Seasons on Harris

by David Yeadon

  “Miserable,” muttered Anne.

  “But beautiful…in a dramatic kind of way,” I suggested.

  Silence. A familiar stalemate of perceptions.

  “It’s scary…the whole moor seems alive with…,” said Anne, leaving me to fill in the blanks.

  “Creatures! Monsters! Things emerging—ancient things—from all this black gloop…”

  More silence, broken by the intermittent whine of the wipers.

  And then, around a tight bend and down a steep incline, came life in a more recognizable form. A man. White-haired and ramrod-erect in the wet, moving among a huddle of boats in various stages of disrepair. Behind him a corrugated metal hut was set in a hollow overlooking a tight, rock-bound inlet—a fjord in miniature—with more boats floating against rough-hewn piers. Compared to the empty desolation of the Bays coastline, this place reeked of activity, purpose, and passion. We had found our boatman-author surrounded by his creations. He watched as I pulled the car off the narrow road. I recognized him immediately from Adam’s description in Sea Room: “He stood four-square, legs apart and shoulders back, resting a hand on the gunwale. His long gray hair was brushed back from his temples. He wore a small gray moustache and looked me straight in the eye: a straight, calm, evaluating look…”

  But with a welcoming smile too.

  “Ah—you must be David…and Anne.”

  “Yes, indeed we are. Hope we’re not interrupting your day…”

  John chuckled. “On this kind of day, interruptions are most welcome!”

  The rain, of course, intensified as soon as we stepped out of the car. We all moved to the cozy, dry shelter of his hut. A boat in the process of construction filled much of the cramped space.

  “Looks a bit like the boat Adam described. The one you built for him.”

  “Ah, yes—the birlinn type. A good boat, that one. Not your ordinary kind of tub like this one. I’m working on it for a friend. Not much of a craft, but by the time I’m finished with it…” John laughed and left the sentence dangling. I explained that ever since I’d read Adam’s description of John’s work on his own sixteen-foot-long boat, I’d wanted to meet its creator.

  John smiled. “Well, now you have…” And then added quietly, “That book of his has led to quite a few…occurrences.”

  “What—like a host of wannabe sailors demanding replicas?!”

  “Aye, well, a bit o’ that too.” John grinned. “But no—much stranger…let’s go in the house for tea and I’ll tell you quite a story.”

  I liked this man already and so did Anne. She was smiling that special kind of smile she saves for individuals in whom she senses straightforward honesty, integrity—and humor.

  “You keep a very neat workshop here,” Anne said. “Everything organized and close at hand.”

  John grinned sheepishly. “I can’t work any other way.”

  Anne was right. The hut, despite its sparse architectural charms, was meticulously organized with all the various boat-building tools arrayed by type and size along the walls above the workbenches. Mallets, saws, chisels, drills, grinders, hammers, and countless other collections of woodworking and metal-working devices were displayed with exhibition-level meticulousness. A dust-coated radio crackled erratically in the corner by the rain-etched window at the rear of the hut.

  John noticed my glance and apologized for the noise. “Yeah, I know. ’S’time I got a new one. Aerial’s gone…or something.”

  I smiled. At least there was one imperfection in this tiny haven of organized creativity. Something he had not yet mastered. Unlike the rest of his life, which, according to others on the island, reflected his Renaissance-man capacities for historical research into the island’s Viking heritage (“I’ve got Norse blood in me, I guess,” he told us later; “MacAulay is the Gaelic equivalent of that very common Scandinavian surname, Olafson”), fishing and sailing, writing, bagpipe and violin playing, poetry, boat building and restoration, and—as we were soon to learn—a new and unfamiliar role, as a father!

  “Yes, it was Adam’s book that altered my whole life. Not just because of its popularity but…well, let me see to y’tea first…”

  We had moved from the hut (a sudden cacophonous downpour on the metal roof made conversation virtually impossible) into the warm intimacy of his home across the road.

  The place had all the thick, stone-built durability of a typical Hebridean black house, and the neatness of the living room, with its cozy fire, reflected John’s meticulous, everything-in-its-correct-place sense of order.

  “Can y’manage a wee bit of cake too?” he asked.

  “Absolutely!” said Anne as we settled into the armchairs by the glowing peats.

  He was back in no time with a full tray, teapot steaming and plates with sliced cake and cookies. One never said no to such hospitality and, as was the custom, one always tried to empty the plates in gratitude for the host or hostess’s generosity. The only challenge was, as we had learned much earlier on, to pace ourselves.

  John didn’t seem ready to tell his tale yet, so the conversation rambled and we let him do most of the talking.

  First it was about boats. “I work maybe on six or so a year, on average. The birlinn is one of my favorites. Not much bigger than a large rowboat but, at sixteen, eighteen feet, she’s more like a small, sturdy ship—integral keel from bow to stern giving you stability, yet it’s still a light craft for its size. Nice narrow bow, good for rowing and direction—she slides through the water—but a wider middle to reduce roll and pitch.”

  Looking outside the rain-streaked window, I pointed to one of his boats set proudly on blocks outside his workshop. “That’s far bigger than Adam’s boat.”

  John laughed. “Ah, yes, well, that’s my private project. Three years in the making. Thirty-eight feet and solid oak. It’s a replica of Joshua Slocum’s Sea Spray. It’s for myself—a sort of retirement fantasy. I’ve no plans of following Joshua’s explorations but…well, some nice extended cruising would be a great pleasure to me in my dotage. ’Course that’s assumin’I ever get any dotage. I’ve just started a boat-building class at the school in Tarbert. Always wanted to try that. I’ve got half a dozen really keen students at the moment and it’s hard work—but a lot of fun. My feelin’ is if I can help even just one of these lads stay on-island and build boats rather than movin’ off, it’ll all be worthwhile.”

  Then the conversation switched to fishing boats and the depleted fishing industry in general. “If I had my way,” said John with almost religious fervor (we learned later that he was a highly respected elder at his Leverburgh church), “I think the whole of the west coast of Scotland should be closed off and kept as a fish-nursery area for at least ten years. The Minch particularly. It’s getting completely fished out. We should just allow creels and long lines—no more major commercial fishing until the stocks revive.”

  “And scallops. Would you include those?” I asked.

  “Of course. Cut out the dredging. It wrecks the breeding grounds at the bottom and you end up with piles of broken scallops—no good for eating. Dive scallops are the best. The ones who’re doing it on-island make a good living at it, but they have to be careful and not too greedy. It’s not just the depth you dive, it’s also the amount of time you’re underwater. Regardless of depth. I know about that firsthand. I used to do it—along with many other crazy things: crofting, working in the Glasgow shipyards, boat chartering. A lot of lives in a single life!”

  “And talking about single…are you?” I asked, wondering when we’d hear the story of his unexpected fatherhood.

  “Oh, right! Yes—I was goin’ to tell you…right. Well, as I said, it’s all Adam’s fault. Here was I, living a pleasant sort of bachelor-type existence, minding my own business, building my boats and whatnot. And then, talk about coincidences. Someone—a young lady—very recently was reading through Adam’s Sea Room on the ferry from Tarbert to Uig and suddenly realized that this boat builder described in his book
might just be her own father. I wasn’t even aware of her existence, of course. I didn’t even know she was on this Earth. Her mother had never told her—or me—who the father was. She only said sometime last year that I was a boat builder from Lewis. Now her mother lives there and my new thirty-five-year-old daughter lives there too, with her own family in Point of Lewis. It also turns out I’ve got three grandchildren!”

  John MacAulay—Boat Builder

  John paused, obviously still beguiled by his new discoveries. “Ah—but look now, I’m getting ahead of m’self! So—she was reading Adam’s book and she knew there weren’t too many boat builders left on the island today and realized that it may be me that’s her father. So when she was back on-island she decided she’d come down by herself, not knowing, of course, what to expect or what kind of welcome she was going to get or anything. And she arrived out of the blue and well…it was just great! Love at first sight! Straightaway I could see myself and my family in her. Very much so. Now that’s about three months ago and we all spent this Christmas together and we’re the best of friends now. But I did call Adam to tell him the story—and I also told him not to write any more books! It’s sad, of course, that I missed out on all the younger years of the grandkids—but well, at least we’ve found each other now and we speak several times a week. And I’m even friends again with her mother. So that was a really nice coincidence…it’s all been quite hectic. Wonderfully hectic. Not just with my newfound family but everyone they’re connected with too.”

  Anne loved the story. “You’re so…lucky!” she said, laughing.

  “Yes, yes, I am. Still can’t quite believe it.”

  “Of course that’s what some say about your seal-folk book…,” I said, a rather tactless segue of mine back to the primary reason for our visit.

  “What?” asked John, a little surprised.

  “Well—that they seem to have problems believing some of your stories…”

  John laughed and nodded. “Oh aye, that’s understandable, I suppose. We’re a hard-nosed Presbyterian bunch on this island. Some people get a little nervous…well…y’know…about the more mythical, mysterious aspects of our culture. To them it can seem like a return to…I don’t know…pagan elements, fairies…waterhorses…the Blue Men of The Minch…the Sruth na Fir Ghorm…all that stuff the church doesn’t like. ‘Long nights in the black house’ legends and the fishermen’s tales. But y’know, when you’ve spent your life in boats out on the water, there are always things happening. Strange things. I’ve got a lot of respect for The Minch and its stories. When I was young I spent deep time out in the fishing boats around the islands and boy!—could those old salties come out with their ‘trawler tales.’ Sitting together around the cooking stove when it’s black and stormy, you’d hear things that you remember forever. Mysteries that last. Of course, they were very superstitious, these fishermen. The tales were taboo except when they were all together…and from what they told me, they hauled up some pretty strange…creatures…in their nets.”

  “Creatures!? What kind of creatures?” I asked, trying to put flesh on the skeletal bones of John’s mysteries.

  “Did you ever see any of these ‘creatures’…did anything in particular happen to you that made these mysteries real?” Anne asked.

  John chuckled. “Och, no, not really…I’d love to give you a true ‘I was there’ tale, but honestly, I don’t think I can. My book was not so much about making the myths even more mysterious, but rather trying to research them and explain how the seal-folk legends could actually be based on historical fact.”

  “But one of the blurb quotes on the back of your book says that you ‘reopen one of the most fascinating puzzles of Scottish maritime history and leave us with as many questions as answers and the mystery surrounding the seal-folk of legend remains …’”

  “Well, that’s as may be. What I tried to do was to remove at least some of the nonsense. I tried to show that the silkie legend of seals assuming human form and being unable to return to their seal homes without their mysterious sealskin belts was, in actuality, based on sightings of Norse kayak-men often seen around these islands in the seventeenth century and long before. They traveled independently over huge distances, wrapped in sealskin clothing and kept watertight in their sealskin kayaks by a tight belt around their waists. They couldn’t set out on their journeys without such a belt. They’d sink in no time. And so the legend of the magic belt and the shape-shifting transformation from men on land to sealskin-encased individuals on the sea began—and endured. There are even traces of very early Norse encampments in the bay north of Ness. They were small people—possibly linked to the Sami Laplanders—the Finn folk. There’s even an island near Ness—Pygmy Island—that’s possibly linked to a resting place for these ‘little folk.’ The funny thing is that the Gaelic for the island is Luchruban…which sounds a lot like the Irish term ‘leprechaun’…”

  “So myths and realities slide easily back and forth into one another,” I suggested.

  “Too easily. The Grimm brothers were masters of the art…” He reached out for a copy of his book. “Listen to how Jakob Ludwig Grimm described these Finn folk:

  “They were like the swan-maidens and mer-wives of Scandinavian and German tradition. They are denizens of a region below the depths of the ocean, and are able to ascend to the land above by donning a sealskin. If this garment be taken from them, they cannot pass through the sea again and return to their proper abode.”

  “So already—reality is merging into myth…”

  “Oh, yes—and isn’t that how most myths emerge?”

  “Through myth-takes!” I suggested.

  John laughed. “Or a mixupery—or a mixery, as opposed to a true ‘mystery.’ And also, out of all this mixery came tales of ‘second-sight’ abilities. One of our most notable lives here on the island, as I’m sure you’ve both found out by now. Let me just read you a bit more:

  “These seal-folk, already endowed with extraordinary maritime skills were nearly always attributed with supernatural powers—able to predict and control weather; practicing magic; soothsaying and sorcery. They also had, too, the power of healing man and beast and an uncanny ability to communicate readily over long distances—through the medium of telepathy…”

  Anne laughed. “A very talented species.”

  “No, but listen—it’s fascinating what published twentieth-century researchers have come up with,” said John on an enthusiastic roll. “Robert Crottet wrote in a 1947 article entitled ‘Children of the Wild’ about a special subrace known as the Scolt (Scott?) Lapps: ‘Nature has preserved in them the powers we generally call “second-sight.” Telepathy among them is a commonplace…we need to know that on the confines of Europe there are some people who preserve these special powers we have had to lose in our constant endeavor to master nature, and sometimes even its creator.’’’

  “And have you had any personal experience with ‘second-sighters’?” I asked.

  John chuckled again. “Ah—you’re trying to get me tangled up with ‘the mysteries’ again! I’m the one who’s trying to sort them out by showing the links between historical fact and maritime folklore—all inexorably intertwined.”

  “Yes, I know. And you’ve done a great job with your book. It’s just that I wondered…I made a note of something in Fiona MacDonald’s book Island Voices [frantic search through my notebook]. Ah, here it is. This is an elderly woman describing her second-sight premonitions:

  “It’s often about death but there’s nothing to be frightened of. It’s something like an inward eye. One thing that’s a mystery—two things—first, sometimes you can pass your vision to someone else if you’re touching them. Also, when I was very young, I could sense death when I walked through the door of a house. And also whatever you see you go on seeing it until you actually understand what it’s about and who it concerns. It keeps repeating until you get the full picture. And once you recognize the person concerned you never see it again…�
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  I closed the notebook. “So—does that sound familiar?”

  John smiled. “Familiar, yes. But it’s still a big mystery to me—although the best mystery I’ve ever experienced is finding my new family!”

  “Yes, I bet it is,” said Anne.

  “Y’know,” I said, shifting the focus a little, “if only you could direct some of your expertise to resolving the mystery of poor old Harris Tweed and its constant misfortunes…”

  “Ah, yes,” said John with a slight sigh of relief, possibly glad of a change of subject. “Now, here’s a real dilemma where some second sight could be most useful. Problem is, weaving’s been up and down for decades. Every few years it goes up. Then down again. Harris was never the main weaving area anyhow, despite its name. It was up in Lewis around Stornoway and Carloway. Most children were once taught to weave as a matter of course. My mother and father, like most folk, weren’t full-time weavers. They did it when they could or when the demand was up. It’s strenuous work, particularly on the old Hattersley looms—you need strong thigh muscles for the foot pedals, and a good eye for the weft, for broken threads and the like. But I’m sure it’ll come back. With some changes. M’be a wider range of colors and a lighter fabric for the ladies.”

  “So long as it doesn’t lose its water-resistant qualities. That’s a great bonus of the old tweed in a climate like this,” I said, pointing through the window at the teeming rain outside.

  IT TURNED OUT TO BE a long, tale-filled afternoon and as a parting gift, John asked if he could play us a tune on his violin. “There’s no words to it…yet. It’s just something I made up for my newly discovered grandchildren…a little jig for them to dance to.”

  And so there he sat by the window, with the rain-sheened view of his boats-in-progress across the road, playing away happily.

  When we were about to leave I had one more question to ask him: