And I'm like wondering how you got to the place where you began to work on that or were you working on it the whole time?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Um, I think I also, I, it's always so surprising to me.

And I think you kind of hear a little bit of this in songs like writer's block where that is ultimately like my, you know, do, am I just doing this thing because I've always done it for music? Um, is it me or is it, is it the world? Like, cause I've changed and I'm not feeling it and I'm kind of depressed and shit's bleak and people are out celebrating and doing these things and, and, and, And that's really me digging into that unresolved grief of like, life goes on.

Like, for better or worse, life goes on.

And when you have these, for me, I tend to... jump to resilience because that's where I can feel my power and feel better again.

i did grandma because i've been lifting weights

So what barriers still remain to getting women into the workforce in construction?

So there, there's a lo- there is a lot.

I'm gonna be realistic.

You know, we, um, in, in Sisk, we did a couple of focus groups last summer to try and understand what the, the lived experience is of women in our business, and the find, the findings from that is aligned with research that's been done in the UK and research that's been done across the world.

A couple of, um, kind of key barriers that stood out to us was there's definitely a lack of role models, there's a lack of networks, there's a lack of mentoring.

You know, if you're the only woman on a construction site, um, which often women are in Ireland, considering they only make up about 1% of site-based roles, you don't have a network, you don't have a community.

That can be extremely isolating, extremely daunting, and sometimes can make women not want to stay within the industry.

And what are you hoping to gain from the roundtables?

First off, Amy, what is the idea behind this new network?

Hi, Susan.

Um, so I suppose I, I set up the network for a, a few reasons.

The main one is really, like, this is, it's important work that we're doing.

It's really rewarding work, um, but it's also really challenging and a bit isolating at times.

Um, most of the people who work in, in equality, diversity, and inclusion roles, they're often the only person in their whole company in that role, which means that you don't always have people to bounce things off, share ideas with, talk through the challenges with.

Um, and a lot of this work is done by volunteers as well, so people who have very, very busy day jobs and who do this work on a voluntary basis in addition to that.

But is there something else? Because I think it's important, all right, to call out the obvious, but I'd r- I'd rather ask you, maybe is there anything hidden or less obvious that's driving that?

And to be quite honest, the real difficulties that some ladies have had to face throughout their entire kind of you know teenage and and adult lives as well and so then my kind of question is how do people so once you recognize okay so i'm in you know this autumnal phase which is typically the the most challenging phase and that has impacts not just on you as as a person but also on your family your friends your work colleagues your horse you you know your pets What do we do about that? Once we've recognised what that looks like for us as individuals, what can we do to help navigate through those autumn times?

Yeah, it's a great question and I think, yes, it can be challenging, but once we recognise it, we can turn that power around to be something positive.

I think what's really important is When I was doing this research, Liz, I really didn't want to take us back to women are hysterical and, you know, people, uterus owners, they can't be trusted because they're just not, you know, like nobody knows what's going to happen from one moment to the next.

They're too emotional.

You know, like the first wave feminists did a lot to kind of dispel those myths that we are, you know, we are.

that we are competent and we're, you know, professional and we're able to be in the workplace.

So I didn't want to undo any of that good work.

And why do you think we are in this era where we have to be so good at everything and the thought of going for a nap is like, ooh, that's a bit

What does that feel like?

It feels very, you go into another world and the rest of the city, the urbanness, even just modern life goes away.

You know, when you go into nature, nature doesn't want to sell you anything, convert you, make you vote for a particular political candidate.

It is without agenda.

And when you get into nature, I recommend that people kind of walk in until they get to feeling kind of private and then just literally shake off the rest of the world and then go forth and take it slow and take it easy.

The forested areas really get that for you.

So the quickest way to get into what I call deep nature is the Ned and Jeanne Fritz Texas Buckeye Trail.

Do you have a particular favorite? Do you have one that surprised you more than the others?

So what was the most fascinating thing you uncovered while making this whole show? Was there anything that just completely surprised you? Oh, so many

things.

Plants can hear and they are actually using what they hear to help shape their lives.

And it feels like Dangerous ground because it feels like it can very quickly stray into the woo-woo.

But there's actual science that has been done and is emerging that is just utterly fascinating to me.

So think about a flower.

You have this beautiful, bright thing produced by the plant, and it smells good because it's trying to attract pollinators, right? But what some scientists I talked to have discovered is they're not only using those colors to attract pollinators, that flower is also an ear and it is listening for the pollinators in some cases.

Tell me about the people you met while you were making this season.