(pic credit, Ray Wood)
Looking through Anothers Eyes
Sun haze, blurred coastline. St Davids in the distance across the shimmering Irish Sea. He had walked from the farm – through the small camp site and through the field where sheep and cattle graze. Seagulls flew overhead – and now he stood at the crag top. A single gannet circles, wings outstretched. Black pointed tips cut salt air. Grey seal skin silver-sparkles, breaks the sea-surface. Silver sparkles. Porpoise fins cut waves, cut waves and cut waves. The gannet dives.
The waves roll … in sets. They roll, rumbling the smooth grey pebble boulders. Thin quartz rings circle the pebble-boulders’ circumferences. Craig Dorys, a crumbling sea crag washed up on the Lleyn Peninsular offers hope to the traveller in search of more…
… than just a number.
The sun’s heat cracks the earth. Rusty barbs and wool-wrapped netting held-up by old wooden posts creak in the wind. Clay bands between crumble-rock are sticky. The sun moves and warms the cliff. Joyous with the return of the sun the rock lightens and the clay turns dust and the dust catches in the breeze and in the breeze the dust finds freedom.
Already it’s too late. Too warm. Forty metres is such a small distance, but forty metres is so far it could be a life time.
He dreams of cutting loose, lifting feet, clinging to crunchy-flakes, picking quartz scabs, probing creaking orange crimps and fingering collapsing pockets. Movement. He dreams upward. But down is what his imagination sees.
Leaving, he decides on an early start for tomorrow.
Driving away from the farm the squashed fox in the hedgerow floods the car with its pungent rotting musk. This will be another night alone with only images and emotions for comfort, but that’s OK. There have been many nights and a hundred training runs, a thousand jogged steps, a thousand setting suns and two thousand tides since starting on this road. The grey pebble boulders have become a little smaller with the brush of the sea and the thin quartz rings have become a little more polished. One more night is fine.
But why did he start? But he knows why. But how far is far enough? And how far is … too late?
I look through the eyes of another.
Sun haze, blurred coastline. St Davids in the distance across the shimmering …
Nick, Sir,
Frost and Hemingway have nothing on you. I first experienced the wonder of your writing when I read an article on Google from Yahoo about a Bear who had the audacity to attack you and friend Greg after an arduous climb and I was enraptured by your words. They caught me like a deer in the headlights! As I read, I was feeling the blood pumping in my veins and the adrenaline surge through me. You have a great talent for putting forth descriptions that place a reader in a cinematic seat observing the event like they were living it themselves. It’s incredible! I had to write to tell you. But of course, you know this already, seeing your a resounding success at what you do. I’m in awe, actually. I thought perhaps you were “just” a journalist. But no, so much more. Thank you for writing that, but I won’t thank you for writing it after experiencing it. I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy. It’s amazing you could store all your blow by blow emotions away in a mental lockbox for retrieval later. Awesome job. Ironic how you are a climber if mountains and I’m such a couch potato. But not the day I read that article. No Sir, I was right there with you. I’d say I wish you luck, but no, I wish you well. Living out your passion. Stay safe. Lol.
Hi Pat,
Haha, wow, thanks for the message, although I’m certainly no Frost or Hemingway… (Sigh) If only!
You look after yourself and have a safe and good life,
Thanks again for such a wonderful message, all the best,
Nick 🙂