photo by kind courtesy of: http://www.anquet.co.uk/Scottish-Lowlands-and-Borders.htm
My unconscious re-connection with Buddhism and the monastic life I'd led in Asia many centuries ago, began in Scotland in 1969 in a remote village called Eskdalemuir.
My (then) Economist boyfriend had rebelled against the mainstream world and taken a job working for the British Forestry Commission in the wilds of Dumfriesshire. He had been immediately posted to a hamlet called Castle O'er, some miles south of Eskdalemuir, about 20 road miles east of Lockerbie - truly in the middle of nowhere and in the back of beyond. In my youthful exuberance, I supported his venture by going to Scotland with him, to make sure he was well fed and watered, so that he could endure his strenuous outdoor occupation.
Located in the Scottish Lowlands, the hilly terrain offered many a grand hike in the crisp fall air. Now part of the Eskdale Prehistoric Trail, the Castle O'er hillfort was once the home of a tribe that used its prominent position to watch for invading enemies and to keep an eye on their animals. At first I found the area and its inhabitants, both past and present, refreshingly quaint. But try as I might, I never could decipher the meaning of their words, spoken in a lyrical Scottish tongue.
press here for an example of Dumfriesshire dialect
Also, because I was just 21 years young at the time, and had always lived in or near a large metropolis, I had simply not been able to anticipate the effects of the experience I was about to encounter. Isolated, miles from another soul, I had precious few neighbours, and thus little company for days at a time. Also, there were no shops of any kind, save the ubiquitous village post office. My overriding challenge was to prove mainly psychological in nature.
"WHITEYETT"
A yett is the local Scottish name for a natural pass between mountains.
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| All Whiteyett photos shown here by kind courtesy of it present-day owner |
Our home had been built from sturdy local stone, and was handily located within 20 feet of a gurgling trout stream that was a tributary of the White Esk River.
In 18th Century that stream had very likely provided both sparkling mountain water and fresh river trout for the house's original inhabitants.
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| view of Whiteyett from the south-west; the River Esk meanders north and south between the trees and Whiteyett's east wall |
A simple but sturdy wooden staircase connected the two main downstairs rooms to the two upstairs bedrooms.
During 19th century, a small wing had been added to the north side of the house, giving it space for a kitchen, a bathroom (literally a room with a bath in it - and nothing more) and a separate toilet.
The kitchen and bathroom windows each overlooked the stream, yet none
of these extra rooms were heated in any way at all. So our ablutions
were, perforce, short and very efficient exercises.
When we'd first arrived at the cottage, the kitchen was completely empty, sporting only a large pitted stone sink and a worn wooden draining board, beneath the window overlooking the picturesque river.
The tap water was plentiful and deliciously cool and clear, but there were no laundry facilities, no fridge, no stove and no cupboards, just a rickety empty shelf that ran along the only contiguous wall.
SPREAD YOUR TINY WINGS
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| view of Whiteyett from the south-east corner of the property; a country bench now overlooks the rive |
The tap water was plentiful and deliciously cool and clear, but there were no laundry facilities, no fridge, no stove and no cupboards, just a rickety empty shelf that ran along the only contiguous wall.
SPREAD YOUR TINY WINGS
At that time, there was no bus service from my area to any kind of shopping area. So the family in the farm nearest to us suggested that I hitch a ride to Langholm with the school bus in the mornings, if I wanted to do some real shopping. But there was a catch. Although I'd leave before 8am, I'd have to remain in town till the school bus returned to this area in the afternoon. Just for the experience, never having ridden in a dedicated 'school bus', I joined the children on that 20 mile ride to Langholm one morning.
The bus collected each family's children from the farms along the way, and was 3/4 full by the time it reached the driveway of Whiteyett. The children were bright, cheerful and well-mannered, and also provided the musical entertainment, singing their favourite songs, learned in entirety from the radio. You haven't lived till you've heard Anne Murray's "Snowbird" enthusiastically delivered in a broad Scottish brogue. "sprade yer tainy wheengs ant flay ah whey".
The bus collected each family's children from the farms along the way, and was 3/4 full by the time it reached the driveway of Whiteyett. The children were bright, cheerful and well-mannered, and also provided the musical entertainment, singing their favourite songs, learned in entirety from the radio. You haven't lived till you've heard Anne Murray's "Snowbird" enthusiastically delivered in a broad Scottish brogue. "sprade yer tainy wheengs ant flay ah whey".
I doubt I'll ever fully recover from that bus trip!
press here to listen to Anne Murray singing "Snowbird"
A SCOTTISH AUCTION
Other helpful neighbours informed me about an auction in Dumfries that would provide all the furniture we'd need for our abode, and even drove me to it, within a week of our arrival. Since the Scottish Auction was reputed to be an adventure unto itself, I was glad for the opportunity to experience it.
The auction itself followed interesting rules. Instead of bidding the price up from an initial low bid, the auctioneer would simply reveal the asking price for each item to the people assembled there. Each bidder would then decide whether or not to pay that price. If there were no bidders, the auctioneer would lower the asking price until someone in the room decided that he or she could not live without that particular item.
In this way, I was able to furnish our bedroom, kitchen and living room for just under twenty Scottish pounds (about $65 in 1969). I procured 2 beds, 2 chairs, one enormous, thick pile living room rug, a splendid mahogany sideboard, a working fridge and a Bendix washing machine. Though the washer had been certified "in good working order", it was lacking the bolts, not to mention the expertise, necessary to fasten it to the kitchen floor!
I had even acquired a second, battered, old sideboard with a solid granite surface, which functioned as an island in my kitchen giving me both much needed counter space and increased storage room for my pots, pans and baking items inside my warm kitchen instead of the chilly larder behind the stairs. That granite counter eventually got a good workout, since I was a keen baker in my youth, regularly turning out hearty meat pies for supper as well as home-made scones and the occasional iced chocolate cake. With a natural cold room, facing north, I was able to store cooked items for longer than inside a refrigerator.
OLD NED
Our closest neighbour, Ned, was an elderly retired shepherd who lived in a small abode at the entrance to our long driveway. Ned still maintained a small herd of sheep, in a field adjoining our property. But his ungulates were no respecters of fences and regularly visited our cottage whenever I was cooking. Starved for animal company, I welcomed their curiosity and found myself chatting happily with a few friendly ewes until the day their ram decided he didn't approve of that behaviour - or of ME. Or maybe he'd approved of me a bit too much? I was not going to wait around to find out which scenario was true! So, on several occasions while I was returning from a walk, Ned's ram would chase me right down my long driveway and straight into Whiteyett. I suppose that's one way to warm up in winter.
Ned would stroll down the drive to our cottage now and then for supper or dessert, after which he'd regale us with tales of his childhood in the lowlands of Scotland. Much as I tried to do more, I only managed to understand the gist of what he was saying. The musical lilt of Ned's dialect was hypnotic to me, and I found myself listening to his stories as if it were a classical symphony.
I think the old man must have been grateful that someone, other than the locals, was willing to listen to him because he soon presented us with a home-made lamp as a housewarming gift, to comfort our spirits and light up our evenings. It was a lovely, thoughtful gift that added much needed ambience to that dark cottage as winter approached! Old Ned, as he was known locally, was a veritible mine of information about local affairs. So when he discovered we needed a stove, he told us about seeing a discarded full size electric cooker (stove) in a small disused dwelling on a neighbouring lot.
Without a vehicle, it took my boyfriend, Old Ned and me most of the morning to bodily haul the old Jackson cooking range back to our cottage. It was an ancient model, and I feared the worst. But, I was happily rewarded when, after several hours of elbow grease and brillo pads, that cooker, which I'd previously assumed was black and useless, was transformed into a bright white stove whose wiring was still quite serviceable. Yeah!!
One small step for womankind, one giant leap for joy at the thought of hot food!
TWO UNHAPPY GHOSTS
Even after the purchase of our comfortable beds and mattresses at the auction, my boyfriend and I experienced several nights of disturbed sleep because of noisy hauntings on the staircase. Sensing the former inhabitants of Whiteyett were displeased by our intrusion into "their" home, I made it my business to telepathically communicate with them.
There were two main ghosts, one man and one woman, both of them elderly and, mercifully, not inclined to be mischievous. Instead they would show disapproval by bumping walls or when disturbed, by producing sudden cold spots, that could instantly chill you to the bone in an otherwise warm room.
Despite our remote location, I felt no fear of our disembodied landlords. On the contrary, our cat and I began telepathic negotiations to appease them. And when they learned that we were to be only temporary occupants, the two elderly residents graciously allowed that my boyfriend and I might remain!
Our furniture and we thus lived only the eastern part of this old stone home, leaving the west wing rooms for their original owners. From then on, save the odd wispy apparition and occasional nightly creaking on the staircase, we saw and heard no more of our (g)hosts.
Most of my days were spent alone, since my boyfriend left for his work at first light and did not return until after dark. His job was to prune existing trees and hand-clear weedy shrubs from the steep local slopes in readiness for new tree-plantings the following spring. 40 years later, the hills around Castle O'er are now majestically wooded with fully grown pine trees that obscure some of the view but provide a much needed windbreak for the homes in that area of Scotland.
Before leaving each morning, my boyfriend would set and light the living room coal fire, which would warm up our portion of the house, rising through the ceiling to the bedroom above. What a treat it was to awaken in a warm, cosy bedroom after a chilly night, during which the lower portion of our outer bedding would often freeze, and frost would etch wonderful patterns onto the inside of our window.
STAYING WARM
The living room fire that warmed our home also warmed the water that I used to hand-wash our laundry and all of our clothes. Everything we owned had to be washed by hand, including bedding, towels and thick woolen socks. Though we had a clothes line on our extensive front "lawn" I soon discovered that drying hand-washed items in that chilly climate was a quite a challenge.
The first set of sheets I'd set out to dry froze stiff within an hour! Too stiff to be bent, I'd lifted them from the line and brought them into the living room to dry . I then placed these tent-shaped sheets before the fire. But as they warmed, they collapsed into a damp pile on my floor and had to be washed all over again. The second time around, I dried these sheets over chairs and other furniture in front of my living room fireplace.
Oh the joys of country life!
THE DEMENTED BENDIX
I had tried to use the working Bendix washing machine that I purchased for less than a Scottish pound at that reverse auction. But I'd discovered too late that the confounded contraption needed to be bolted to the concrete floor. Not only were the bolts, themselves, missing, but nobody local could, or would, perform this simple feat of engineering for me. Consequently, my first attempt at automated laundry had ended in disaster.
All had gone well until the spin cycle began, at which time the demented machine rapidly lurched across my kitchen floor, pinning me against the bathroom wall when I'd stupidly tried to arrest its progress. Although I managed to pull the plug from the wall, before being crushed by the heavy machine and its full load of washing, I was thoroughly stuck, totally unable to extricate myself. And there I remained, for several long hours, trapped by modern technology, till my boyfriend returned from work to rescue me. This he did quickly, but not quietly, indulging himself in a raucous belly laugh at my expense. I, however, was not amused! Needless to say, he made his own supper that night!
NOT SO SPEEDY DELIVERIES
The pace of life in this part of Scotland was slow and very different from the bustling city life I had left. behind me in London. As is the way with Scottish place names, the name of the place describes its location. Eskdalemuir thus meant "the moor (muir) in the valley (dale) of the River Esk". And, in the Autumn, before the now lush forest was planted, a wicked, biting north wind blew all the way through that broad valley and directly into the bones of the unwary. Though I had not been aware of it before arriving there, I soon learned why Eskdalemuir is renowned for being the coldest spot in Britain during the winter!
There was no town centre in this hamlet, nor any food shops in the area, nor a hardware store, nor even a cosy country library in which to browse away the hours. The Internet was several decades away from being mainstream, and the area had no television reception. So we were well and truly, in the middle of nowhere, without a vehicle of any kind between us. And yet, we did not lack resources.
Every Wednesday, a van carrying grocery supplies would visit each property in our neck of the woods. The arrival of this van was a welcome sight in our valley. And it was also magical to behold, much like an Arabian tent, much larger on the inside than it seemed on the outside!
Every square inch of the van's interior was devoted to shelving, angled slightly downwards to the sides, to prevent the goods from sliding or scattering when the van was in motion. A narrow central aisle led from the back entrance to the front of the van, behind the driver's seat, and on each side were stored all the provisions you could name from canned fish and meats, to bottled fruits and jams, kitchen implements, biscuits and condiments. Large sacks of potatoes, grains, flour and oats plus glass bottles of fresh milk were also readily available, but the van carried no fresh animal protein. We had to acquire eggs and meat in town, on a schoolday, or depend on the generosity of our any neighbours who kept livestock.
Once a month, the library van would deliver a new crop of books, along with magazine and newspapers telling of local, community and world events. And on alternate Thursdays, a hardware van would arrive, much to the delight of the few males who populated the area.
NEIGHBOURS
Our nearest neighbour, beyond Old Ned, was half a mile up the road, which discouraged one from borrowing a "cup of sugar" - especially as winter approached. Instead I taught myself how to keep careful lists of our household items so that we would never run short. And slowly, I learned when to replace everything, from sacks of potatoes to packaged laundry soap to skeins of grey wool for the knitted pull on caps I made for to warm my boyfriend's balding head under his hard hat. It was the only way we could survive and thrive in that wilderness.
SECTION 2 Chapter 2 A Tibetan Monastery in Scotland Continuing my escalating escapades in Eskdalemuir
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