Havens

I suppose we all have a Haven that we want to go to when times are bad or we just want to have time out.


My friend Linda - my partner in drink and kimble chocolate eating - stays on Skye - ye s - the Island just off the west of Scotland that Charlie (he of the Bonnie Prince title) fled to.
Linda stays on a new(ish) housing estate, where all the street names are in Gaelic. Her street is called Rathad Na H Airigh.


Now - not speaking a word of the Gaelic (i am a lowlander!!), i didn't have a clue what it meant! Neither did Linda - even tho her Dad spoke Gaelic when he was young, when he came to live in Glasgow, it was always English he spoke.


It turn out (because the now have street names in both Gaelic and English) that Linda's street is "the Road of the Sheilling". 
A sheilling is a place of save haven, a refuge. Often it would be somewhere that the shepherds out oh the hills would go if weather turned bad and they could not get back home.


(But I'm sure Linda will correct me if i am totally off the mark!!!! She who has turned from CITY Girl to Island girl!!)


There have been few havens over the years. 


One was the very first place Matthew and I bought. 
Top floor flat.
Our first place together. Coming home after our honeymoon and opening the living room door to catch a smell of the Roses from Matthew's Mum's garden. The proper kinda roses - nit the "lovely to look at but no scent ones" you often get. THe smell takes me back in a flash!!!
It was also the place we brought Louise home to after she was born.
Nothing like it!! If i could have expanded this place i would never have left, but alas, leave we had to.


Our 2nd place - well, to be honest, it was a roof over our heads. It was what we could afford at the time, but it never really quite felt like home. It was big enough for our needs at the time, but i have some not so good memories - like everything that went on with Peter and then some years later me being really ill. And one lot of neighbours really got to us. 


The good things round about then were - having the boys and getting to know my friend May. It might not sound like much but it was enough to help keep my shreds of sanity intact.


I have to admit, after living in this house for 15 years, i can just about call it my haven - ok, some rough times along the way - what is it with some neighbours, who try to make your life a misery???? All because you go to a diff church or school. But they are well outta the way now. 
It still unnerves me tho when nice neighbours decide to move on - i get worried about who'll move in and wonder if we'll go back to the hassle and name calling that Lou, Peter and Paul got about Peter.


Now to be honest - most of my neighbours are ok. They are neither too aware of Peter's problems or they really just don't give a toss. He's just Peter who stays in that house.


But you know what - my haven the past year has been the times i have spent in Portree. Just having someone we can be with, who has known me for soooooo long. There are things i can say and tell Linda because i HAVE known her so long that i maybe couldn't say to others who i know. 


And best of all - the therapy is reasonable rates - choccies, booze and lunch!!!


Now that would be the best haven of the lot!!