Life on Mars

I walked out of the interview, out into the snowing streets of Paisley. A walk and a pint were in order. The interview was good; enjoyable, in fact. However, I needed to feel a more tangible reality, and wanted to explore the area.

The snow was fine – more like dust than flakes – and, rather than falling, was driven by the wind, round the buildings and horizontally down the streets through which I wandered without direction. Nonetheless, the streets were busy; wiry Scots with no outer apparel, dashing between house and pub. Old women, proud and staunch as the granite hills, scurried in their coats and scarves, trailing their shopping trolleys behind them. Most of them are Grans; they’ll live forever. The shops were universally interesting. A local butchers. A charity shop with a row of cheap shoes, old paperback books and a wedding gown in the window. A piano trader; the shop hardly wider than the keyboard of a full grand. Local hardware stores and electronics shops. Kebab shops, chippies and Indian restaurants. People from all walks of life were everywhere. A constant background of the whistling wind, snippets of conversations, traffic rumble. The smell of partially burned diesel from a town-centre bus drifted up my nose. Snow was blowing in my eyes. All my senses were alive. The place is gritty. Dirty. Real.

I followed this bustling street for some time, not knowing to where I was headed. Then, there it was. Through a gap in the stone buildings, as I crossed a railway line, was a grassy hill with a few trees scattered on its slopes, protruding from the surrounding town. A small path led past the railway station, and I began to climb Saucel Hill, a natural mound which seemed to have been designed for the express purpose of sledging – just the perfect average gradient and undulations. The ground was clearly waterlogged, but the surface was frozen, so I crunched my way to the top. Through the low lying clouds, the town surrounded me in all directions, layered in shades of grey toward the distant weathered hills, starkly standing watch over the valley, still conscious of times before the self-consciousness of humanity had ascended to these lands. The grass of the hill was dusted finely with snow, looking like faded green denim. I stood for some time – a lone dark figure against the pale grey of the clouds above, the white hill underfoot – slowly lightening as the snowfall strove to integrate me into the landscape.

I descended, passing kids playing football in the street – their old foam ball with great chunks missing from one side. I stopped for a pint on my way back to the guest house, where I bumped into a friend and we went for dinner at a good local restaurant, in which I had a most delicious half of a wild grouse with wild Scottish mushrooms, with some potatoes, parsnips and carrots, and a glass of red. Suitably fed, we joined the locals of the nuclear group in the Bull Inn, an excellent 100 year old pub, with original interior and some first-class snugs. A Belhaven 80-shilling and a Caledonian IPA later, and then a few whiskies (Bowmore and Lagavulin amongst others) fueled an evening of excellent conversation. After kicking-out time, we bought some chips over the road (which, post drinking, tasted as fine as the wild grouse ever did!) and staggered back to the Ash Tree. We piled in, and were enjoying our feast when the proprietor materialised out of the woodwork. Apologetically, we asked if we were a disturbance. “Och, noo!” came the answer. “I just wanted to see if I could get you anything.” The word ‘whisky’ came up, and he returned a little later with a bottle of The Glenlivet. We stayed up another hour or two chatting amongst ourselves and with him. He’s converting the old coach house into a very special bar. It will carry 350 different single malts. Heaven!

I love this place. I love these people. It's Life on Mars. The only problem is, Annie’s not here.