May 7th: Aberdeen

I'm cranking away at my writing. It's going well, I think. I've finished drafts of 2 of the 3 essays I planned to write while I was here. The third one was the least well-formed in my mind, so I may let myself write freely, instead of making myself write something that doesn't have a clear shape or direction.

After I wrapped my morning writing session at noon, I hopped on the train and headed 20 minutes to the next town north, Aberdeen. Aberdeen is the "big city" in these parts--I think I read it has about 250,000 people. The brief history of Aberdeen is rooted in fishing the North Sea, but the recent history is perhaps even more interesting: fishing for oil in the North Sea. Aberdeen has exploded in the last 30 years from investment in off-shore oil. Lots and lots of new money--also people from all over the world coming to Aberdeen to work. I played golf at Stonehaven with a guy who retired from the oil rigs and said, "there's a lot more oil out there, but the damn greens won't let us touch it."

Damn greens: saving the earth for future generations of human beings.

Aberdeen itself is not green. It's grey. In fact it is the single most monochromatic city I have ever been to. Everything--and I mean everything--in Aberdeen is grey granite. It's all stone from a single local quarry. But yesterday, when I visited, the sky was grey, too. It was all eerie and even a bit depressing. There clearly is also a level of poverty in Aberdeen that's not being addressed. Union Street, the historic main street through town, has lots of empty storefronts and folk who look pretty down on their luck. 

The Central Library was funded by... who else? Andrew Carnegie.

Looking west down Union Street from Mercat Square. Grey-land.

Union Terrace Garden is the only patch of color I saw all day. I tried to sit there for a while, but it was just too cold.

There was a great building boom of churches in Aberdeen after the "free church" folks split off in the 1840s, I think. Scotch Presbyterians were some of the most stubborn sons-of-bitches the world has ever seen. 

Aberdeen had its own version of the witch trials in the 1600s. These modern feminist plaques tell the story of some of the women whose lives were destroyed.

And here's Robert the Bruce, famous 14th century Scottish king, and (sort of) namesake for my 3rd child, William "the Bruce."

I returned to Stonehaven around 9PM. And suddenly, there was color in the world again.