I used to spend my summers on Sandymount strand (we lived right on the beach). There was a treasure trove of tidepools and rocks with all sorts of prizes: crabs, eels and whatever. As a little devil I used to take crabs and chase girls with them - until one girl blew it all. Instead of running like the others she said "Oh, neat. where do you find those?". It was the closest beach to the city center and had good bus service so, on a nice summer's day it would be a hive of activity. People would pour in from the inner city and vendors would set up stands and, if the tide was out, people would bring ponies and carts and just ponies and sell rides. I can still hear the cries "Penny a ride on the pony and cart, tuppence a ride on trigger." I spent all summer there - my mother would give me my lunch over the beach wall. There are other memories. I was sent to boarding school when I was 11 so, when I came home, I was no longer part of "the crowd" and remember wandering the beach (it ran for miles) desperately lonely. And I remember sitting against the wall in fetal position crying my heart out when my Dad died. I remember some friends and I having a music session there just to have fun but finding that we made money at it , not a lot - just enough to fund that night's drinking. And I remember walking on that beach with a woman I was in love with (my first real love as opposed to a crush) and she turning to me and saying "When you break up with me, do it slowly" and my turning to her and saying "Why do we ever have to break up? And if we do, why does it have to be me that does the breaking up?" And I told her I loved her. And the very next day she shattered my heart. A former boyfriend who had broken her heart had visited and she had realized that she was not yet free to love. And I remember going back to Ireland when my marriage was in trouble and I needed to think and remembering how my wife and I had danced joyously on Sandymount strand, all alone early in the morning, and resolving to go home and see if we could ressurect that. We could not, but I still remember that joy. So many memories.