When despair grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
— Wendell Berry, The Peace of Wild Things
Our time in Scotland began with a flight from Dublin to Edinburgh at 7:30 p.m. We cobbled together a dinner at the airport before we left (okay, if I'm being honest, I wasn't feeling particularly healthy that day and mostly ate Wotsits and Kinder Buenos). The city bus was easy to catch, though I wasn't really overjoyed by my first impression of Edinburgh: the route from the nearest stop to the hostel was completely uphill, and by the end, I thought my calves were going to give out.
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