I told her if we moved away from town then she would be giving up the studio, everything. If we relocated to Bray, for example, then artistically she would be on her own and hadn’t she only been talking about collaboration. The only cultural activity out in Bray was a tiny arts centre where you had to pay to exhibit your work. Jenny was above that.

I remember when I stopped talking. How I made up my mind to cease being the person who always controls the narrative. I was the listener, I wanted to be the listener. I wanted my ears to be filled with her thoughts.

27. Work Trip Blues

July 2017

I’m trying, really trying to keep my hand in with the job and it is deeply frustrating. I tell Graham that I’ll go away with the work crowd for a team-building event even though I don’t want to go. He tells me that I don’t have a choice. My work is boring enough as it stands but to be subjected to this thing down in Cork is deeply upsetting. Subjected to headache-inducing activities that even a decent hotel by the water will not compensate for. No amount of comfort can help me be okay with flip charts and ice breakers. I have had to endure ice breakers before when I joined the Dram Soc back in college. People acting out roles and asking each other what they believed in and what their hopes were and the whole lot embarrassed me to the point where I found it difficult to speak, let alone engage properly. I imagine that this kind of activity is more suited to an American well used to self-promotion.

Modesty can be so disabling.