ash & maggie go to camas.

I have returned from camas and am in love.

With creation, life, possibility and beauty (ha. corny.).

We are calling it the camas drug and I can’t stop smiling.

From a ferry ride to a 2 ½ mile asphalt walk, passed mckinsey’s auto shed where diet cokes go for sixty pence, to a half mile walk down a thin plank track in ankle deep bog, camas, in its simple fishery goodness, right on the blue water of the sound of mull, emerges as a well deserved reward for the journey it takes to get there. on our way, we passed friends tom and callie, who were each wheeling wheelbarrows to the road gate to pick up supplies for the week. woah.

we (adventure buddy maggie and i) traded one bit of isolation for another. And it was brilliant.

So, we were shown to our accommodation: a small mongolian yurt erected in the center of camas’ organic veggie patch by becky, the resident gardener and resident lovely person-fairy. The yurt is becky’s. A circular red tent piled high with cushions and enough space for a downward facing dog (no mountain pose) -- strung with a mini glass tea light lantern and opens to cucumbers with mini doors, I am quite positive that I could spend the rest of my days happily in that yurt.

I knitted on the seaside,

Waded into my knees in a flooded saltmarsh,

Talked family and spirit with burly rob,

Played pitch,

Ate veggie dinner with norwegians,

made music by candlelight,

repaired a stone labyrinth,

And was astounded by the simplicity of the chapel of the nets.

Something about those orange fishermens’ nets, piled high like dunes around the found object sculpture of community: defined in anchors and shells, glass plates and rope… pulled together to create a haphazard whole.

A circle of tealights called it sacred.

Maggie is one of my favorite people on iona. She is smart, articulate, quirky, and wears a blue bandana. She focuses on consensus making games and anti-oppressive, peace building programming for children who come to iona (she invented “capture the illuminated manuscript). She was a perfect partner in adventure. And she writes songs. Good songs.