White ice over dark peat makes a grey carpet that binds within it grasses living, dying and dead- green, orange and yellow- like threads on the concrete floor of a tweed weaver’s shed

Lying on the moor (suitably waterproofed) with your eyes at insectivorous sundew level it seems like a tropical jungle in its lushness and variety. Noticing my cap has rolled off, I am surprised by how dull it now seems compared to the moorland’s summer bloom and how lacking in variety yet these were the very things that led me to pick this particular tweed in the ‘Lewis Looms’ shop in Stornoway- art has imitated nature but cannot match it.

Standing on the moor and looking down you marvel at the variety of the tiny plants and mosses, lichens and grasses that form its intricate colour and texture; there is reason in the placement of each, dependent on the nature of the ground- heather on the driest places, bog grasses on the semi-dry, sphagnums on the wettest. Where no vegetation can flourish the watery pools, crevices and openings reveal glimpses into the depths of the peaty morass; shapes and objects can be vaguely made out- beneath the rippling feet of the water boatmen and pondskaters- the blurred furriness of ‘drowned kittens’ moss, leaves, grass stalks, twigs, down to unseeable depths, mysterious caverns and passages in the unsolid mass of the ancient peat. Standing in itself is a timed activity as you gradually or quickly, depending on the part of the bog you are on, sink.

God-like you stamp your feet and the whole surface earthquakes in shivers.

“…And the curious deer, watchful and tentative,
Hesitant, sensitive: I have had all these clear, in my sight.

Duncan Ban MacIntyre

‘Praise of Ben Dorian’, 1768. Translated from the Gaelic by Alan Riach, Published by Kettalonia

Sustained by Christmas cake the colour of the moor, my boots/boats have ferried me across this land/water place.

After yesterday’s post my friend Kristan pointed out:

“My general experience with peat-flavoured drinks tends towards an erasing of memories!”

Bottle in freshly cut peat bank, Lewis.

…and there is further joy for the other wee boy in the photo, as well as becoming an uncle Uilleam has won a competition to have his own strap line added to a bottle of Islay whisky. “To the cauldron add burnt twigs, peat, antiseptic, moss result MAGIC.”

Like so many of his island ancestors exiled around the globe, and though living by the salt mudflats of the Thames estuary, he is instantly transported back to the peatlands of his youth by the uncorking of a bottle of Laphroaig to “wet the baby’s head”.

You can just make out Ross with his red hair and red trousers sat on his big sister’s knee on the family peat stack in this blurry photo…and here they are again at Raigmore hospital, Inverness last week with little Molly- proud aunty and even prouder dad.

This characterful little beetle on an info board at Flanders Moss reminds me of the kind you see in the wonderful illustrations of @TheRealGruffalo

This is the complete drawing of the background image on my page: ‘Peat bank (for Angus Gillies)’, Autumn 2016.