DUNMANWAY

Sally's Place

My next assignment was to be at Sally's Place in Dunmanway.  Her place is way out on a one-lane country road where grass still grows in the middle of the tire tracks.  It is not a place you can easily walk out of and go to town.  The town that they call a village is very nice.  And the bus runs through it going somewhere every day.  It seems that everyone knows everyone.  And the Main St.'s buildings are colorfully painted every color on the pastel palette.
When I rode from Dunmanway out to Sally's place, I saw some very nice, beautiful homes surrounded by pastures and cows and sheep.  Then we came upon Sally's place.  I wanted to run.  But I thought all positive thoughts about the possibility of it being pleasant inside.  Then I went in.  OMG!  It was completely (by my standards which are not especially prejudicially high) unlivable.  It was really by Sally's choice that she live this way.  It was full of clutter and junk and empty containers that she 'might' need someday to put something in.  There was not one square inch of space on any of the counters to prepare food.  The small table was of course full of stuff.  It smelled very strong of wet dog and barn.
The floor was large 2'x2' slate or rock filled in with concrete.  But then there were the dogs!  They all were amazing and I felt it a little difficult leaving them.  They all lived in the kitchen amongst the clutter and filth.  they were not allowed in any other room.  Sally was extremely strict with all of them but very, very kind and gentle.
Sally showed me to my room upstairs.  It was very difficult getting my 2 bags up those narrow, steep and of course full of clutter stairs.  But I did only to find another room of clutter before getting to my tiny but livable room at the end of the house.  And it was COLD.  So I was very relieved when Sally said I had an electric blanket on my twin bed and if I wanted could keep it on all night.  It was specifically made with 'all night' settings.  When I went through the living room and saw the wood stove, I asked if I could start a fire.  She said 'no' because she only had enough wood for 2 more nights.

    
                                                          DOGS

Sweet Pea     Mastive weighing about 250 lbs.  A true 'gentle giant'

Tuti               Looks like a pit bull.  Lots of personality and is ALWAYS on the lookout for something to 
                     eat.

Pippa           Wippet  Sweet as could be.  Loved watching her run

Corky           Mix of many. Looked like a Scotty/Westie.  Orange colored.  If I could have taken any dog
                     home in my suitcase, it would have been him.  He was the only male by the way.

Lassie           Border Collie mix.  Need I say more?  Loved to run.  Always on the lookout for some 
                     sheep to herd.


Upon arriving I was assigned 2 baby lambs just 1 week old to bottle feed.  One was all black and the other was black and white.  I had to split a bottle a sheep milk (powdered) between them every 3 hours.  The last feeding was about 10 at night so by 7 in the morning they were really hungry.  They got to know my voice and acted quite tame after a few days.  Then Sally told me that the male will end up in her freezer in a few weeks and she didn't know who she'd give the female to.  Sally already had 2 chest freezers FULL of meat she had as pets once and killed for food.  I did not eat any meat while there.  Sally made it very clear that she felt people who ate meat but would oppose killing an animal prior to eating it as hypocrites.  I guess she considered me one because I said I could not kill an animal and then eat it.  She is a true farmer at heart.  We had many heart to heart discussions on this matter.

Sally rescued many animals in her 38 years in Dunmanway.  All of her dogs are rescued from an unfortunate previous life which she has seemingly been successful at turning around.  I give her  a lot of credit to live this lifestyle at the age of 62.  And she does it alone.  She has one daughter and two sons.  Her daughter lives quite close with her husband and 2 and 4 yr. old boys.  They are all beautiful people.  They (all 4 of them) live in an old "2up, 2 down" concrete cottage with no clutter and the wood stove is going constantly.  The 2 boys are adorable.  They have a boxer who I also fell in love with.  Olivia is her daughter's name and Carl is her husband who is a full time chef in a nearby town.
One of Sally's sons (Sam) lives about 20 minutes away on the side of a mountain in a rented wooden house (rare).  There is no town name associated with that area.  It is just referred to as "Cold Mountain".  Anything posted to the people who live in that area is simply put "Cold Mountain" as its' address.
Her other son Aron lives with his partner and their 2 yr. old son Cullen in the Mayo district very north of Sally.  So they don't see each other very often.  They have a second child on the way.  Most people as I see it don't get married because the government will give more money to a single mom than a married mom.  Similar to Italy, many people live on government money.  Sally collects money each month called "The Widows Pension" because her husband has been gone now for 10 years.  She also collects money because she has had cancer.  And she collects money for her injured shoulder.  She also earns money for the dogs she grooms and boards.  She boards cats too at 7Euro/night.

I don't know how many ducks and geese Sally has. From memory I'm guessing 5 female ducks and 1 drake (male duck), 5 or 6 baby ducks, 4 geese;  One which would always hiss at me when I came near.
And chickens.  She had chickens many which did not give too many eggs and would end up in the soup pot shortly.  While in Bantry on market day, Sally bought 4 new chickens, for fun she says.  They were not prolific egg layers but the farmer did not have the hens she wanted and she did not want to go home empty handed.  They cost 15 Euro each.  For fun.  We had to clean out a very old and unused coop which was falling apart for the new hens to go in when we got home.

And she just last week got a pet ferret. (rescued)

And she said she had rats....outside..

And she has an indoor cat and 2 ferule cats that she feeds inside the bathroom where she leaves the window open all the time for them.  Freezing cold bathroom.

I could easily feel sorry for Sally and in leaving her before my time was up but I know she puts a lot of strain on herself by having too much stuff and too many animals to take care of.  I do miss the dogs and lambs.  How I wish I could have helped her clean the place up and make it better.  But she did not want that.