Greenland. Day 17: Whether.

Put your coat on, that big, sensible, all-weather one you got in Sports Direct in Wood Green. Great value place. You just have to swallow your principles, be nice to the zero-hours people, buy your stuff and run. There's a metaphor there, somewhere. Anyway: put your coat on and walk with me down to the harbour. Feel the rain on your cheeks. Or sleet - it might be sleet? It's knife-sharp and grave-cold, whatever it is. Lets stand here for a bit. That dog wandering past seems a little scared, doesn't it? Let's look out for a while at the perfect blues of the fjord, the shining whites of the boats, the bustling browns of the trawler. Those men are always there, smoking, sitting, watching. Can you feel the gentle waves of loss and hope? Can you feel the chills of more-days-behind-than-ahead, the warmths of memory? Can you hear the bustling spirits of all the shamans, all the fishermen, all the crooks, all the fathers, all the girlfriends, all the dreamers, all the deals and seals and madnesses of the Norseman and the Dane and the Inuit? Can you taste the too-long nights and too-long days? It's not just me, is it?

Do you know that song, Our Town? Beautiful. The older you get, I think, the more you search for home. And the further away you are, the more you recognise and start to love the good town that isn't your town. 

Let's go back? The rain/sleet's stopped now. The sun's prodding the clouds. We can go back and just watch it for a while.