On the Bridge

I went by myself across the long bridge. The tide was rising and the sea seemed very close to me as I fought my way over against the wind. It was impossible to face the wind and breathe. For some moments it was impossible to walk. My ears were buffeted, my eyes streamed and the hard sand from the beaches cut the skin of my face and hands like miniature shot. Out of the confusion of sound, in the darkness, as I leaned with my back on the wind to rest, I thought I could sometimes distinguish the rise and fall of music, slow, like a pibroch, and sometimes I heard rocks tumbling heavily down. But nothing was clear. It was hard to distinguish the wind from the sea, and at the far side it was impossible to know where the sea ended and the land of South Uist began below the bridge.

--David Thompson, The People of the Sea: A Journey in Search of the Seal Legend