Day 51 has seen 8 miles walked but also a new milestone reached. 400 likes!! That is fantastic news so a huge thank you to all those who have been beating the drum for me and encouraging friends and family to join the journey. If you can think of anyone else who might enjoy the journey or might even find some hope, comfort or inspiration from my journey do please let them know about the challenge.
I had a cracking nights sleep last night. A straight 7 hours of sleep. It was amazing and should have been bounding out of bed for the day. I was meeting Allie who had volunteered to come with me for a couple of walks up by Aberfoyle. The best bit was that she was driving as the bus plan involved an enforced 60 minute wait in a bus stop by Blair Drummond. So I had lots to look forward to. I forgot to mention in my post yesterday how I decided to seize the opportunity to challenge the brain to function more efficiently as part of my building the capability in the left side of the brain as a back up generator plan by trying to learn a new organ tune more complicated than the last. In order to have any success at such a mad cap scheme I believe that I would need to focus my efforts on the brain when it is feeling at it’s weakest. Yesterday I used the Piano when I returned home after the cricket pavilion work party and went over this particular phrase in the organ tune that I was struggling to get in to my head, time and time and time and time and time and time again. The children were being particularly patient but I ground away at the problem and eventually got it. It felt so good to have got the Cogs working and to have done it. I circumvented the bit of the brain that was refusing to function and just by being a stubborn, you know what, managed to get the brain to find another way to read and understand the music and get the hands to perform it. It took a long time but I got there in the end.
So today with the fuzziness from Saturday’s seizure still lingering in the lips and the heavy head like the morning after the morning after I was pleased to have a couple of short walks planned and a friend to come and escort me.
It was a pleasant little bimble up Doon Hill enjoying the atmospherics of the mist clinging to the forest trees as little faery houses popped up in tree trunks along the route. Neither Allie or I believed in Faeries particularly, except for the tooth Faery, but the eerie silence in such a secluded, lonely forest environment, the mist drifting through the trees, seemed to lend credence to the local tale of the kidnapping of the Reverend Robert Kirk by the faeries for shedding light on their secret world through his book. I believe photographs of their houses is okay but I cannot tell you where they are!!
Once back in Aberfoyle safe from kidnapping I suggested to Allie that we stop for a picnic by the river before the next walk. The look of shock and relief on Allie’s face was a picture but merely reflected by my face when Allie pulled out a waterproof picnic rug from her day sack; Allie had just carried it all the way around Doon Hill! Now I understand where the nickname Mary Poppins comes from! I was flabbergasted but also hugely thankful to be spared a wet bum.
Lunch eaten we set off for the second walk around the Lochan Spling. All was going well until the map and the ground failed to correlate with each other and the route we were planning to take. Left with a 50/50 decision we took one particular road that was going in the right direction, just through a dank forest that was straight out of the set of a Pirates of the Caribbean tropical island scene. The air was mild, the mist hung menacingly so the entire atmosphere was one of a tropical rainforest. As we plodded on we had a long conversation about which would be the correct onomatopoeic word (I spent most of the conversation practicing how to say it!) for the rather interesting feelings and noises emanating from under our feet. Squelch was the winner as we made our soggy way through the tangle of decaying wood and trap door like booby-traps hidden under layers of mattress thick emerald green moss. The effects of my veggie pick and mix bag were starting to brew uncomfortably in the stomach and with no bus lane within which to conceal both noise and smell I found a sudden desire to go and reconnoitre additional possible routes through the tangled webb in which we found ourselves. From the blushes of sweet Allie I am guessing that the gurgling of the stream and squelching of the ground under foot was not enough to conceal my real reasons for the recce. Onwards we adventured certain on our location and direction but having to find our own route as we leapt gracefully as a deer backwards and forwards over the stream searching for a safe route. It took a while but all the effort was worth it as we hit the track that took us down to the Lochan Spling. The water was looking inviting and certainly Georgie was quickly in for a dip. There were a number of sculptures along the Lochan as we walked alongside it which brought to both our minds the quote from Isaiah verse 40 that I carry in my back pocket and often bring forth in my mind to steel me for the fight as I feel a seizure trying to bite. ‘ I shall believe in the Lord to renew my strength; I shall mount up with wings as Eagles; I shall run like a deer and not be weary; I shall walk the long path and not faint.’
Earlier as I tried to eat a tea of sardines in tomato sauce, mashed up with parsley on toast, I suddenly felt very peculiar – almost as if a Dementor of Harry Potter fame had passed over me and sucked out some of my strength or will or soul; I don’t quite know what happened but the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. I felt cold and suddenly felt odd, as if I had lost something and struggled to speak and was seeing oddly again. The immediate sensations passed quite quickly but then as I started writing this post a low tremor started pulsating throughout the body and my hands have started shaking. I know that to beat this I have to push it away with determined effort. I don’t want the Ivy coming back. So I keep writing, proof reading and re-writing, sentence by sentence by sentence to keep focused until it is done.
I have had a great day seeing 8 miles walked with a good friend and no kidnappings by faeries and despite the fuzziness and slight moment earlier can report no seizures. Please have a pleasant evening.