Sandbox Blog

A young girl is standing on the shore, looking out to sea.  There are fishing boats in the harbour, but she is alone on the shore, looking out to sea.  And the sea is wild, dark blue, white foam, spitting, speckled, flecked, and the wind is cold on her cheeks and in her ears and rough in her hair, and there is rain on the wind, kissing her cheeks with soft, cold rain, but she doesn’t feel the cold and she doesn’t feel the rain.  She is looking at god.  Out there, out there on the horizon, in the sea, in the waves, there, out there, in front of her, connected to her, is the almighty.

And there are no words needed.  Nothing needs to be said.  She stands in the face of timelessness, strength, destruction, awesome, mighty power, love, words, power beyond words, beyond our comprehension, eternal, stunning, beautiful, complete.  The strand and the machair and the sea and the sky and the rain and the cold of the wind are all: complete.

And she knows as she stands there that her spirit is connected to her grandmother and her grandmother’s grandmother and she knows that they too stood there as young girls and old women and without smiling recognised what was in front of them.  What they had the privilege to see.  What others were blind to.  The might, the power, the amazing glory of god.  The power and the glory.  The roar of the waves.  The rain in the wind.

With thanks to Mari Boine whose song Ahccai inspired this piece

It was a grey old day today.  Grey skies.  Grey, foreboding seas.  Grey mist.  Grey waterlogged land.

You might be forgiven for thinking it was totally grey.

But there is colour everywhere, if you know where to look.

Walking along the front at Lamlash I notice a line of small birds.  A flock of oystercatchers.  My favourite bird (how did you know?)

I bend down to try and capture the group.  The movement makes them fly up and away.

The sky is a flash of black and white, brilliant flashes of white, illuminating.

As far from grey as can be.

The settlement at Lagg is a little faded in the winter light. No visitors at the Inn, only a couple of large dogs parading outside. The post office is closed down. Although there are primroses in the window, a sign on the lampost says the post box has moved down the road. A small boat lies upturned in a yard beside the river.

In the wood, the wind flies through the trees, spooking me with its whispers. The golden remains of autumn lie on the path, even though we’re nearing spring. Gorse bushes are walloped by the wind and the rain, bright petals strewn like confetti in the path.

At the break in the path, an old green bench sits waiting.

It marks a break in the landscape. The sky opens up. The woods stops its whispering. Here the gorse bushes stand strong. The sea shimmers silver ahead.

The path runs on to the cairn at Torrylinn.

I stop to soak up the history. It’s only later I notice the colour of the stones, the perfect ending to my yellow-seeking walk.

Stained deep with yellow lichen.

~~~

This particular record of the walk was inspired by focusing on a colour – this time yellow – noticing what you see, and then writing what happened.

As I walk, I shift to looking for blue.

It helps me pay attention to the walk, wake up my senses for my writing, and generates some good photos too. Blue is a bit of a challenge in a woodland walk but as I emerge through the glen and out onto the Esplanade at Dunoon it’s all I can do not to laugh.

The sky is a huge brilliant blue, the sea a magnificent reflection. The view I’m drinking in as blue as blue can be.

“Blue enough?” The universe whispers. “Won’t this do?”

And twirls off into the sky, leaving me to admire the clouds of her trail, and an utterly wonderful blue.

The crossing never fails to delight.

It’s a cold wet day by the time we leave Brodick and it’s only the smokers on deck. Looking back to the island I can’t help but notice the rows of empty seats, looking out to sea. Something jaunty, Victorian, no Edwardian about their colours, their steadfast wait for the stream of day trippers.

Not ten minutes later and the weather’s changed again. Brilliant blue skies over the Ayrshire coast, demanding more pictures. It’s a feast of blues – more sea, I wonder, or more sky? I take some of each, adjusting, admiring as I go.

On the other side of the boat the skies have darkened. Streaks of black rain on the horizon. The faint outline of Ailsa Craig in shadows of darkness and light.

A fishing boat drifts past. As I turn back to watch the boat is perfectly framed: dark clouds, sheets of rain, bright silver sunshine illuminating the water.

Why do I prefer this side of the boat? It’s not just the last look at the island.

It’s the appeal of the dark, the wind and the rain, the edge of the Atlantic, the promise of the islands, the stretch into wildness, the depths of my history, the wildness of the west.

I can resist it no more.