23 Comments
User's avatar
Lyndsay Cedarwood's avatar

I'm glad I popped back to Substack for a little peek through fingers. I'm glad I read this. It's as though I was on a sensory time-travelling adventure with you Sarah. Just brilliant. I'm doing EMDR at the moment and this heat is knocking out my, well all my systems really. I'm just about holding on to reality! But you've just shown me a new attitude here that might make floating in and out of memories and in and out of the present and sometimes out of my body more acceptable to my mind. You made it sound like it could actually be fun. Haha. Wonderful writing.

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

I'm so glad you popped back too. Thank you so much for your comment, and if it can be of any help at all with EMDR that makes me so happy. How is it going? I hope you have a good fan and are able to get a long uninterrupted sleep after your EMDR sessions. When I was doing it I found I had to re-arrange my work schedule so that I was off the entire next day because it wiped me out so much.

Expand full comment
Katharine  Sheridan's avatar

My heart like a house fire heart burned a bit and shines ruby red. Thanks for the memories running alongside yours.

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

Love you Kathy, thank you so much. <3

Expand full comment
Theo's avatar

Not sure what I've just read, but I love it!

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

Thank you so much Theo. I'm so glad that someone else who has experienced the magic of Langamull has read it too. Have you had many birdy experiences while on Mull?

Expand full comment
Theo's avatar

Nothing very dramatic, but a few. A brief view of a white-tailed eagle overhead was more than I dared hope for. But it was equally nice to bump into a wildlife guide who picked out the location of a calling cuckoo that I'd been thinking was "sort of over there somewhere", and later to be investigated by a brave little great tit who perched on the standing stones I was visiting.

Expand full comment
Briana Olivares's avatar

Love how you capture memory through sound/smell/vivid mind-photographs. A lovely sprawling landscape. Think I'll read this again at nighttime to see if it induces any bird dreams...

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

I hope your dreams were full of cranes and thrushes. Thank you for your lovely comment Briana.

Expand full comment
Felicity Martin's avatar

What an evocative journey into the past. For me, and I guess other readers, it brought back a flood of my own apparently disconnected memories.

Now I see why Langamull is special to you.

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

Thank you so much Felicity. I hope you make it to Langamull next time you're in Mull, and I hope the curlews come out for you too.

Expand full comment
Rob Tourtelot's avatar

I'm going to reread this, multiple times. It's such a stunner, Sarah... really just the most wonderful, evocative writing. I feel like anything I write in response will be insufficient, but it was like full-body experience reading, time both compressing and expanding. Your gifts as a writer are simply extraordinary.

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

Well, I'm going to reread this comment multiple times Rob! What a wonderful, wonderful compliment from you. Thank you so much.

Expand full comment
Parsifal Solomon's avatar

Thank you so much!

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

Thank you so much for reading and commenting Parsifal!

Expand full comment
Alexander M Crow's avatar

This is, well, everything, really. What you do here is nothing short of magic and I love it, so very much. Frankly, I have no idea what to say (which is a rare thing), except thank you, thank you so much for such a beautiful, essential piece.

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

Alexander, thank you so much for taking the time to read and to comment such lovely things. I'm really touched by what you've said about it here and when you restacked it, thank you.

Expand full comment
sharon Ioannou's avatar

Sarah, i read this sitting on Seasalter beach as the sun goes down and the water slowly ebbs out, revealing what's beneath just like all the many rooms and installations of the museum, I feel like i left my body on the beach while my senses travelled through time and space taking it all in. It was a truly magical and wonderful ride. Thank you for sharing your gift of storytelling

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

Sharon, this made me tear up. Thank you so much for taking the time to read, and leave such a beautiful comment.

Expand full comment
Margaret Bennett's avatar

That has taken me on a magical, emotional journey of places and lives. And fired up my senses to take it all in. Breathtaking Sarah.

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

Thank you so much Margaret. I wish they'd already invented some kind of scratch and sniff version of Substack so I could share some of the best smells with you.

Expand full comment
Wendy Varley's avatar

I read and read again, Sarah, to catch the swoops and swoons. Your paean to nostalgia and yearning is like gossamer. Very beautiful indeed.

Expand full comment
Sarah Crowder's avatar

This was such a lovely (and beautifully written) comment to receive Wendy, thank you so much.

Expand full comment