August 18, 2010

My dearest,

Edinburgh was a blast, wasn’t it? We stayed with Dr. Mouse and we climbed to Arthur’s Seat and held the whole city beneath our gaze and our feet. We battled the winds and the chill and enjoyed the comfort of warm winter jackets in spring.

You tried on at least twenty of Dr. Mouse’s jackets and coats, a mini-fashion show in his apartment. One day, maybe, I’ll post pictures from that spontaneous shoot. (Please don’t kill me.)

We ate, a lot and very well. From the best Thai we’ve had outside of Siam to a wonderful diner named Malaysian Delights manned by a KL chef (that was indeed delightful; we went back twice!) to 9-course tasting menu at Abstract, a decidedly French affair.

We shopped and we walked and we shopped some more. It’s the Edinburgh air, really, that’s to blame. But we couldn’t stay here forever, we had to go home eventually. But not immediately, thankfully. There’s still time for one more stop, before we head to Heathrow and board our flight back to Kuala Lumpur.

We return to Bath.

Our friend and possibly the best host in the world (we certainly think so) is waiting for us at the Bristol Airport when we land. Pey is part pixie and part magical medicine woman and potent poetess and adventure girl all rolled into one. I don’t think I truly lived till I spent the better part of an hour once listening to all her stories, the lands she travelled through whilst backpacking, the loves and the laments, the serendipity that led to oceans-apart romance and then bliss…

She reminds me that life is for living, and also for dreaming. On the best days, we can’t tell one from the other.

Pey takes us on long, rambling walks all over the city of Bath, from the weir where seagulls swoop down and scavenge and fatherly swans practice househusbandry over ramshackle nests made of garbage and twigs, to the verdant slopes of Priory Park and the covered Palladian bridge in the landscape garden, mystical and mysterious.

We stumble upon an assortment of wildlife and their domesticated brethren – from ducks to geese to swans and gulls, from cows and sheep to songbirds hidden in the trees we pass, the only clue to their presence the constant chirping over occasional swooshes of wind. You want to see deer and even as I tell you how unlikely this is, we manage to spot one, as we are walking down the hill from the park, amongst the trees. Just there for a second, then gone, but three pairs of eyes can’t be wrong.

Incredible.

We walk on, along the banks of a stream and past stationary river boats. We walk, separating from each other to peer into bushes at imagined creatures lurking there, smelling strange flowers and identifying common ones. We rest on benches from time to time, just taking it all in. This, this may not repeat. This moment in time. The breeze and the quiet sounds, the scents and the conversations. The heady loss to come when we have to leave, even before it comes. We are missing each other already whilst still immersed in each other’s precious company.

I have fallen in love before, not countless times, but enough to know what it feels like. This is love, this adoration without the threat of an affair, without the danger of sorrowful letters and missed rendezvous, this is love in its most perfect, possible form – to be brought back to life, to be lifted up, to have a smile turning up on my face the moment I see your face.

This is love, a gift and a blessing, and a promise to always return.

Yours, ever and always.