Spring is when you feel like whistling even with a shoe full of slush. -Doug Larson

Things I love:
The April daffodils along the banks of the Ness and in the churchyard beside our flat, above • sunsets at 10pm • breezy sunny afternoons • the scent of freshly-mown grass • the first outdoor glass of wine of the year • anticipating all our summer visitors
We made the trek back to Shetland for the Folk Festival during the May bank holiday weekend. Amazing music from around the world, and the evenings ended at dawn with 'sessions' through the night. The pic above has musicians from four countries jamming on a stairwell at 3am - these Shetlanders are mad. Seriously. Check out Le Vent du Nord, one of the best live shows I've ever seen. The other highlight was watching two of the guys from Chinese band Hanggai in a 3am session with American band Brother Mule - mixing up American folk rock with Chinese two-string banjo and the lead singer's wailing whilst wearing a tool belt with two water bottles filled with beer. Shocking.

Talking of shocking, the newest American treat...
'Cause pancakes and sausage on a stick just wasn't enough. (image from the Jimmy Dean website, take a look if you dare)

Which leads me nicely to one of the biggest obsessions, food. Food we're loving this month (homemade by me or the mr): gorgonzola gnocchi • Italian spiced salmon • blueberry, mango, strawberry and orange smoothies • spinach salad with feta, oranges, avocado and dried cranberries • Yogi 'throat coat' tea • Matt's soon-to-be-famous bruschetta • a weird fish we got at Tesco that tasted pretty good baked in lemon juice and garlic • sticky toffee pudding with vanilla ice cream

(which I don't eat as it's too sweet, but it fits with the newest feature on Kramblings: The Cultural Divide, which could be subtitled as 'ways I annoy Matthew on a semi-daily basis'.)
Matt wants his 'check' shirt. This is the one he means, pre-ironing:
Now I call this 'plaid' (as does the manufacturer) but the whole plaid-tartan-check thing is confused in Matthew's mind. Poor thing. The Cultural Divide extends to many things within the DIY and home-related lexicon (washing-up liquid v. dishwashing soap, hoover v. vacuum cleaner, cooker v. stove, etc etc), which I find amusing but annoys the daylights out of Matt. (Evil laugh.) It's a white shirt with a green plaid. Right?

I thought so. Sunset, tonight:
And, finally, our fab new Fermob furniture for our makeshift outdoor patio (really the pavement in front of the flat) also makes a gorgeous writing space for me as I finish yet another rewrite. Proper nesting happening now, folks.
Fab: Delicious:Days • anticipating upcoming travels • Kitsune Noir • lilies • fireplaces • Jon Stewart • studying Italian • our house plants • the library • reading one true sentence that I wrote

"Up Helly Aa is a lot more than a sub-arctic bonfire and booze-up." - STA Travel website

(From 2 February - a bit late!) Lerwick can be described, at best, as a sleepy town. Its 7000 residents keep to themselves, and a busy Saturday morning could mean 25 people on the town's high street. But this is the end of January; this is Up Helly Aa week. The narrow Commercial Street suddenly becomes thick with people, some sporting thick beards, aging them beyond their years. A pipe band marches through the town's few streets, leading the Jarl Squad, a battalion of men and boys in handcrafted metal hats and mesh tunics, gripping gleaming axes and shields. Even the most tattered of the town's three cafes have a line snaking out the door. The last week of January, even Lerwick could be mistaken for a buzzy village anywhere.
The last Tuesday in January begins at 7am, when the "The Bill" (above) is placed at the Market Cross, which marks the town center. At this time the mayor of Lerwick hands the Jarl, the head of the festivities, the key to the city. Lerwick now belongs to the Jarl and his squad; they can do whatever they want to the place. During the day, the Jarl Squad usually visits schools, hospitals, nursing homes, and government offices. They ride around in a large bus, eating and drinking and rabble-rousing along their way.

Work ends early on Up Helly Aa day. People begin lining the streets at dusk, standing three to five people thick, anticipating. At quarter past seven, the lights of the city are turned off. The impact of the darkness is instant, as the stars become bright and a chill climbs up the spine. Then, a flash of color, lighting up the rooftops two blocks away. The flash continues until an entire block of rooftops are outlined by smoke and light. This continues as the line of torches snakes down a side street, then in front of us. The heat is almost painful. Leading the procession is the Jarl Squad, then the Galley, a boat with a serpent's head and tail, with the Jarl inside. Of the 941 'guizers', 875 men with torches marched, in full costume, along the Lerwick streets, doubling back and meandering in the same manner that has been marched for over a century. They meet in the middle of a playground, where the galley is surrounded by the men with their torches held high. The Jarl tosses his onto the galley, then his squad, then the other squads, in meticulous order, one by one. The sight is spectacular. Flames higher than the houses surrounding the playground stretch to the sky, the only light on this cold evening. A band begins to play, and when the final torch is tossed, a fireworks display lights up the dark sky. Then, it's over; everyone leaves.

There's no police presence. None was needed. No fire brigade waiting around the corner. Shetlanders have taken part in this ceremony for generations. Accidents don't happen, because they just don't.

It's nearly nine, and it's now time to change and get ready for the party. Twelve 'halls' are used as a restaurant, dance floor, and performance space. We go to the Territorial Army hall, in a stone fort just beyond the town center, with the most dramatic entrance of red carpet and a long awning. The girls spend an hour 'hostessing', or taking tea, coffee, water, sandwiches and cakes out to the dining tables. All females who are invited to the halls are expected to help hostess for an hour; fair enough, but far easier towards the beginning of the evening. (One of our group had the 6-7am time slot.) The 46 squads visit throughout the night, performing skits and dances based on local politics, culture, and gossip. The skits are quite clever. Costumes include everything from fuzzy animals to old people masks to robots. The squads have worked for a year on perfecting their skits and costumes, and it's their night. After their skits, the squads announce a Highland Dance. Here's where I'm glad I took dancing lessons a few weeks ago; it's far more fun being able to join in for the madness. Then they sip soup and grab a quick sandwich, and their time is up, and the squad piles into a bus and goes to their next hall.

We made it til about 6am. Zain was feeling really tired, and Matt and I probably would have pushed it (and regretted it!) had he not wanted to go home. I was proud of us though - a load of time on our feet, dancing and being silly. And we made it home with one bottle of wine - which means we had 5 between 3 of us over the course of 12 hours. That's also impressive.

The next day they did it all over again; the Jarl hosted a 'hop'. Are you kidding me?! Matt and I napped for a few hours and couldn't feel our faces until sometime mid-Thursday. I haven't pulled an all-nighter in years, and now I remember why. Kudos to the Shetlanders who party far harder than I could ever imagine.

Then, it was Thursday, then Friday, when our friends gave us a great send-off. And now I'm in Inverness. I've already heard admirable comments from local Inverness folk who have also survived Up Helly Aa. More to come from this charming city, but as for now, bask in the glow of fire and Vikings and ritual and tradition.

'Naethin ever cam frae Scotland/But dear meal an' greedy ministers.' - Shetland expression

Images from our weekend in Northmavine, the northern part of mainland Shetland. We stayed at the tiny white croft house on the right side of this photo. It was a lovely weekend of eating, drams, chat, and attempting to stay upright in 60+ mph winds whilst hiking.






Happy Up Helly Aa! We've seen the galley and heard the pipes. The parade is at 7 and the party starts at 9, and ends at 8am. Have a wee dram and think of the Jarl.

"On life's vast ocean diversely we sail, Reason the card, but passion is the gale." - Alexander Pope

January 24th, or the day before Burns Night, or the day before our friend Zain comes to visit. Shetland has been ornery this week. Spats of rain and wind, then a few blissful hours of sunshine, then a temporary deep-freeze, then more wind, then blue, blue sky, then clouds. Today was the weirdest yet - walked ta da toon, sunshine. While at lunch, rain. Walking to butchers, sun again. Back out and these pebble-shaped snowflakes (not heavy enough to be hail) pelleted us, then in another shop and out, sunshine again. Then rain. Then more pebbly-snowflakes that covered the road, which is where we are now. There's no choice when it's sunny - you take what you can get and get your ass outside to play before it changes its mind. Monday morning we awoke to snow - or Shetland snow, which is a light dusting of similar consistency to powdered sugar, and thick, invisible ice that throws down WWF-style. And it lasted all of about 30 minutes.
The seals were out in full force that day. They let me get to within about five meters before they started barking. The drama queen of the lot began flapping her body around and pushing other seals with her face, but they all preferred to be lazy in the sunshine. I'll miss these guys.
The Clickiman Broch, below, is one of the many on Shetland and is not even two blocks from my house. I've never been. Brochs are unique to Shetland (*LIE! The Tourist Board thinks so...but apparently they're also on various other Scottish islands...thanks JDS) and were built and rebuilt from the Iron Age onward. This one was inhabited from 1000 BC to AD 500 and was restored in the 1950s. Thirty or so people would live in the area, working the peaty land around it. The view would have been amazing from the top of the broch onward towards Bressay and the North Sea.
It's been a good writing week. I had a chat with my agent last week and am now reworking 30K words to create a completely new book. I have to be finished by the end of February, so that's given me incentive to do between 3K and 5K a day, and I have sorted out a new ending. This part is exciting, seeing where the story is going to take me. Our mate Zain is working on a book too, so poor Matt will have to deal with our pretense all weekend as we sip tea with our pinky-fingers sticking out and frown and say things like, "Extraordinary dialogue" and "Magnificent imagery". We're staying in a wee croft house in the middle of nowhere with a peat fire and a kitchen - should be extraordinary, magnificent.

Next Tuesday is Up Helly Aa, the Daddy of all viking fire festivals, and the men are getting hairier by the day. Seriously. Their beards are creepy. Then four more days and we move. I'm so, so excited to have a place of our own (without hairy, shedding roommates who cook ready-made curry for every meal that stink up the apartment and take three 35-minute showers PER DAY) and to have the space to set up (gasp!) a desk to write on and sit on (choke!) a sofa that isn't vinyl (my butt has permanently scarred the sofas in our living room, as it's the only place to sit and write all day). This place is second-to-worst on my scale of Hellacious Living Quarters, the worst being a windowless room in a dark apartment in Lisbon where I shared with a psychotic Portuguese woman who would paw through my things when I wasn't there and thought she was psychic. Obviously she wasn't - I moved out one day without telling her and she freaked out when she got home and I was nearly finished. I digress.
Expecting gales again this weekend, so should be an interesting stay in the croft. They've even cancelled the ferry service until Sunday. (Here, that means no food at the supermarket, no newspapers, no mail either.) For more interesting small-town island news, check out the daily Shetland News.
Happy Burns Night, and go get a beer on Tuesday in honor of Up Helly Aa.

'piss up' indeed

The Scalloway Fire Festival. What it was: A gathering of randoms along a street in Scalloway, Shetland. All lights in the town went out. In the distance, the sound of a drum, the lilting sound of bagpipes, a chorus of yelps and hollers. Then the heat of a hundred long torches, held by men and women clad in everything from elaborate Viking costumes (below) to pink fuzzy skirts to policewomen to traditional kilts.
The randoms followed the lighted mass along Main Street to Da Waterfront, where each torch added to the lit boat structure, or galley.
And once everyone had a go, the boat was gently pushed onto the water. Pretty amazing event, and this apparently ain't nothing compared to the Lerwick Up Helly Aa.

New rumors about this tradition: The various squads, often a group of people who share a profession, make up skits and dances and songs to perform on the day. Once they've learned their part, the dress rehearsal happens. (This was yesterday for most squads.) The squad gets together in the morning, spends an hour getting drunk, then performs their entire sketch drunk - just to see if they can do it. This continues again and again until everyone can perform it perfectly whilst intoxicated.

We had a busy weekend. Spent Saturday cooking a massive Mexican fiesta for friends before heading oot to da middle a nowher for a party. (Ask me sometime about pushing Matt's car up an icy hill when we took a wrong turn.) One of the nurses at the hospital has this party annually and invites the whole hospital, though it was mainly nurses who turned up. Val and John are in their early 60s and have a wonderful house on the water - an old croft house with a beautiful extension that is the nicest home I've seen here. John is a small man with a white beard and spent the first two hours dancing and singing along to country music - he used to be a truck driver - and I tried to teach him how to two-step and line dance. Such a laugh to hear this music in this very uncommon location. Matt took his pipes and the inebriated nurses decided to trip all over themselves attempting to Riverdance. Or something. The party was to celebrate the Shetland New Year, always on 12 January, according to the Julien calendar. So at midnight, everyone toasted as Val fed everyone amazing soups, meats, cheeses, and breads. Once you're in with these folk, you're in; everyone was wonderful to us on Saturday night.

More fire...very cool!

"One guy asked me the other day, 'What is it you call the fire festival?' I said simply, 'An excuse for a piss-up'." - guy on the street in Lerwick

It's January 11 and the day of the Scalloway Fire Festival. It's the kick-off event of the Viking Appreciation Festivals which run through March each year. Learning about these events is similar to trying to get your head around the US university Greek system, the Masons, and the Junior League, and perhaps a smattering of Opus Dei, at the same time. Some of the events are exclusive, some welcome everyone. Some don't allow women to participate, some do. I'm still confused about the Lerwick Up Helly Aa on the 29th, as apparently we have tickets but can't tell anyone we have tickets because we're not supposed to get tickets, as 'foreigners'. So don't tell anybody. Each event has a Jarl who is like the grand poobah, and in Lerwick this honor costs 40,000 GBP - !! The Jarl then chooses his squad and they get drunk, spend the day meandering the town visiting schools, rest homes, government offices, etc. and basically rabble-rouse until the official parade begins. It's all quite hush-hush and I'm keen to steal more information as we get closer to the Lerwick event.

Tonight's festivities include a Jarl squad parade and a 'burning of the galley' - whatever a 'galley' is. I'll know in a few hours.

Matt and I went back to the mainland for New Year and got back to Shetland on Sunday. It was nice being somewhere that had daylight after 3pm. Our flight arrived early, so we went to St. Ninians Isle for a short walk while we still had daylight. It's a cool place as the Atlantic shore is on both sides of the sand. The island itself is grassy and flat, and often splashed by huge waves. Pretty amazing place.

Every other day has been nice this week - by nice, I mean 7 degrees and sunshine. This is the Clickiman broch (a Shetland dwelling from 1000 years ago) by a loch not even 10m from the sea. Our flat is just to the right and down the road.
It's strange thinking we're almost done with our time here. The lack of stimulation means more creativity is needed, and perhaps that's how these books have been completed. I'm working on a new one now, and it's writing itself. Must be something in the air.

Happy new year to everyone. May '08 be the year it all happens!

"Do you honestly think Jesus would carry a gun and vote Republican?"- bumper sticker, Wichita

Christmas at the Pedrojas, December 18.

2:31am, 24 December. Room 223, I think, eight hours into the 12 it will take us to get back to Lerwick. The sea is thrashing us back and forth, my handbag is sliding towards the door, then back, Matt is snoring in the bunk across the narrow room. I’m listening to the Indigo Girls for the first time since the autumn of 2001 and on the verge of crying. It’s been a weird week of miniature epiphanies and minor setbacks but I’m finally heading back to an island nearer to the North Pole than to Kansas where the sun will be scraping the land for few invaluable hours a day.

This is the first time I’ve not been ready to leave Wichita ever. Ever. I’ve never held a deep connection to my hometown; I spent my youth plotting my breakout, dreaming huge, wishing circumstances had clashed to spit me out of a more exotic locale, such as Los Angeles or New York City, or even Kansas City. And as the story goes, fifteen years later, I become as cliche as millions before me who find themselves with uncomfortable affection to a place they once despised. There are decent galleries; more eclectic cafes than Starbucks locations (thank god); restaurants from places as far-fletched as Nepal, southern Chile, Sweden; theater and film events to rival those of any other city; a promising number of people with “Make the scary Republican go away!” and “Do you honestly think Jesus would carry a gun and vote Republican?” affixed to their rear bumpers. Of their cars, of course. This is, after all, America.
Somewhere in the past two weeks, the shift of frustration has melted with some deep sense of pride for how this city is evolving. It’s chilled-out; its pace resembles that of Portland or Vancouver. People eat out, a lot, in groups, sharing laughs. The American dream of home ownership is attainable. People here travel, because they can afford to spend their two weeks abroad. They dress well and drive nice cars and their homes are immaculate - money goes far here. And the skies are huge, the sunsets glowing in sherbet oranges and reds and yellows.
These realizations took a long time to simmer - it’s easy to point out the ridiculous nature of America and overlook the more immediate self-transformation. Idiots still loom everywhere, edging closer to ruining everything, but the balance is beginning to shift; inspiration for a better planet is everywhere - often subtle, perhaps ill-received, but well-intentioned.

Above, Christmas Eve in Shetland, just before sunset.

I went to dinner with friends I’ve known my whole life. We’re all in our 30s, and are beginning to settle into the lives we’ve created for ourselves. Our stories include divorce, offspring, deaths, heartbreak, cancer, love. Gathered around that table, attempting to stomach insane portions of food, was a group of people far more committed to each other, to their families, to their lifestyles, than to their jobs. This is rare, to be in the company of eleven people who have a clear sense of priority. Work was mentioned as anecdote, not lifestyle. No one moaned about their jobs. Indeed, everyone is in their proper place. Rob has cut down his teaching days to paint; Pete has shelved his camera and dove into his job as a counselor at our old high school; Val shifted her career in social work to a less mentally taxing job; Alex is making a mint selling cars; Justin is a talented contractor. All are with partners who share their passions. Spending the evening with a group of people so content was refreshing. There is much to be said about the balance these people have achieved.

And there is much to be said about not conquering the world, about reveling in where you are, not losing sight of the future but enjoying the now.

Does this make me middle-aged? Yikes. So I got on a plane, traveled halfway round the world and escaped. Only this time it didn’t feel like escaping.

Lodge on the Loch, Aboyne, 22 December.

Matt organized a spa day (bless him!). Musings while receiving a wonderful massage included:

• Five days clad in the same pair of jeans doth not an attractive woman make. Thanks, Air France, for finding my second bag and finally delivering them both five days later with only one visible breakage issue.
• Going through my 2000+ CDs in my parents’ basement was cathartic; rediscovering the songs I had shelved for years had me remembering how far I’ve come as a music consumer, not unrelated to the germination of a personality.
• I’m on the cusp of figuring out my identity as an author, and am in love with the new book I am piecing together, my second attempt of a story that hasn’t bubbled around in the corners of my brain for a few years. This one is working. That feels good.

Christmas Eve in Shetland, 2:20pm. Sunset.

Today, Christmas in Shetland, where Santa plays the fiddle and arrives on a pony. Maybe. Matt's at work, and it's already weird to be alone with the BBC Breakfast show on Christmas Day. It's also Matt's birthday, so I am attempting a cake to take to him later. The light is beginning to wash the land in a strange purplish light, and I'll get out later to wander. But for now, happy holidays from Shetland.

Finishing a book is just like you took a child out in the back yard and shot it. - Truman Capote

This is what the sky looked like this morning when I went on a walk. I was intending to say goodbye to the seals, but none were out as the water was rough and jumpy, and the waves nearly reached the sidewalk. Shetland behaved today; sunshine all day and a nice breeze coming through our tiny windows. I heard the seagulls outside today, and the toll of nearby church bells, both of which I block out on a daily basis. It will be weird going back to Kansas, the polar opposite of the island life.

Saturday was spent Christmas shopping and watching a heartbreaking Scotland v. Italy football match. It was a Euro 2008 playoff game, and Scotland played well, especially against a team of diving cheats. (It always shocks me to see that a normal bump sends the ragazzi sprawling onto the field, grabbing their whatever, rolling around, wailing, embarrassing themselves). One would think that referee school would include special clinics on how to officiate a match involving the Italian football team. I adore all things Italy but the cheating and chaos that surrounds their 'national sport' needs to be controlled and the refs need to learn to not fall for their vomito. Pardon the rant.

Yesterday we went to Hillswick in the northern part of the island to the St. Magnus Hotel. It's a fabulous Norwegian design, and the wood was shipped on steam boats from Norway. Every Sunday they do a 'carvery', which at the St. Magnus means an all-you-can-eat feast of Shetland lamb and Scottish pork, ham and beef, veggies, potatoes, and Yorkshire pudding. I'm not a massive meat lover, but Shetland lamb is gorgeous. The locals say it's got something to do with the heather and the seaweed, and the fact that the sheep and lamb here are allowed to roam free and hang out wherever they wish. That and that the animals here are treated like royalty. The flavor and velvety texture are amazing. We arrived at 2:30 and by the time we left at 4, it was pitch-black. There's nothing like being in the middle of nowhere in the dark to really feel secluded.

I chose this title because I am having a tough time putting the recent book to rest. The new one is plodding along but I am forcing it a bit. A day of flying will be good for it. I love flying - the time alone, just you and a selection of horrible Hollywood blockbusters and a stack of chick magazines. Below, this morning's sunshine in a sepia - fun with iPhoto.

Storm force 10 northwesterly winds will gradually ease to force 7 or gale force 8 overnight.

Focus has been difficult today. Locals kept talking about 'da stoorm' and now it's here. They say it's a 10 on the 'gale-force winds' scale - 12 is a hurricane - and since about 5 this morning our cement building has been pelted with branches, random objects from the construction site next door, plastic trash bins, and this odd rain/sleet/hail/snow mixture that is whirling around in circles, desperate to turn into a mini-tornado. Cars in the parking lot are dancing on their tires. Light poles are belly-dancing. The TV says gusts hit 93 mph today. Now I'm a Kansas girl and I know my wind, but this is beyond anything I've ever seen. The one tornado I've been in wasn't this loud.

The noise is a constant, low drone, spiced up every few seconds by a thumping/whirring, similar to a gigantic pinwheel. A higher-pitched huff joins in when it so desires. This along with the arbitrary smack of a gust against the building and the whistling through the tiny space between the window and its sill. These winds are in harmony; the pitches are in thirds. I've never thought wind to be melody.

I went outside earlier and attempted to video the sea. I've never seen water flow out from the shore before. It resembled a white leopard, waves in reverse, powering out to sea. The air was so fresh, with the faint scent of salt. Five minutes outside and I felt like I'd just had a facial. (There's an idea, Shetland Beauty Tours.)

No wonder there are no trees on the island.

Get rid of the stuff that's not working. Just pare it down until it's a beautiful thing you can hand in, probably late, to your editor. -Kurt Loder

Daylight Savings Time, whatever. It's still dark at 4pm. When you've only got a few hours of daylight to play with, and these hours are becoming fewer and fewer, you have to take advantage. Matt and I went up to Unst and Yell last weekend. It's less than 2 hours, including ferrys, to get up to Saxa Vord in the north of Unst. On a map, it looks ages away, and frankly feels worlds away. Saxa Vord is an old RAF base that is currently being renovated into a holiday resort and will be a really cool place to be in the 'simmer dim' summertime, when the light lasts until the wee hours of the morning. We met some charming locals up there (including a woman from Florida, of all places) and got a taste of how remote it is, as fewer than 900 people live on the island. Lerwick feels like Manhattan after this place.

On Saturday we headed to the Hermaness nature reserve, which is home to numerous birds, including puffins. Above is the peaty marsh that we slogged through trying to hike to the lighthouse. There is something incredible about standing at the edge of Britain, staring at the water, when the only thing out there is the North Pole. Many signs point to "Britain's Most Northerly..." (church, lighthouse, sheep, etc.) To live here would take a special sort of self-sufficiency, as well as the tough skin to deal with everybody knowing your business all the time. Imagine being 2 hours from the nearest bank, or supermarket, or coffee shop, and living at the mercy of the ferry schedules. I admire those who live this sort of life. The wind howls at a pitch I've never heard before. But the sky goes on forever. Below was the view back to the car through the peaty marsh. Pretty amazing.

We drove all the roads in Unst and got the ferry down to Yell, stopping at what is probably Britain's Most Northerly Coffee Shop, the Wind Dog. It's a great little place with internet access, sandwiches, and a small but well-stocked lending library. I love these sorts of places, which are all around Shetland, these one-stop shops that are the saving grace for weary travellers in dire need of a caffeine fix. Below are "Da Twelve Shetland Apostles": Artist, Howdie, Preacher, Poacher, Crofter, Knitter, Boatman, Banjoman, Roadman, Smuggler, Birdman, Whaler. There's Shetland heritage on one wall.

Ponies, ponies. They're weird little things. I'm not one for small things - those mini bananas, or baby corn, or anything that's smaller than usual. It's probably due to my own fear of things smaller than me, which there ain't much of in this here world. The ponies are quite friendly, and as soon as they see a human they immediately come over to say hello. Our cleaner raises them, and she and some of the other pony farmers pay a horse whisperer to come once a month from the mainland. Apparently these ponies are intelligent little guys, and are inquisitive because they feel superior to humans. Hmm.

On that note. Here's Matt with the typical Shetland Bin. Yep, that's Shetland English on the sign. Matt loves it as it's close to the dialect from Deeside, where he's from. I like it because I've had to deal with the dialect from Deeside, so it's not been too difficult for me to understand when it's spoken. Shetland was given to Britain as a dowry, essentially, from Norway, so it's not surprising that they use so many Old Norse terms.

Matt and Caroline and I went into town for a cup of coffee this afternoon. I'm feeling nostalgia for this place already. I leave for the US on the 19th and won't be back til Christmas; after that, 3 weeks in January (including the Up Helly Aa Viking fire festival!) and we're gone. I admit that this place has worked wonders for my writing. I'm now in a groove that might not have been possible in a place with distractions, such as bookshops or nice weather. Or things like a social life.

The second novel goes to my agent later this week. I have a couple of phone interviews with people this week, then the finishing touches and it's ready. Various lawyers, estate agents, tourism boards, and friends have been so kind to help with this book. I wonder if all works of fiction are the result of many, not just one.

"Start on page three." - Kurt Vonnegut

I like to call this Matt's First Pumpkin-Carving Experience. Note the dual faces. Yes, that is a bagpiper on one side and a funny face on the other. Happy Halloween y'all.

Shetland has been cooperating since we got back. Mornings are bitterly cold, bearable when clad in snowboarding gear, but beautiful. The North Sea has a seductive sheen in the mornings, glistening from the sun, calm after an evening of chaotic flow. A few mornings ago, I shared some rocks with six beached seals. Some were spotted, others brown, others gray, and all were fascinated with me. They didn't talk, but stared - their black eyes are mesmerizing. Perhaps it's the Kansas girl in me, but there is something magical about seeing seals in their habitat. And birds, and jackrabbits, and all the other animals that live every day somewhere. In Shetland, though, people exist with nature. There is talk of the whales someone spotted, the sick seal who washed up on shore down south. It's a healthy respect for living alongside the creatures who were here first. That said, there are no paper or plastic recycling facilities on the islands. Paper is burned for fuel. Plastic is tossed away with everything else. This is frustrating, even as a temporary resident.

We went south for a walk along the coast the other day. Scotland has a fab law that allows trespassing. Those who walk the peaty fields must respect the path and the animals, but have no limits as to where they go. This black-faced sheep followed Matt, then backed into the corner and stared at me. I figured he wanted to be immortalized.

I like this photo (above) because it shows the sense of how it looks here. This is around 50 meters from the coast (below). It really does feel like wilderness when you're the only two people for miles. It's always weird to think that this island is in the same country that claims London.

I fell in love with the sea when I moved to Seattle in 1996. Kansas is a two-day drive from any sort of coast. I had always found solace in the Colorado mountains, skiing down a piste or hiking or rafting. I never really understood the allure of the sea. Of course I didn't - I'd only been to southern California and to the busier Florida beaches. The ocean meant bikinis and surfing. Then I found a spot in Ballard, near Ray's Boathouse - this tiny park with swings that look out over Puget Sound and the Olympic Peninsula. That became my spot. A lot happened in my three years in Seattle, and that spot was a place of healing in many ways. The sea became sacred.

The endless faces of water fascinates me. The stillness, the chaos, the anger, the resilience, it's all overwhelming. The Shetland sea is a chameleon. Some days, the waves swell a hundred meters from the coast, push and push and thrash the rocks with fury. Other days, tiny ripples lap at the shore. Sometimes the swells are light, splashing on to the shore enough to hit the sidewalks. Seals like to body surf in these waves. I like going out to see what kind of sea is visiting that day, that moment.

I finished the first round of edits earlier today. I am, as ever, disgusted with some of the crap that came out of my brain. That said, some of it is okay. My guinea pigs have spared the barbarous slagging that the first novel received (and deserved!), so perhaps I've learned something already. The next phase is to re-read without stopping or editing, making notes on a separate piece of paper, checking things like consistency and characterization. I'm also doing NaNoWriMo with a story idea that's been kicking around in my head for awhile. We'll see how it goes. I've never just started a novel without having years of notes to rifle through to find a compelling story.

Editing is tough; you end up cutting things of beauty. And the unnecessary. Hemingway wrote an amazing short story: "For sale. Baby shoes. Never worn."

It's never too late - in fiction or in life - to revise. - Nancy Thayer

Let me start this with a shout-out to Bitwrathploob whom I sadly missed at the rugby last weekend. Sigh. Maybe one day our paths will cross again. Come to Shetland!

Matt's schedule this week is 4-11pm, so we've got the days to play. Today it was too rainy to cycle, so we drove south instead and found ourselves at Jarlshof, a fabulous archaeological site at the southern tip of Shetland. There is something quite moving about wandering around ruins dated back over 3000 years. It consists of layers upon layers of stone dwellings, most of which were hidden by turf until the late 1800s, when a violent storm ripped the turf away from the coast. It's a fascinating place, especially the 'wheelhouses', which divided the homes into rooms while supporting the turf above. Archaeologists think this place may have been a stopping point for passing Viking ships en route to Greenland, Norway, the Faroes and the UK. The place is drenched with stories, and wandering through the immaculately preserved ruins twists perspective on its head. Some of these buildings were used for 400 years, others for 1000. We toss figures like this around, and don't ever think of the lives this included - that's generations who lived in the same house, shared the same life.

The sun decided to come out in the early evening, so I took a walk. It is difficult to explain the peacefulness of Shetland at dusk. The hills gracefully float atop the sea, the clouds flirting with the sun and the hilltops. Bursts of sunlight shine in sporadic places on the hills, and the sea stretches out forever, to a horizon brightened by faraway blue sky beyond. The wind tonight came in gentle gusts, beckoning rather than shunning. For a brief moment, it was the most beautiful place on the planet.

I turned a corner at the top of a hill and saw a crowd (read: 10 people) gathered at a stone wall, staring at the sea. We've got an oil platform coming to town. Two large tugboats pulled a rig into the harbor, and this is Big News. As I walked back to the flat, I noticed more and more people sitting at the shoreline, watching the rig slowly slide through the sound. Oil is a big thing around here. Apparently BP wanted to drill, and Shetland got itself 1/3 of the profits before they allowed BP to consider the project. This island could easily be self-sustaining, with the windmills, the oil, and the sea. Tough characters here.

Website of the week: No Catch, a Shetland company dealing in sustainable seafood. I've had the cod and it's delicious. Book of the week: Kevin MacNeil's The Stornoway Way. One of the best Scottish novels I've ever read. It gives a glimpse of island life that is painfully honest - he got into a load of trouble with the locals (though he is from there) after it came out. He includes explanations of Gaelic words and expressions as footnotes, which are as amusing as the book itself.

Am now midway through the re-read of my first draft and, again, I am appalled by some of the things that came out of my fingers. Grammatical errors! Inconsistent characterization! But I've not thrown Sven across the room yet, and am still thinking about this story all the damn time, so I suppose it is salvageable.

I keep waiting for the Northern Lights...

The process of rewriting is enjoyable, because you're not in that existential panic when you don't have a novel at all. - Rose Tremain

This is central Lerwick in the sunshine. It's a pretty place. The weather lately has been crazy, sunshine in the mornings that leads into horrible rains for half an hour and back into sun, briefly, then the winds start. I've had a few beautiful early-morning walks along the shoreline this week before the rains and winds kicked in. This weather is good for me, actually. It's toughening me up.

So I finished the second novel on Tuesday afternoon. In writer-speak, that means it's got an ending. I've always had a problem trying to edit as I write, and this time I didn't, I just got on with it and got to the end. I wrote a short story in 2002 that I always wanted to evolve into a novel, and initially I had a completely different take on the story. I've changed it considerably from these early notes. This was the novel I was working on when I did the Radio Scotland Write Here Right Now event last February, which challenged participants to write a novel in a month, writing 1000 words a day. But most of what I wrote then has been tossed to the winds and reworked already. Now the re-writing begins, and this could take months. I had a goal of finishing this week, and to get it done two days early was fantastic. Now the goal is to have it ready to send to my agent before I go to America in November.

Late September is always special to me, because it's my birthday and I take an 'inventory' of where I am and where I want to go in the next year. Many things to think about this year. I'm looking forward to this weekend - real shopping! Real supermarkets! Real restaurants! We're taking the ferry to Aberdeen tonight (watching that carbon footprint after flying so much in the past few years) and driving down to Edinburgh tomorrow night in time for the Ireland-France match. Sunday we go to the Scotland-New Zealand match at Murrayfield. I've always wanted to see the All-Blacks live so really looking forward to that. And to being back in civilization!

Below, the bowling green. See? It is a pretty place in the sunshine.

The book everybody likes hasn't yet been written. - Kevin MacNeil

I am still buzzed from the weekend. Shetland hosted a film and book festival (called Screenplay and Wordplay respectively) which was fantastic. On Saturday I got to participate in an excellent workshop with Kevin MacNeil. MacNeil has written every genre and type of book/play/poem out there, and has a keen eye for detail and using all 5 senses to transport the reader deep into the story. He had everyone in the room write a 400-word Flash Fiction piece, using one of the following perimeters: a) A dream you remember; b) The last time you thought, 'wow'; c) Your first ever memory. He gave us about 40 minutes to write, and less than half turned up for the second part of the workshop. The outcome was interesting, as the group was filled with people from every walk of life imaginable on this small island, from fishermen to doctors to teachers to elderly ladies who publish poems in the local newspaper. The stories were all of a similar vein, however, and dealt with memories, not dreams. Perhaps dreams are too private to share, or too difficult to translate into words. I read mine first; my voice wavering and my hands shaking. I don't like reading aloud, not my work, not to strangers. It feels like an intrusion.

In a place as small as Shetland, it's easy to truly feel the vibe of greatness oozing from people like Iain Banks and Denise Mina and Kevin MacNeil. I saw many readings in this two-day event, and each author took the time to answer questions both in front of the group and afterward. I've been to numerous book festivals where the authors are cattle-prodded through reading and signing and reading and signing, and Shetland was refreshingly void of all pretense. The authors all stayed in the hotel next to our flat, and I was even invited to a drinking sesh last night with the heavyweights (which I respectfully declined, knowing my knees were shaking enough when meeting Iain Banks let alone having a beer with him. I would spill it on his shoes.).

It's weird being star-struck by writers who are keen to know about your own quest for your writing voice. In America, I often felt that other writers were more concerned about the competitive nature of publishing and marketing than of nurturing the writers within. And festivals are often so huge that they feel contrived. This was a good weekend for me, to be around writers who are keen to hear about the successes and pitfalls of those of us new to this animal. I had some great conversations with people who have made this scribbling their careers, and all of them were positive, encouraging, and eager to help with contacts in the UK should I stay here long-term.

Saturday night we were all invited to a ceilidh (kay-lee for y'all non-Gaelic speakers) in the south of the island. The hospital pharmacist and his wife told all the junior docs and medical students (and, by default, me) to come down for the dance and to crash at their charming croft house by the sea. We were less than half the age of most of the attendees, and once they were used to us, they welcomed us with open arms and feet. The band played traditional ceilidh music, with fiddle, guitar, accordion and drums, and the number of dances filled an A4 piece of paper. Of course we joined in - and once the regulars knew that we were all pathetic, they were kind enough to guide us all through it. All in all a fantastic evening of traditional Shetland music and dancing.

Weekends like this are why I was so excited to move here.

fore-shadow, flash-back

Things I Am Learning In Shetland
1) Makeup is unnecessary. Mascara will end up dripping down your cheeks, as the rain falls sideways here and directly into your face. Lip gloss is a nightmare as the wind blows your hair onto your lips and your hair is gooey for the rest of the day. Sunscreen is unnecessary because there is no sun.
2) It's cold and it's wet. The rain just hits out of the blue – no sprinkles, no threatening clouds, just rain rain rain that attacks from all angles and stops as quickly as it began. All-weather packing is a necessity each time you leave the house. There was a time when I would complain about this weather, but that's silly in a place like this, where the weather is as much a part of the people as their music or the land or the sea. I'm toughening up.
3) Umbrellas are futile. I brought my strongest (read: most expensive) umbrella to the supermarket on Sunday and I hadn't taken 3 steps out the door and the damn thing was upside down and broken. I have used my waterproof jacket more in three weeks in Shetland than in two years of owning it. Hoods are the new black.
4) For some reason, I brought skirts. I am not sure why – possibly because I thought I'd dress up at some point, but Shetlanders are logical folk. Dressed up is trousers and a nice sweater. I like this. And now that it's September I don't mind wearing my boots and coats. Somehow it just didn't feel right in August.

On to other things. The New Novel (working title: Sangria) is rocking right along at 40,000 words. I am not kidding myself though, as 30,000 of the aforementioned words are crap. It's going, though, and I am finding myself in the zone when five or six hours go by without my knowledge. I am having difficulty weaving the backstory into the text, as flashbacks usually don't work, and readers hate them. However, they are integral to this story, so I'm doing it anyway and hoping it doesn't explode.

Sangria takes place in Lisbon. I'm engrossed in reliving my time there. My memories of Lisbon have become a mix of people and light and noise and smells and intensity. The city is a central character in the book, and I hope I am doing it justice by allowing it to transform the other characters.

I'm getting kicked off the library computer now. It's taken longer to get internet installed in Shetland than in any other country I've lived in. Grr.

"One always begins to forgive a place as soon as it's left behind." - Charles Dickens

Teachers tend to think of 'years' as 'school years' - i.e. August to June, or something similar. And for those of us who have gone from school to uni to teaching are even more confused. Some people do their inventories of their lives in December, and start again in January. Teachers tend to start again in September. Needless to say it's been a strange week, as TASIS people are beginning their orientation, friends in the US and Europe are beginning their classes, and I'm in Shetland trying to salvage nearly 79,000 words that make up "The Goddess of Woo." I feel like an imposter, and like I am skipping something that I should be doing. Parties are going on all over the place and I'm not there.

Do I miss TASIS? I'm not sure yet. There is a part of me that is yearning to be back where I was a year ago, anxious and eager and excited, but perhaps that is the forgiveness part kicking in.

My 'due' date of Sunday is comfortable, now. Rewriting is hell, though. I thought I had a good story three years ago when I sent off the first 50 pages. Then tweaking, then more tweaking, then more. I look back at past incarnations and am embarrassed by the inconsistencies, the lack of gutsy characterization, the cliche, and wonder if I will look back at the current state of the manuscript and be embarrassed of its many flaws. Every time I read it, I find something else I want to change. I wasn't ready for this type of frustration. I can't imagine my arrogance when I was younger and actually thought of a piece as 'finished.'

Dreams are a funny thing. I'm living it now and not sure what to do with myself.

The sun has visited us a few times this week. I am to the point of understanding 90% of the Shetland dialect now. I have no access to cash as my bank card won't work in Shetland machines. We're still waiting for internet at the flat. I have a new friend, Caroline, who is from Perth and is lovely and allows me to drag her to the gym with me as my translator for the other 10%. Life is slower here. Everyone takes the time to talk with me. The genuine curiosity and kindness of the locals is such an unexpected bonus of being here. Orcas have been spotted outside our apartment. (In the water, of course.) The Tourist Info center sends out text messages whenever orcas or porpoises are spotted off the coast. They also send the weather report plus sunrise and sunset time every morning. Fiddle music is everywhere, in the shops in the centre, in the library, in the pubs. Twice a week, local musicians bring their fiddles and accordions and mandolins and bongos to a place called The Lounge for impromptu and disorganized jam sessions – we went last week and it was great. I've spotted my first American tourists this week - tons of them, speaking very loudly, dressed in tennis shoes, shorts and huge college-logo sweatshirts, sporting huge fanny packs/bum bags protruding from their oversized bottoms - but bless them, at least they have passports. I am also addicted to television – it's the first time I've had more than 2 channels to watch (in English!) in over six years! And much to my mother's pleasure, I am loving the cooking and property shows. I'm middle-aged already.

I look at a blank Word document and think: Fill this empty space with your dreams. Here we go. I am still scared to death.

This is the glorious Eshaness, a simply magnificent coastal walk that we did on Saturday. It is easy to imagine how rough the seas can be thrashing against this jagged coastline. We walked for a few hours and saw two other people and a few dozen sheep, along with gorgeous birds. No otter or seal sightings yet, though. Driving around Northmavine exposed us to more of this interesting place. My Rough Guide describes the villages in the area as 'settlements' and that is indeed correct - some of the settlements are four or five buildings clustered together, making enough of an impact on the landscape to justify their own mark on the map. After driving along the interior, we came upon Hillswick, one of these settlements, which has a wonderful vegetarian cafe at a place called Da Bod, which is housed in Shetland's oldest pub. It's a cozy spot, and we were shocked to see that they don't charge for anything in the restaurant - all they ask for is a donation to the wildlife sanctuary. Very cool, very progressive idea for a tiny settlement in the islands.
And yesterday's sad discovery that nothing, save the newsagents', is open for a coffee on a Sunday afternoon. Sigh. I need to stop living in places that close on Sundays.
I'm also including this lovely photograph to prove how damn cold it was for Saturday's walk. Though this appropriate clothing thing helped significantly. It's August, people.

Memory is not abstract, it is made of bits and pieces, sometimes called junk. These are your materials, the things you begin with. You take them to another place. Writing is your imagination's rescue work. - paraphrasing from Julia Casterton's Creative Writing: A Practical Guide - very interesting take on fiction and poetry from a high-art perspective of what writing, in its purest form, should be.