09 Blog post 9 September 11, 2024 Inverness to Aberdeen

Two firsts for this trip, both of them so normal that they almost don’t seem worth mentioning: we did laundry and I got sick, not terribly sick, but (I think) exhausted sick from the constant moving around, visiting people, eating food I don’t normally eat.

We’ve done a tremendous amount of driving in the past two days, leaving The Bunessan Inn on the Isle of Mull to drive up past three lochs—Loch Linney, Oich, and the more famous Loch Ness—to Inverness. Inverness means “Mouth of the River Ness”, which runs straight through the heart of the city and into the Loch we all know so well. And yes, Nessie is big business there! The trip took about 4 hours of driving.

But wait, how did I fail to mention the 2 ½ hour wait for the ferry that only takes 10 minutes to cross from Fishnish, on the Isle of Mull, to Lochaline, on the mainland of Scotland? The weather was so bad that day that they had to cancel the big ferry down the way from Craigrune, so all the cars that normally would be on the bigger ferry came down to wait on a long line for the much smaller ferry that could take only 20 cars a trip across. My first response was frustration. We had to DO something, GO somewhere else, SOLVE the problem. And the reality was that we couldn’t do anything but wait. In fact, it was entirely possible that they could cancel this ferry too, and then we’d have been in trouble with no place to stay on the island. It’s strange sitting in your car for 2 hours going nowhere. The one time I left the car to get a cup of coffee at the ferry station, we had a micro-storm blow in with torrential rain and hail stones. Drenched in minutes. But I had my coffee!!

After finally crossing the Sound of Mull, we entered the highlands of Scotland and drove up to Inverness, winding through forests and past the UK’s highest peak, Ben Nevis. The strange thing about these mountains is that they have almost no trees on them. The fading patches of heather and other grasses look like mottled pelts or fur on the sides of the mountains, as if ancient giants had fallen asleep on their sides and been covered by native plants. But no trees. This gives an expansive view of the mountains which is much different than the Adirondacks.

Our delay in travel at the ferry had cost us though. We needed to do laundry and once we checked in at our B and B, we hurried out to the City Launderette, wheeling a suitcase full of dirty laundry behind us. The Launderette was small and PACKED with people. I’ve never seen so many people trying to do laundry in such a small space, but we managed to get a machine. By the time the laundry was done, it was pouring rain outside, a cold, penetrating rain that ran off my raincoat and soaked my jeans and my shoes. This is bad on a trip because you can’t always dry your things in time to leave the next day.

And then as we wheeled our now clean laundry home, I could feel the exhaustion pull at me and I was concerned that I was really, really sick, but a good night’s sleep made a huge difference. (Tiredness seems like a theme right now because I fell asleep three times today on the car ride from Inverness to Aberdeen!)

Before we left Inverness, we had the opportunity to tour the Cathedral of St. Andrew, which is an Episcopal Cathedral. While I was glad to learn more about the Cathedral and to visit, I wanted to be in a church to remember 9/11 and to pray for radical peace, for healing and for continued consolation for those who lost loved ones. It felt strange to be praying from far away, but I was glad to have a sense of being wrapped in the sacred as I knelt in the Cathedral and lit a candle of remembrance.

Currently we are staying with friends in Aberdeen, my grad school roommate and her husband, and the years fall away as we talk and catch up with each other. Alistair feels at home here, as if he is in a place where people speak his language, we were able to eat a healthy home cooked meal—such a gift! This sabbatical is giving me the opportunity to reconnect with people I have not seen in years, and I am so grateful for that.

I am also grateful to be well, and grateful to have clean laundry. Do I realize the blessing of small things—of a warm meal, good conversation and clean clothes? Today I do. My prayer is that I hold onto these experiences enough to remind me of the abundance around me.