Finding Solace in the Cairngorms
In the summer of 2019 I went backpacking with two close friends in Scotland. This was a very turbulent time in my life and my personal journey, perhaps the lowest period of my life. I felt at a loss with how to deal with certain family relationships without compromising myself.
We set out to walk the West Highland Way (highly recommend), and I ended up earning some gnarly blisters along the way, so our plans changed and we went for a lil break in Cairngorms National Forest.
To get to the forest, we took a bus from Fort Williams to Inverness, where we toured around for a day or two before contuing on our journey. In Inverness, on a rainy day, we walked into a small, old church, just to sightsee. At the entrance there was a sweet, old man who handed out little booklets called “How to Pray”.
My friends and I joked about this, “three jews walk into a church…”. But secretly, I felt comforted and intruiged by the booklet and tucked it into my bag.
On our first full day in the Caringorms, after we settled into our awesome hostel (there was a mushroom foraging group that took over the kitchen, they were big, awesome, nature nerds), we set out on separate paths. My friends had gone went on a big mountain trek in the sleeting rain, and I went in search of the Eileen Donnan Castle (turned out I was in the wrong location, but I made it to both versions).
This ended up becoming a solo, twenty-five kilometer walk in the forest, almost entirely in nonstop rain. It was quiet. Cold. Refreshing. Beautiful.
On this walk I pulled out the “How to Pray” booklet for the first, and maybe only, time. I don’t recall exactly what it stated. I remember it was very simple, basically - have a conversation with God or whatever entity works for you. So I tried, and I practiced, and I felt more at peace with what was weighing down on me in a long time, by sharing it out loud in the forest, trusting that something out there is listening and has only benevolent intentions for me.
The trust, support, beauty, and peace I gained from this day was a turning point for me. I was truly desperate for something to help me with a situation that I felt I had already tried everything in and just couldn’t “win”. I felt exhausted, fried, and in search of relief. Nature had always been a comfortable, exciting place for me. But this - this connected me to nature as altar, as guardian, and I never felt more at home.
