Winner of the 2024 Creatives Flash Nonfiction Contest, kindly supported by Fort William Mountain Festival and the Highland Bookshop.
Cairngorms, 1978
Even my eyebrows are ice-laced. Nippy hail stings strawberry cheeks, nose juice and squally tears quickly crust. But I’m six and blithe in a bonny red hat, on blue plastic skis.
Scour! Edges rattle and waxy bases slide. Scrape! Gnarly heather, what unexpected brakes. Slush! That miry Scottish tablet snow.
I crash (often). Dad peels off a bauchled glove, clamps it in his teeth, and sticks out his safe-warm palm. He hauls me up and we go (again).
Kirkyard, Banchory, 1994
My palm gets a bit burny as yards of coffin cord slip-jerk over it. We are six folk, lowering Dad into this fibrous, wormy lair. It’s a hell of a long way down.
Cairngorms, 2023
Coorse wind, summit is blizzard cloaked. Must be nigh on 40 years since I skied here. Lumpy ice on tousie hair. Scour! Scrape! Slide! I swear I see him in this whiteout.
Lead photo by martin bennie on Unsplash