The Maiden Journey
A Dutch duo, a few Germans, a Spaniard, and allied Americans.
And so, these wandering destinies took onto their grand adventure - into the bustling town with a verdant garden, an opulent church, a museum of wonders. The river Tay bubbling-a-way, the chariots buzzing by, the train chugging through, did we walk and enjoy the city of Perth.
This departure, one longed for due to the aforementioned quarantine, gave invigorating breaths of fresh Scottish air, cool as they breezed through bronchi. The morning walk to the bus stop felt preconceived, as if the prior weeks of strife were had all for that day. Really, that quarantine is what gave such freshness to the day’s journey – gratefulness is owed, in some way.
The riverside walk, featuring centuries-old brick buildings, gave perfect background to the destinies’ conversation. Simple laughs of minute conversations are something to treasure. It’s important not to hoard them, however. As such, here on this page will not be a list of every laugh or guffaw, as they are best left drifting in the breeze where they are created.
Echoes of hymns danced around the church, practice hour for a choir member. With their belting tones the destinies walked and embraced stories embalmed in stain glass. Stories of fallen warriors, recounts of historical records, all filtering the midday sun into prospective red, green, and blues. A wooden Christ hangs high below an archway, it’s veneer glistening in a sun-golden ray.
Censers hang, glowing in that same gold, waiting to spread olfactic prayer to the hall. Another Christ, the one captured, gilded beside a Roman and Mary guards several rows of pews. Piano now accompanies the practicing choir member; a harmonic rhythm develops between the two. Ascendant high notes soar through the church, filling the space as if a palpable fluid.
The destinies depart, in pursuit of the museum. Inside contains local histories of the land. Bronze-age relics and their recreations while they sit peacefully behind plexiglass. Sculptures of local thinkers stare stoically at blank walls, a few stare at paintings hanging across the way. A grand serpent fills an entire room, warning the destinies of pursuits unbecoming of them.
Stuffed animals and pricked insects adorn the halls of a nearby exhibit. Geese, those same green-shimmering mallards, look as passerby read the accompanying info blurbs. Death looking onto his subjects while he waits for their coming. Most of the destinies filter through quickly, waiting on a lone straggler as he takes his time.
They circumnavigate vast oceans of green gulf, following the bubbling away Tay. Journey-goers, clubs in bags over their shoulders, tell stories of frustration and success as they play. Leagues of little ones run at each other, scrumming until out of breath.
A bridge leads to a garden trail. Hedges of flowers and manicured bushes guides the destinies, red and orange dots the trees as a warning sign for the coming fall. Bright yellows and purples in patches of lilacs and tulips line the sides of a stream. It follows a path underneath a small, cobblestone, bridge. The stone-lapping stream fills the bridge’s cracks with lichen. Weeping trees intermittently break up the garden’s bright monotony. Refreshing melancholia to balance the humors.
They break at the stone-stopped mouth of the tay. Dunes of light and liquid form as the water rushes over the rocks stopping the stream. Smooth, as if by a sculptor’s touch, these humps seem like a constant, despite the infinity of changing water that rushes over them.
The destinies return to their maiden stop. While traveling an hour of quiet descends on them – the sky, draining of its sun, tucks in the plains with a sheet of radiant gold.
I look at my fellow destinies and appreciate the characters this journey has been casted. Brandon and Marten – the Dutch Duo, Philip and Sebastian – the few Germans, Ben and I as the allied Americans. Finally, Berta as the scheming Spaniard, who planned this whole day.
The juiciest moment of the whole day, however, was in the moments of silence on the way back. Berta and Brandon laughing, Marten resting (Big Tiff, as we call him), and the rest of us partaking in our own individual sonderings. A bus window seems to suck the soul out of the rider, forcing us to look at the world as a round, revolving, marble rather than a static plane for our journeys.
Just before we returned the last moments of light descended on our home. Fog sat still in the bowl of a riverside mountain, as if it were a grandchild to the ancient glaciers which carved it. The two combined to wash the entirety of Dundee in this gray-gold-glow. Smooth, yet warm and comforting.
