If there exists a land of windswept fairy tales, Skye is it. I finally found a landscape as dramatic as I am.
It feels like you are on the edge of the world. Fog curls around the mountains like gray cotton candy arms wrapping the hills in a hug, pink wildflowers dangle like bells, old stone bridges arch over rushing rivers, the kinds of stone bridges where ancient legends are made, legends of fairies and magical creatures who dance on the bridges at night, bridges from this world to the other world, the magic world.
Lush waterfalls cascade down the hills between silver birth trees and hazel, crashing and tumbling over boulders. Various etymologies say Skye is the “winged isle” because of the peninsulas that radiate out from the center mountain. Ancient norse poems from the 1200’s refer to Skye as Skuy, or the “misty isle,” but Skye is much older than that. Legends speak of a warrior woman who lived on Skye and trained heroes in martial arts. Her residence on Skye was called the “Fortress of Shadows.” I could probably use some training with a warrior goddess.
This is the kind of place that would inspire a ghostly love story like Heathcliff and Cathy, the dark brooding man walking the moors at night in search of his true love, who died many years ago.
I wonder if that’s me? Am I like Heathcliff, striding across fields of wildflowers across stone bridges, running through the fields at night in search of my true love, Kim? Is my trip to Skye a journey to find a place, a portal, where the mist blends the edges between worlds and I can touch her hand and look into her laughing eyes, eyes like the rising sun shining through a glass of whisky, just for one moment? Actually a moment wouldn’t be enough. It would need to be eternity.
Does it make me weak to say that it’s been 4 years since Kim left the planet and I never stop aching?
Aching is a word that describes the better moments. There are many moments that feel more like a smoldering fire laying dormant under moss… a memory comes along that ignites it: a memory of her making a face like the Lochness monster that sent me to my knees with laughter; a memory of her dropping everything to drive to me wherever I was, when yet another lover had broken my heart; a memory of her dancing with an ecstatic smile on her face, one hand over her heart, the other reaching out to me.
The memory ignites, and grief rips through my body like a wildfire, out of control and wild, scorching everything in its path. When this happens, sobs erupt, and I don’t know what to do except say, “Oh Kim,” sometimes in a wail, sometimes in a whisper. I double over, my hands on my knees, or I grip the towel bar until the fiery sobs burn themselves out. I wipe my eyes and carry on.
I drove for hours on the winding narrow roads to Skye, holding tight to the memories of visiting there decades ago with Kim. I wanted to walk the same paths I walked with her, but this time I was with my beloveds: Henry and Annabelle. I wanted to show them the magic, the castle and the fairy lore, the protector and the legends, the mushroom circles where Kim and I danced to see if we could disappear into fairy world together, the Fairy Bridge where locals say the fairies dance at night. Kim and I went and sat on the stones and waited. No fairies appeared, so we danced together on the bridge to make the legends true. I wanted to bring her back to life with through stories of how hard we laughed when we visited; stories of rainbows splashing all over the island as the sunshine and the rain mixed together, creating an ethereal golden light that turned into a great gray cat crouched on the hill and then suddenly burst into vibrant colors.
When the kids and I arrived at our hotel that dark and rainy night, we dragged our suitcases to our lodge, a charming little place on its own in the gardens. We were weary travelers in search of a warm place to sleep. After they were settled, I stepped outside into the crisp cool air and inhaled the scent of fresh soil and woodsmoke. The windows of the main hotel glowed amber in the distance, and I wrapped my sweater tighter around my body and looked up at the black sky powdered with stars. A waterfall tumbled nearby, and the ground felt like home beneath my feet. “I can’t believe I’m finally here. I came back, Kim.”
I closed my eyes, my head tilted back, the soft spray of rain landing on my lips, or tears, or maybe drops from the waterfall… It didn’t matter. It felt a lot like I was in that magic land, the land where she was next to me, the windswept land of fairy tales.
“Come Away, O Human Child, To the waters and the wilds,
With a faery, hand-in-hand,
For the world’s most full of weeping, than you can understand.”
Yeats
Shakespeare said:
“Give sorrow words/The grief that doth not speak/whispers the o’er fraught heart /and bids it break.” Shakespeare
Skye
