Picture This: The Pull of Loch Maree

Following the sun west from Achnasheen through glens gouged by glaciers, the road to Wester Ross flutters like a ribbon lofted from a child’s hand. Sweeping slopes of earth and forest leap toward the powder blue sky where lavender-tinged clouds break upon the peaks. Then, crossing Glen Docherty’s ramparts, a vision. The moments fragment, for I am now standing in the wind with this view in my eyes, Loch Maree hung like a sapphire between the oaks of Letterewe and Slioch’s eminence.

That is not electricity I feel. It is the resonant signal of the sixth stirring beneath the five, awoken by this magnetic beauty. There is perfection in the natural world unequaled by contrivance or artifice, and all the roads, fences, cottages, and clear-cutting are distractions that wither beneath this sky-wide truth. It is a fool’s faith to think we are separate and superior; we are inseparably bound. And as my windy vigil nears its end I am grateful to gaze at this mirroring view and count the subtle, unnamed sensations.