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| first time seeing Edinburgh Castle |
I have been to Scotland three times in my life. The first time when I was 18 and a senior in high school. We took a picture with a big rock at the Scottish/English border then went to Edinburgh for one night and I took a picture with that little dog statue.
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| sunset over the University of Glasgow |
The second time I was 21, a junior in college, and on any given day I swung from mildy depressed yet functional to couldn't-get-out-of-bed severely depressed. The daylight situation during winter in Scotland is NOT an enriching environment for those who have a fickle relationship with serotonin. The sun rose around 9am and sank again a little after 3pm and I learned that I can never go that far north during the winter ever again. It's soul crushing. It was hard to make close friends and the friendships that I did have were fickle (and I just realized I used fickle twice in one paragraph but don't feel like changing it- that's how being 21 is: fickle fickle fickle). It was a blur of a semester and I was happy for it to end so I could be free to roam Europe how I pleased.
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| the station was so tiny I had to wave the train down or it wouldn't stop here |
The third time I was 22 and almost three months into my post-college eastern Europe trip. I made a "detour" to Scotland to meet up with two close friends that I made in Slovakia the summer before. We rented a car and drove around the North Coast 500 and hiked to bothys, abandoned sheepherder cabins that are communally upkept by those who visit. I then spent a week with different friends in their cozy house in the Highlands, doing nothing but drinking, reading, and relaxing after three months of hostels.
I like Scotland more and more each time I go, and have gone further north each time too. But Scotland isn't the one that's changed over my visits, it's me. The more I love myself the more capacity I have for loving other places. It's a good thing to realize.