Bobby meant a great deal to me and I held him in the highest regard. He was an incredibly kind and caring individual who both calmed those around him but also invigorated them. If my small bit of writing strikes a chord with any others or simply provokes a handful of pleasant memories containing Bobby then it is at least doing some good. Alongside the writing are pictures from the Outer Limits tour.You can read Mike's write up of the tour here.
Eastern religion and mysticism, speaking from a Caithnessian centred outlook, states that you cannot step into the same river twice. In that same vein and train I imagine that that also means you can’t skim a stone over the same water twice; although that maybe has something to do with you having thrown your stone in the first place. This idea focuses on the moving substance and element of water. What it fails to do however, is take notice of anything else.
If water and its constant motion symbolise time, where is
the rest of the picture? Where are the stones and silt carpeting the river bed?
What has become of the darting, dancing fish or the insects they prey upon?
What of the aquatic greenery or the moving grasses that sway above the water,
bending and dipping to touch into both worlds. Where are Ratty and Mole singing
as they play upon the swirls and eddies? Where have the birds gone? The
swirling, swooping, gliding swallows? The waiting, watching eyes of the heron
and the gentle scull of the ducks and ducklings?
Surely these representations are of the buildings and worlds
we have created and the vessels of life that move among them. Yet where are
they?
The Buddha would state impermanence.
The Dalai Lama would repeat it.
That list of importance is insignificant; a list created and
extinguished repeatedly throughout time.
Time.
The only constant.
Yet to a western mind, let alone a rural Highland one, such
explanations do not fit nor carry much favour. The all expansive finality and
assurance, somewhat lacking in warmth. If the Devil were to blame then at least
there would be some reassurance in the normality of the heat of his flames.
The explanation of the river has no warmth.
In that particular scene one living, screaming, laughing
vessel is missing. It may not be their picture but it is mine.
Our world has been irreversibly changed.
A swallow has vanished from the sky.
A fish has disappeared from the water.
Ratty and Mole aren’t singing in cheer but lamenting.
They’re describing a being that lived and laughed, cared and
created. Painting a picture of a soul that grew and groaned. A possessor of a
heart that beat a rhythm and gave warmth to those around him; safe and
protected under his watchful, caring, smiling eye.
He left a trail among the water; a wake which would be
pointed out to be passing. Yet such thoughts of nothingness sit ill with such
strong feelings and memories. The banks still feel the push of his passage
past; even if that is all that is left.
Those fish will remember and the birds will continue to sing
his memories and stories of his life from dawn to dusk.
Thank you Bobby for your life and all the positive energy
you channelled and shared throughout it.
See you downstream. x
