The Shack

Lots of people can’t quite believe The Shack.
I mean, okay, there it is: a handsome wooden… well, shack, at the edge of the sumptuous Marble Hill Beach.
But, look: things like The Shack happen in your dreams, right? They don’t actually exist in reality. You dream of finding a pitch-perfect coffee shack at the edge of a pitch-perfect beach on a pitch-perfect day in remote County Donegal. And that's a dream, right?
Absolutely not a dream. The Shack is potently, marvellously real. And it is utterly bewitching. Sensible, sober people who discover Tom and Min’s masterpiece talk about it in the most incredulous way, speak of it as not just a place to have superb coffee, but as some sort of divine benediction, a blessing in caffeine at the edge of the perfect stretch of white sand.
We understand the feeling. The Shack is too good to be true. It’s an archetype, something we believe could exist, might exist, but don’t expect to actually find at any point in our lives.
Yet here it is. So, sit down on the bench. Admire the flowers. Take a sip of the latest brew which Tom has roasted up in Downings at their roastery. Tell yourself you will extract some sea buckthorn berries from the adjacent hedge to take home. Have an ice cream.
It’s your best life, right?
Right.