Picture This: Hills Eclipse the Light in Skye’s Glen Brittle

The light stumbles over the hills, falls cold beyond the sward. A river and a road wend through Skye’s Glen Brittle en route to Loch Eynort, where they will stop. The sublime traverse nearly forgotten in its ending. I heard tell that fairy pools hid amongst the glowering hills, but the newly-flushed burns and streamlets thwart my exploration. It’s no bother; everything in this beguiling half-light is of the fairy realm. There is little to draw the eye in this glen, the visual equivalent of silencing the ever-chattering voices of the mind. Meditation. 

The name Glen Brittle is an anglicization of the Gaelo-Norse, but it feels right. The hard Black Cuillins soar to the southeast, but this space feels brittle, fragile, thin. It could disappear in a blink or a breath. This is why I come to Scotland. This moment as the light and the dark slide over me. And this one. And this one. And this one. It is not the activities I wish to do that compel me to Scotland, but rather the places I wish to find that bring this feeling into perception. I watch the light clamber over the hills. Something is speaking to me and I can almost understand the message.