Teach Bhríde XVII
Looking beyond this past year and back to the application process, it seems a bit silly now that I was so scared to even apply to this program. I often tell people I applied on a whim and almost turned it down when I was offered a position, because coming to Dublin for a year never felt like a real possibility. In my mind, once people graduated college, they moved on to graduate school or a “real-world” job. Without the support and encouragement of those around me, I never would have had the courage to step into a year of service like this.
One of the things that surprised me most about this program is how quickly a place can become your home. Although I do consider the apartment I share with the other girls a home, I’m not referring to one specific living space. The NDNC has become my home. Newman University Church has become my home. Dublin as a whole has become my home. Walking to work became routine; the local coffee shops along the way became familiar; and even Grafton Street became just another street.
While the surroundings became familiar enough to lose their novelty, the real reason this city became home is not the places, but the people. When the four of us arrived in Dublin, most of us had never been this far from home before. We came together as strangers, working in an unfamiliar place, adjusting to life away from everything and everyone we knew.
The people became a crucial part of my adjustment and my love for this program. My fellow community members were a constant source of laughter over the smallest things—sometimes without even knowing why we were laughing. The NDNC staff offered steady guidance and warmth to four girls who had no idea what the next ten months would hold. The parish community was equally welcoming, always making an effort to learn about our lives and to share parts of their own.
I had never been outside the United States before coming to Dublin. In fact, I spent most of my life within an hour’s radius of my home. My high school and college were just down the street from each other, and I had little reason to leave that sense of familiarity. Living in a different country for ten months was entirely new to me. Up until now, the places I’ve lived have felt like home because they were tied to everything I already knew. Experiencing that sense of home in a completely new place—let alone a new country—was something I had never encountered before.
Looking back now, what stands out most is not just how far I traveled, but how much my understanding of “home” has expanded. Home is no longer defined by proximity, routine, or familiarity alone, but by the relationships that ground you even when everything else feels new. Dublin will always be marked as the place where I learned that lesson—where strangers became community, routine became comfort, and a city I once arrived in with uncertainty slowly became a place I could belong.
