whole $10 on a cup of ramen and a Pepsi thanks to WowAir’s severely over-priced food menu).
The entire weekend was a less aggressive traveling style than I was used to. My friends and family back home made fun of me, asking if all I had done was drink my way through Dublin, like every other study abroad student I saw doing on the streets outside of Temple Bar. And despite my protests that we saw and did other things (which we did), I have to admit that my favorite part of this random, whirlwind, 25th birthday weekend to Dublin were undoubtedly those hours spent in bustling, cozy pubs. I didn’t mind, for once, that I got to simply experience a city, rather than filling my trip with a jam-packed to-do list of every tourist location on the map.
. Maybe sometimes travel is just this: long hours huddled on rickety bar stools, a beer now warm for being held too long, and an elderly man crooning generations-old war songs in the corner. Just you and a friend in a dimly-lit room in a completely different part of the world, talking late into the night about family, irrational fears, your first crush and your current one, the state of the union, your favorite ice cream flavors, and everything and nothing, all at once. Sometimes it’s those conversations – not the big, national monuments – that are, in fact, everything and nothing. But mostly, everything.
well as grizzly old men reading the newspaper at the bar. An enormous stag’s head (aptly named) loomed over the large collection of whiskey, but we opted for local lagers and some food instead. Pretty soon, the quiet of the Stag’s Head got to be too much for our jet-lagged exhaustion – we zipped up our raincoats and stepped out into the torrential drizzle. 
test. The taste-test portion was easily my favorite – they had separate rooms set up with varying levels of light to either dull or shock your senses while trying the Guinness, which was trippy (especially when still jet-lagged). This was the freshest Guinness, they reminded us, that you’ll ever have, as it was being poured right there, from the factory. I’ll say that I tasted a difference, but honestly, any freshly-poured Guinness at 11 a.m. would have tasted good to me at that point. We also received official training on how to do a true Guinness pour, which was way more intricate than I’ve ever seen a bartender pour for me here in the U.S. I am officially a certified Guinness pourer though, with a printed certificate, so you could say I had a true academic experience while abroad.
We got our little cardboard boxes filled with greasy, battered fish and thick-cut potatoes, all coated in a dusting of salt, and camped out on the lawn of Dublin Castle. Patrick inhaled his food in about five minutes, but I struggled through mine. As a self-proclaimed lover of food, I have one, major flaw: I don’t like fish. I’m 
my Italian with the waiters. We ended the night in the outside courtyard of O’Donoghue’s Pub, sharing our last pints of Guinness before an early 5 a.m. wakeup call to the airport the next morning (the airplane ride would include getting more hot dogs at the Iceland airport, and accidentally spending a whole $10 on a cup of ramen and a Pepsi thanks to WowAir’s severely over-priced food menu). 
90% Pasta 
