It’s the question no one asked when they heard I’d be camping in the arctic in the summer of 2009.
Last April, seven years later, the same topic lay fallow on the fringe of conversations concerning my dogsled trip in Ittoqqortoormiit, East Greenland. It was barely alluded to, and never expressed in words, until now…
Q: Sooooo, what do you do when duty calls in the wild, high atop the world?
A: You answer it. Otherwise, the whites of your eyeballs will turn yellow and 1, 2, 3 you’ll burst like a water balloon when it misses its mark and hits the pavement after being tossed from a five-story window, leaving itty-bitty pieces of yourself to be fill in the blank (’cause if I do, you’ll deem me a wack-a-doodle).
In all seriousness, the dogsled trip was very different from my first time in Greenland. Continue reading
One homemade heart
Alice Wetherby Pimms knew it was in the library. The beautifully scripted note written in 
You’re probably thinking how conspicuous that might seem, rather like a toad wearing a hot pink béret on a sunny day, 
Words fail
The ageing comedian, known the world over for his slapstick parodies, brushed past me in the pre-dawn chill to take his place in the crowd queuing up to board the British Airways flight from Edinburgh to London. I have packing my warm jacket in my checked luggage to thank for our chance encounter. Had I not hung back to keep warm in the stairwell, I’d have totally overlooked him.
Highland sheep dotted the roadside under the pre-dawn sky. The velvet canopy looked like flocks of faeries had tossed fistfuls of glitter at the new moon only to have it stashed inside the Big Dipper and then purposefully strewn across the Milky Way by their extraterrestrial counterparts so that this tiny group of earthlings might stand in awe of the universe’s expansive beauty from the gravel car park at the foot of Beinn Hiant, Scotland’s 
Once the morning sun broke through the clouds, the grey mist pulled back from Glenborrodale’s ragged shoreline’s nooks and crannies. It rose from the loch like a gossamer shade tugged from the edge of a wooded windowsill revealing a beauty distinct to the Scottish Highlands.
Ichiro snores. The fog horn blows. My feet are cold and the fragrance of lilies on the kitchen counter drifts into the living room where I stare at the precarious position of my teacup on 
Donna Gwinnell Lambo-Weidner 