Dick Mack’s, take two

my second night in Dingle, I came upon a group of ladies from Michigan in search of a pub listed in Rick Steves, reported to have good craic. since I’d been walking around town all day, I knew precisely where they were headed and offered to show them the way. turned out, there wasn’t any music on at the time we wandered through, so we ended up at Dick Mack’s again, just as their live music was wrapping up for the night. we got our pints and headed around to the front sitting room and chatted, and all the while the pub continued to fill up. apparently Wednesdsay night was good enough for going out, and for drawing all manner of visitors to Dingle.

we’d been sitting and chatting about travel, and Michigan, and the system of higher education in the United States, and my thesis (it was quite something to have someone express interest in learning more about my subject for the first time in a year and a half–leave it to someone who teaches on gender issues at the collegiate level to be interested, how fantastic!). just as we rid ourselves of the unwanted attentions of the pub drunk, one of the young women from a group in the next room over decided to pull up a rickety stool to the piano and began to play.

it was something you’d certainly never see in the states, and it wasn’t something that I saw happen anywhere else. this fashionablly dressed thing, who couldn’t have been more than twenty years old, pounding out reels on a creaky old piano, implored by her friends and other patrons of the bar to play one more, eventually inspiring someone to track down a guitar and other additional instruments to start up the music again. the reels got people talking about dance, and it came out that one of the pianists friends was quite the traditional dancer; after much imploring she was induced to take off her spike heels, take hold of her (very) short skirt (they were clearly out for a “girls night”, maybe even a hen party) and started dancing along with the impromptu music session. thad kind of stuff, that’s what people mean when they talk about the craic: my second night at Dick Mack’s in Dingle was definitely good craic.

Author: Erica

born in the midwest with wandering feet.