If Once You Have Slept On An Island

Oh, my long lost Better Lifers! After my last post, I dashed to the States to take care of some matters that had sprung up (all is well). Like most Stateside visits, it was a whirlwind week with LOTS of driving and City traffic that I happily forget about most other days. Like other visits, it also had its upsides, most notably a too-short visit with my visiting Uncle and Aunt, recently-moved-to-the-area grandparents, mom and brother. And, of course, the gorgeous aerial views on the return flight home to the island. It was also a week of staying largely offline, so I’m glad to be reconnected with you now.

Happily home, I’ve been unpacking, loading groceries, sorting through email, walking Angel and Milo, giving the dogs a bath, sorting trip laundry and otherwise getting caught up from my absence. With not even 24 hours under my belt, I’ve already shared sunset wine with dear friends on their dock (well, the little that is left of it anyway since Hurricane Irene), gone to the Village to catch up with friends and had an impromptu dinner out of sheep tongue souse that a local shop had cooked up. (Yes, that’s right, I actually eat sheep tongue souse! So long as I don’t think about what I’m eating, it’s delicious!) There’s plenty more to do next week, but, for now, I’m relishing every moment of being home on the island.

My mother recently emailed me a copy of a poem she had seen posted on my refrigerator on the island. That poem was left by a visiting friend, painted in a lovely script alongside her own beautiful watercolor painting she had done while on the island. The poem, written almost a hundred years ago from an island situated far more north, conveys a timeless sentiment of island lovers:

If Once You Have Slept On An Island

If once you have slept on an island
You’ll never be quite the same;
You may look as you looked the day before
And go by the same old name,

You may bustle about in street and shop
You may sit at home and sew,
But you’ll see blue water and wheeling gulls
Wherever your feet may go.

You may chat with the neighbors of this and that
And close to your fire keep,
But you’ll hear ship whistle and lighthouse bell
And tides beat through your sleep.

Oh! you won’t know why and you can’t say how
Such a change upon you came,
But once you have slept on an island,
You’ll never be quite the same.

— Rachel Field

Have a wonderful weekend!