Boy must be delighted. He might be able to actually use that umbrella he bought...
Henry's was nearly empty when I arrived an hour or so ago, but it's been filling up. The table to my right has a couple nibbling on pastries and chatting in a thick accent I can barely understand. An old man in a navy rain jacket sits in the corner and waits for his wife to bring him coffee. The patio is filling up with intrepid Scots who aren't bothered in the least by the impending deluge.
Writing has been nearly impossible for me, as of late. It's unbelievably frustrating, but I suppose it's just part of life, right now. Part of a life that feels familiar but so very peculiar at the same time.
When I travel alone, I stay in the same place for a long time. So long that I don't have to worry about where I'm going to stay next. I'm not used to constantly searching for new places to surf. I spend... an hour... two hours? on couchsurfing every day. Sending out requests, reading rejections, trying not to take anything too personally. Researching bus routes, buying tickets, trying not to worry too much about money. Half of my life seems to be on the actual road and the other half seems to be figuring out how to get on the road again.
Another unforeseen difficulty is how late Europeans stay up in comparison to old people like Boy and me. My bedtime is usually ten or ten thirty pm. This enables me to wake up and feel moderately well rested by about five or six am. However, in Europe, it seems like midnight - one am is the norm. Boy and I are happy -- thrilled, even -- to stay up and spend time with our hosts, but our mornings have disappeared.
I don't function well without mornings. Morning is my sacred space. Morning is when my heart and hands and mind feel the most connected and writing comes so easily. but when I don't fall asleep until one in the morning, morning is boggy. Morning is like a swamp. All my thoughts are stuck in sleepy sludge so thick that not even epic amounts of caffeine can set them free.
Boy and I took the bus to Kim's last... what was it... a week and a half ago?
I hate falling this far behind... this is a sign that something isn't working. When I don't feel free or present enough to write for a week and a half.
Bus from Bristol to Cardiff.
Quiet coffee in Cardiff.
I can't believe that just happened... I can't believe that I was someone's negative experience on couchsurfing. I don't know how to handle this.
Bus from Cardiff to Swansea.
Quiet picnic in Swansea.
What if she leaves me a negative reference? What if she leaves a reference that says, "Aimee and Troy are nice people, but they are not respectful. They had loud sex in the room upstairs and treated our home like a hostel." And with the new couchsurfing reference system, I can't even see what she writes about me until I write a reference for her. So I can't respond to what she says. Gosh. Complications of couchsurfing as a couple -- any noise must sound like you're having TOO good of a time...
Bus from Swansea to Haverfordwest.
Boy left to explore the city and Girl sat with her thoughts.
That experience took all my energy... it just... drained me. Drained me of enthusiasm, of desire to meet new people, of optimism. Made me want to settle down in my own little place where I know that I can relax in my space.
Bus from Haverfordwest to Newport.
We disembarked, exhausted from a full day of travel and fretting, but thrilled to have finally reached our destination.
"Hello!" Kim met us at the station. Which was directly in front of a pub. "You must be Troy," she greeted Boy and then gave me a hug. "Can I get you a drink?"
"That sounds great," I smiled.
I love this person. Every time I'm around her, I feel so at ease. She has this easy-going, generous demeanor that makes me feel at home as if her home is the little place I dream about having someday.
Boy drank a wine, I drank a cider, and we settled into the gorgeous Welsh pub with dark wooden benches and old floors full of character and a warming atmosphere of friendliness.
Kim's husband, Phil, drove us to their new home in Felindre Farchog at about ten pm. Boy opened a bottle of wine and we chatted until late in the night (late for Boy and I, anyways). Then Boy and I fell asleep in Kim's guest room and I felt a bit of that depleted energy being restored.
Thank god for people like Kim. People who help me feel like this way of life is possible. Not only possible, but wonderful.
The next day, we set about hiking Pembrokeshire's "mountain" that Kim and I had hiked when I'd visited in 2013. However, when we got to the halfway point, this is all we were able to see --
"The view is usually beautiful," Kim said. "It's a pity the weather is so bad."
This is magical. Mist blowing through the grasses. Silhouettes of wild white ponies barely visible in the distance. I feel like we're walking through a cloud.
It's been kind of funny to hear people apologizing about the weather.
One reason we came to Great Britain was so that Boy could escape the horribly hot summer of Grand Junction. We want mist. We want clouds. We want wind. We get three hundred days of sun a year in Grand Junction -- this soft weather is heaven.
We scurried back down the "mountain" and returned to Newport. Where we wandered. As one does in Wales. One walks slowly, sits for a while, and then walks slowly again.
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| These flowers are everywhere in Wales, it seems. I think they look like cotton candy. |
"This is exactly what I needed," I told Kim. "Boy loves big cities, but I need nature. I need quiet. I need this kind of beautiful."
This is how I slow down. With views like these.
Back at Kim's, she prepared us a Pimm's. Apparently, this is one of Great Britain's most popular drinks, but even though I've spent months in England, I've never had it before.
Pimm's is a liqueur made of gin and herbs. It's served with sparkling lemonade, strawberries, cucumbers and mint.
It's such a big deal that it has its own pitcher. And cutlery, which is used to stab the strawberries.
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| How Boy looks at any drink that isn't wine. |
Kim had work the next day, so Boy and I lingered too long at a cafe, had a picnic with a view, walked, and sat on every bench we could find.
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| Biggest dandelions I've ever seen. |
We also had a grand time trying to pronounce the names of houses in Newport.
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| Newport's church |
Phil is a chef at the Golden Lion, so one would think that his garden at home would be full of vegetables and herbs. But one would be ever so incorrect to think this. Phil uses his garden to plant the most beautiful flowers.
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| Some of Phil's hanging pots. |
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| Kim's new dog, Willow |
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| View of Carningli, |
Kim took us to the location of an old castle. Where there is no actual castle, but a magnificent chair that more than compensated for the lack of castle.
We said goodbye to Kim and Phil on Monday morning. I promised (again) that I would come back and stay with her during my someday walk of the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path.
There are few things I want more in life than to just walk. To be in nature, to walk, to sit. To be quiet. To listen. To breathe clean, fresh air like this.
Despite our best efforts on couchsurfing, Boy and I couldn't manage to secure a place to stay in Aberystwyth (although I've written it so many times that now I know how to spell and pronounce it. Which is a feat in and of itself), so we scheduled ourselves a long layover in this idyllic town in north Wales.
Goodbye, Wales. Whenever I visit you, I'm captured by the beauty of your landscapes, by the friendliness of your people and by the way you encourage me to move. So slowly. So appreciatively. So simply.
I'll keep coming back to you. Again and again and again. There is so much for me to learn here.
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