At the Feet of Benbulben

June 13, 2025

North of Sligo, on the west coast of Ireland, situated within the Dartry Mountain range, lies Benbulben. It’s a table mountain, meaning that it has a flat, not peaked, top. It has been a site of artistic inspiration, myths and legends, and rebellion.

For me, last month, it was a site of revelation.

At the feet of Benbulben there is a forest trail. Patrick and I first walked it in 2022; we stopped there again this May as we drove from the Fanad Lighthouse to Galway. It’s a gentle looping path that provides stunning views of the mountain on one side and the ocean on the other. There are many reasons I love Ireland, and the scenery is high on that list: the way it surprises, overwhelms, soothes, unsettles, provides perspective.

Our first trip to Ireland was in March 2017, shortly after my uncle Ryan died by suicide. I flew to Montana for a few days for his funeral, came home to Minnesota, and the next day we took off for England and Ireland. Our primary goal was England, but we decided to take the ferry to Ireland because, well, why not? I did not anticipate loving Ireland the way I did. The way I do. As a Murphy, I’ve always been aware of our Irish heritage. The older I’ve gotten, the more I’ve been drawn to the music, literature, history, and symbolism of Ireland. But still, it took me by surprise how at home I felt when we stepped on Irish soil. It felt different, like my blood and bones knew this land because, somewhere down the line, my ancestors had been here. I had returned.

When one thinks of Ireland, one normally pictures rolling green hills dotted with sheep. Indeed, such landscapes do exist. Those are not, however, the ones that take my breath away. On that first trip we stumbled upon the Burren, a national park and wildlife preserve. Much of it is limestone, though as the stone dissolves over the millennia more grassland appears. Farmers used to move their herds from the grassy bits to the stony ones in winter because the limestone held heat, and there was enough grass poking through where stone had eroded to feed the animals. One of the placards we read on this trip said that in 5 to 10 million years all of the limestone will be gone.

Traveling abroad right now is odd. I tend to be very aware of and plugged in to news while I’m at home. I read various stories, keep an eye on the socials, stay attentive to what’s happening. For the nearly two weeks we were in Ireland last month, though, I tried to be there, to check the news but not get sucked in. I can spiral. The ability to bow out is, I know, a great privilege. But we didn’t really bow out because wherever you go, there you are. I was keenly aware of how heavy the idea of coming back to the States felt. Not only that, but I was keenly aware of how safe I felt there versus here. Usually we go to Ireland in March. It’s not their high tourism season. Going in May is a bit different: many more people, loads of tourists, and because of the weather for the first half of our trip, everyone was outside. It was a little overwhelming. And yet, as we stood on a corner in Galway, watching some musicians play, I realized that I wasn’t scanning the crowd, didn’t have an escape route planned, was simply enjoying what was right in front of me without planning for catastrophe. I was aware of my surroundings, but I didn’t feel on guard.

I almost always feel on guard in public at home.

We are riding waves. As someone with anxiety, I’m used to this. I can handle so much, and then the wave overwhelms, pulling me under. Panic, inability to breathe, freezing and sweating all at once, heavy and lightheaded, disoriented and weirdly focused. Finally I break back through the surface, taking sweet, sweet breaths. The steadiness returns. I ride the waves.

Last night I was drawn under; the wave crashed right on top of me. I realized it after watching the video of Senator Alex Padilla pushed out of a press conference and forced to the ground, handcuffed. My body immediately tensed. My breath tightened. It didn’t make sense. Until it did. We’ve been seeing so much violence. We’re reading about it, hearing about it, watching videos about it. Some of us are experiencing it. The language all of us are using is, to some extent, violent. There are so few soft places to land right now.

As we finished our walk at Benbulben this time, I looked up at the mountain. I told my husband how not ready I was to come home. Yes, I missed our pets, our people, our home. But Ireland was my soft place. I say this knowing that the history is tumultuous, that peace is always hard won and tenuous, that nowhere is perfect. I looked up at the mountain and it struck me how long it has stood. Regimes have come and gone. Wars have broken out and been resolved. Tyrants have scrambled for power and been defeated. In Ireland and across the world. And Benbulben has seen it all, perched there on the edge of a little island nation.

I felt small. I am small. I am insignificant in the grand scheme of all that is. I stood staring at Benbulben and cried. It has been, is, and will be. I simply am. We are.

This is our moment. When rocks can form and erode over millions upon millions of years, one begins to wonder how one lands in a particular place at a particular time. I do not know the answer. I kept photographing plants growing from stone on this trip, though. To be reminded that soft, beautiful things grow from hard, rocky formations.

In the midst violent threats and actions that have been made by the current administration, the slow creep of abnormal toward normal, I strive to embody what the Irish landscape reminded me. Because I want to be, myself, a soft space to land. Because while my heart is, in some ways, stony, the tendril of a stem emerges. The hint of a bud just waiting to bloom. Tender. Resilient. Here. Now.

Note: I am sending this essay as a Heart Forward Yoga e-mail and through my other Substack, Murphy Untangled. If you received it twice, it’s because you’re subscribed to both. Apologies for the repeat.