An Age Old Story

Which is: Old Men Wanting Younger Women. Age-old (in more ways than one), and boring, but hopefully this won't be. While I was searching about in my mind for something interesting to write about, I realized that there are plenty of little tidbits from my trip, both silly and serious, that haven't been shared, so here, without further ado, is Travel Journal Post #1: Triple Threat.

There's absolutely no point in denying that when daydreaming about Scotland (and England, and France, but mostly Scotland), my mind (and Natalie's, I'm sure) drifted across the chance of whirling around the country in the delightful state of foreign romance, which is three times as romantic as normal, home-grown romance. A slight possibility, hmm? That our paths might cross with handsome, accented young men, and lead towards an, ahem, more permanent residence in Britain? If You Know What I Mean And I Think You Do.

But when our feet were set on foreign soil, Nat and I seemed to be in a constant yet subconscious attempt to hinder our chances at romances. Our sense of sensibility and safety led us to stay at quaint B&B's favored by older couples; to eat at pubs, but not at their bars, only in their elegant upper rooms that, once again, older couples favored; to ask only couples to take our pictures; and to sit only by old ladies on the bus. In short, we kept our feet strictly out of Young Men Territory.

This is not to say that this constant and subconscious attempt wasn't for the best because Natalie and I utterly enjoyed ourselves in a completely safe manner. Oh, oh yes. Older couples in Europe tend to be well-traveled, mannerly, and experts at conversation, or, if none of those, simply fascinatingly interesting. And the waitresses in the elegant upper rooms began to recognize us and seat us with views over castles and rivers, and the couples that took our pictures were sweet and smiley, asking for pictures in return, and we weren't sexually assaulted on the bus like one poor woman who sat a few rows ahead of us by a sketchy man. So, all good (for us). All stories that you will hear eventually. But there was one day in Scotland that male attention became both unparalleled (until Paris) and strangely unwanted.

Our bus was to leave Tarbert, Harris, at eleven. We had said our farewells to our beautiful, discounted hotel room, the blue and green harbour, the moonscape hills, and the ever-present sheep. We had lugged our suitcases out to the parking lot. Then we waited. The sun was hot, and Natalie's toe was bruised from the night before - she had tripped over my suitcase and almost fallen out of the hotel window (there seems to be no such thing as a window screen in Scotland, or sheets for that matter). And then came along an old man with a backpack and a baseball cap and a big old grin. "Are you waiting for the bus? I noticed you ladies at the bar last night."

What a beginning! First, it wasn't really a bar - just called one to distinguish it from the more expensive restaurant. Second, we certainly hadn't noticed him - too busy glancing at the young farmers with tousled hair and work shirts in the corner. And he was old - old enough to be our grandfather, and standing uncomfortably close. Unfortunately, I am far too polite to snub someone that obviously (unless they come up to Natalie and I in the Paris metro and repeat "C'est bon! C'est bon!") so we had to make half-hearted conversation about the fight in the bar that left a man stumbling around outside bloody and half blind with anger (we weren't present at the time; we spied on his conversation with the police out our hotel window). He was an architect, retired, and overly interested in sailing around the Hebrides. Finally he requested that we inform the bus driver not to leave the lot without him, and took off to make a phone call in the tourist bureau. Well, we sat on the bus, by two elderly ladies, sweet, innocent, moral people! And the bus driver was getting ready to leave. "Should we tell him to wait?" Natalie whispered. I groaned. And we did, because we are nice girls in general and in this case in particular. Luckily, the retired architect sat far ahead of us (turned off by the elderly ladies?) and left with a cheery wave in Stornoway. Goodbye to you, sir, and the leer in your bleary eyes!

We turned our gaze to the ferry, our favorite mode of travel in Scotland. (Why? You leave all your bags in a luggage rack. You walk around bookstores and giftshops. You stretch out on the long couches with a Coke in one hand and a Yorkie (not for girls!) in the other, and close your eyes, and fall asleep, and everyone does this, and no one is afraid of anyone stealing anything or being inappropriate in any way. It's bliss for the weary traveller.) After leaving our heavy suitcases with good riddance in the rack we sat down tiredly in a corner with access to both television and window, on a couch that curves its way completely across the room. On a nearby curve of the couch, sat down an elderly gentleman. Completely decked out in red and Canadian flags pinned all over his body. After deliberating for a moment, Natalie said politely: "What part of Canada are you from?" (Which, may I instruct all old men, is a much better opening than "I Saw You In the Bar".) He was from Vancouver (typical). "Oh - and we're from the Maritimes!" Natalie said. "And we're from Quebec!" Cheered the blond couple directly across from us. "This is the Canadian Corner!" someone said, and we all laughed in delirious recognition that we could just Let Our Guard Down and Be Canadian, whatever that means.

For the next hour or so, Mr. Vancouver regaled us with tales of his life and his children and his desire to cut his trip short. Out of the places he had traveled, he liked Glasgow best, which seems to be a trend among the working men I've known that have gone to Scotland. Shocking to my romantic eye- what can compare to the mysterious kitsch of Inverness and Nessie? The moonscape of Harris? The almost disturbing beauty of the highway from Fort William to Arisaig? But that is all, all, another story.

Mr. Vancouver continued, 'opening our eyes' to the wondrous invention that is the hostel. Well, I have been skeptical from the beginning of the trip of those particular inventions, not least because the PEI boy we met described our smoky B&B in Arisaig as a 'haven' away from hostels and drunken friends, though he eagerly participated in both hostels and drunkenness when with said friends. But my skepticism reached an all-time high point when Vancouver told the tale of $300 stolen from his pocket in his latest hostel. "But that hostel was beautiful!" I thought of the modern boutique hotel we had just left behind with fluffy white duvets and sparkling spring water and thick doors that locked very securely, for which we had paid only slightly more than a single room at a hostel. "Yes," I said. "I'm sure it was amazing."

Eventually, we managed to slump down enough in our seats for Vancouver to transfer his attention to the blond couple from Montreal, and we closed our eyes and stretched out and slept for two hours, to the music of the sea and the ferry engine and the news on the TV and Vancouver chat, chat, chatting away. We parted in Ullapool, as he strapped his backpack on and left in search of another beautiful and utterly amazing hostel.

But neither the Old Man in the Morning nor the Old Man in the Afternoon compare to the Old Man in the Evening. It was our second time in Inverness and we knew and thirsted for old haunts: Topshop; the Castle Tavern; Hootananny's. Sick of travel, we showered in three minutes (a record for me and laughing unbelief from Natalie) and put on summer dresses and sandals and left our hair to dry in the Scottish evening sunshine. "It's going to wave, badly," I said dubiously. But we were in too much of a hurry to wait to enjoy mango chicken curry and strawberry kiwi cheesecake (almost too beautiful to eat) at the Tavern and then to saunter down the road for a ceilidh at the famous Thai pub, Hootananny's, which is very fun to say and even funner to experience but not fun at all to type.

We slipped in the door of Hootananny's and went straight to the loo, which is the easiest way to navigate a pub such as this when you can't go up to the bar and lounge around with a drink in your hand. Then you tidy yourself up and survey the room from the relative safety of a neutral position. The trick is to watch everybody at once so when they begin to leave you can make a mad dash for their table. We had to sit on some speakers for about half an hour while we waited, tapping our feet to fiddles and accordions and banjos and you-name-it. However, when we made our mad dash for a table, so did an older gentlemen! Number three! I could hardly speak or believe my eyes when he sat down on the speaker beside us and asked permission to place his drink on our table for safekeeping. After thoughts jumbled together in my head I said of course you may, because better that than looking as if we were taking a table from a paying customer, which is exactly what was happening. Sorry. And we settled in for another conversation with a man old enough to be our grandfather. (One thing that annoyed me about each man was that they all hinted at or outright asked if we had money. Which, we didn't, because there are ways to take a trip cheaply while avoiding hostels and dives, but that was none of their business and I certainly didn't answer. What puzzled me was that in this sort of situation... shouldn't it be the other way around?)

But I must say that The Old Man in the Evening was my favorite. He was educated, healthy, a good conversationalist, and altogether interesting. He was a stockbroker... yes, you can imagine why he would need a break, and quite a break he took - traveling around the world on his own. He's been everywhere, knows everyone, offered to get us a job working for someone in Halifax, a minister of agriculture, but I said no thanks, I have no interest in agriculture unless it's to tramp across some fields of my own in muddy boots and an old coat with two black and white sheep dogs at my heels, plotting some plot in my mind to set down on paper. But nice man. Interesting. The sticky part came when two handsome - yes, oh yes - young men strolled in and took up position where they could keep an eye on us and an eye on the bar. I stared past the stock-broker longingly. In the exact same instant, one looked at me and smiled as the stockbroker asked to buy us a drink and a look of horror passed over my face. The young men laughed quietly behind their hands, as we shook our heads politely and died a little inside. It took us a good few minutes to convince him that we didn't drink alcohol and we didn't want a Coke (though I did - but thoughts of Natalie's mother warning us Never To Take a Drink From a Stranger danced menacingly through my head). He continued the conversation, the young men - exactly our types - moved to a distant table, and that was that.

We slipped out the door later that evening and put up the umbrella, each ahold of the handle. "You know," I said, as we walked in our lovely dresses and wavy hair through the dark Celtic night, lights reflecting off the wet cobblestone beside the castle, rain sliding off the umbrella merrily onto my shoes, "sometimes I think God sits up there and just has a good laugh at my life."

I certainly do.