The train stuttered and swung its way from the east coast
through the familiar litany of towns packed with bored and down cast
commuters. I did not care – I was not
there. A few miles north Culbin lies
quiet and secret under the full moon, invisible beyond the infinity mirror
windows of the train.
I seem to remember I was having trouble with riding on sand.
The back wheel was breaking away and I was tipping over. Aye, that was it. So I
headed for the fire tracks and braved the mud left by the harvesters before
breaking away myself into the empty still wood. I aimed for the Buckie Loch
just to see. When I got there it was a stony field of downy dried thistles hiding
from the sea’s next big temper behind a ridge of stones. The bike and I climbed
the stones in a fluid pull on the bars and stopped, stunned and stilled.
Waves dropped quiet on the sand. Not breaking along the
beach but just dropping – plop, soosh - in a single second across as far as the
eye could see. White dry sand blew along
dark wet sand in swirls. Out to sea gannets speared into the white caps. Rise,
cruciform, turn, spear, splash. Fishermen
in endless benediction.
I dropped the bike and sat down. The ridge top was a mosaic
of small pebbles. Red granites, white quartz, layered toffee sandstones,
smoothed ancient gneiss on its last journey after 3 billion years. Glaciers had
gifted these stones to the sea as rough rocks ripped from Cairngorm, the tors
of Avon, the hills of the great glen and many others. The sea had loved them
smooth as skin, cold as their mother ice under my hand.