My week has been rather a curate’s egg so far - good in parts that is.

Work is going well. I have a proposal to submit, which is taking longer than I had hoped, and is getting in the way of the actual writing itself, which I’m finding quite frustrating. There is definitely an itch there that needs to be scratched, and I don’t know about you, but time is of the essence when it comes to creativity, when you’re feeling it, you’re feeling it. I suppose this is one of the drawbacks of being self-employed, I’d much prefer to be working ‘in’ the business, than ‘on’ it. Which also brings me to my two new addictions - Substack and ShopMy.

I have to say I am thoroughly enjoying Substack. Why didn’t anybody tell me this was all going on just a couple of clicks away? I had no idea. There is so much beautiful writing to be found and perused - I need another distraction like a hole in the head, or should that be rabbit holes in the head - because I keep disappearing down them, such diverse subjects, from current global affairs and politics, to starting off a no-dig garden. (Can you guess which one of those topics I was more engrossed by!)

The same goes for ShopMy, which is one of those affiliate websites you see influencers ‘tapping the link’ to on Instagram. I was invited to join ShopMy a few weeks ago, and thought nothing of it, until again, one evening a fortnight ago, I disappeared down the rabbit hole of playing shop, who knew?

If you don’t know, it’s sort of building your own doll’s house sized Selfridges/Heals/Petersham Nursery - curating mini departments of all sorts, from my favourite wild swimming gear, to items I covet for Pilgrim Cottage, to jewellery I highly recommend as investment/inheritance pieces.

I am curating collections from what’s in my Scottish country wardrobe, to Pottering Shed necessities, and recommending them forwards, for which I receive a tiny commission at no cost to you, the buyer.

Again though, this is working on the business, and not in it. There is a fine line. And the last few weeks have tested every iota of grey matter lolling between my ears, building websites, formatting, PR, marketing and video editing. You could hear my brain creaking over there where you are. I feel as if I’ve just invented a new Ai, or space rocket, or the cure for men approaching me and telling me inappropriate jokes, more of that to come below. There is no cure for that obvs.

But I have managed to begin. And we all know that begun is better than perfect. I will write about why I am here on Substack, and why I shall enjoy every minute of ShopMy in my next Letter from Scotland, and more to the point, why I am taking this so seriously, and why it’s relevant to you, lovely reader.

The main theme will meander around what it is to become a woman of a certain age. (Can we invent another term for that? Crone, hag, silver-scaler, later-life disruptor, Perennial…?) What are the challenges for women who are on a cusp, at a crossroads, thinking what next, where do I go from here, and how do I get there. As you know, I have been at that crossroads myself, I’m approaching another one right now, we can navigate it together. (And for you chaps, this is relevant for you too!)

Speaking of the what next, and where do I go, I can tell you where I have been. That might be slightly easier.

I spent a lovely morning in Wigtown, Scotland’s national book town this week, to mark Independent Bookshop Week here in the UK, the picture above is me next to the Bowling Green and Wigtown sign. We have whisky, martyrs, books and golf apparently, but not necessarily in that order.

There are 12 book shops in Wigtown, two of which are ace caffs with quite nice book shops attached (apologies to Saatchi & Saatchi and the V&A for pinching that). I met my friend for coffee at one of these and found a table next to the shelf groaning with European history books. You can browse my book selection for this week here.

She had chicken soup and soda bread, which looked delish, but as I had only just wolfed down my homemade granola rabbit food ensemble breakfast - nuts, seeds, honey, kefir, you name it, I’ll hum it, I settled for a cappuccino.

We had a great catch up, there may even have been a wee whisper of local gossip exchanged, and were just getting fully into our stride when a couple approached/ambushed the table. They were acquaintances of my friend and chatted/transmitted at length, and then some, about a party they had recently attended. I nodded along politely thinking about… pondering… the awareness of others, or lack of, when it comes to reading a situation. However I didn’t have to ponder long, as the wife suddenly realised that her husband’s flies were undone. She was horrified, and instead of playing it down, she made quite the fuss. He however, wasn’t in the least bit flustered. He turned to my friend and I, and announced with utter conviction, that we weren’t to worry as ‘nobody has ever seen a dead budgie fall out of an open window.’

Tumbleweed ensued.

It took me a while to register what he was saying and then once the penny dropped, I was left with an image I couldn’t unsee for quite some time. That is until I arrived at my most favourite place in the world. The beach.

I had my swimming bag with me, as I knew it was a late afternoon high tide, and being Summer Solstice Eve with perfect weather conditions, I wasn’t going to miss it.

The drive to the south of the peninsula would make even the most world-weary soul sing on a day like this. The skies seem to expand with the midsummer light, the billowing clouds towering up and marching along against the bluest backdrop. The fields are verdant, and the road margins and hedges are heaving with wild flowers, and fledgling birds. I can feel my shoulders relaxing as the sea comes into view.

How special it is to swim in the sea, in Scotland, alone on a deserted beach on the longest day of the year. How lucky I am. I will never take it for granted.

And I don’t share this with you to impress you, dear reader, I share it to impress upon you:

You think you have time. It’s later than you think.

What are you waiting for? Take the plunge. Swim.

‘Head home in another starlight’:

Solstice

Tess Taylor

How again today our patron star
whose ancient vista is the long view

turns its wide brightness now and here:
Below, we loll outdoors, sing & make fire.

We build no henge
but after our swim, linger

by the pond. Dapples flicker
pine trunks by the water.

Buzz & hum & wing & song combine.
Light builds a monument to its passing.

Frogs content themselves in bullish chirps,
hoopskirt blossoms

on thimbleberries fall, peeper toads
hop, lazy—

Apex. The throaty world sings ripen.
Our grove slips past the sun’s long kiss.

We dress.
We head home in other starlight.

Our earthly time is sweetening from this.

The Weekly Curation:

A wee selection for you this week:

• The Cottage - A wonderful sale in Edinburgh at Lyon & Turnbull next week. Plenty to catch the eye here, including this charming work by Irene Heath. I’m collecting snow paintings for the cottage walls, this made me smile.

  

• The Summer Solstice Gift Guide - Well, all things STRAWBERRY obviously, with Wimbledon coming up! Jewellery, candles, kitchenware, fashion, you name, if it’s got a strawberry on it, it’s here!

• On my TBR to be read pile:

Warning, you may want a house with a moat!

The book that inspired the wild swimming movement! Wonderful. I do tame swimming btw.

The classic, lyrical diary of a subversive journey through Britain's wild waters. A masterpiece of slow nature writing and the absolute perfect companion for these endless midsummer twilight evenings:

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And please do take a look at ShopMy, I’d love any feedback. And if you fancy curating your own shop front, contact me, and I will advise you how.

I have my own rituals for the solstice, to honour the sun on the longest day. I shall make a visit to the stone circle, a bronze age sun dial, and take a piece of ribbon, and during the day nine knots are tied in it…. Do you have any traditions on the solstice?

Until next time, have a wonderful week ahead, best foot forward. Thank you for dropping by, and look out for my notes and posts, share and restack and spread the word.

With love from Pilgrim Cottage.

Kathleen x

My letter to you today continues with some insider glimpses of the publication process of my book - Devorgilla Days - which is FIVE years old this year, and FIVE lessons I learned.

(I wrote Part 1 recently about the writing process, how I went from scribbling notes in a tatty old journal in Wigtown Library, to being signed by an agent, to selling my book to one of the Top 5 publishers in the world, followed by total panic. You can read it here)

Part II below discusses the reality hitting home, signing contracts, a global crisis, and being isolated with the rigid rulebook of my debut memoir for company.

So I hope you’ve got a warm drink in hand, and you’re sitting comfortably, (I’m having a hot toddy, Flaming June it isn’t, and I’m not putting the heating on) because we are about to dive head-first into the deep and choppy end of the publishing pool.

Last week, I wrote about finding and meeting a dream literary agent, the wonderful Jenny Brown, followed by the panic of ‘what on earth have I done, and what am I going to do next with this bundle of papers and scribbles in front of me purporting to be a memoir.’

Apart from panic, and having the largest dose of imposter syndrome known to woman, my first notion was to head to the library. I would find the Creative Writing section, select a few books, and formulate a plan. Now I’m not sure if you’re familiar with Wigtown Library, it’s not exactly the Bodleian, just a small room with a section for toddlers to chill on bean bags, and a table and chairs for pensioners to read the local rag. I headed to the desk and asked Heather to direct me to the Creative Writing Section. She looked blank, but made a good job of confidently striding out from behind the counter over to a shelf of cookery books and dog training manuals. She pulled out a book, and passed it to me. It was Stephen King’s ‘On Writing’.

That was it. Just the one book on creative writing. I took it back to Devorgilla Cottage gave it a brief peruse, and pondered my next move. I had never written a book before, nor did I know anyone who had written a book, I didn’t have the first idea. In the meantime Jenny, my agent had been in touch, she had sent out my proposal, (a labour of love and hate, and at 40 pages long, it was more hate,) to several publishers and was waiting to hear back.

The proposal alone had taken me weeks to complete, consisting of: synopsis, comparative titles, author bio, complete chapter breakdown, my platform and audience, four sample chapters, and the colour of my underwear. Again, I didn’t have a clue, and looking back was rather naive, optimistic and foolish in thinking this document was going to secure me a six-way auction, and a six-figure sum.

I waited for the call from Jenny, champagne on ice, imagining the literary life I was about to lead; TV appearances, book signings, new Cos wardrobe, (no longer Prada, darling) Hollywood on the phone, and then back in the real world Jenny rang, I had a deal, this was the offer.

Dear reader, I was silent on the other end of the phone. Jenny was silent too. I know how grateful I should have been, what an honour it was, how marvellous to be invited into the inner secret sanctum of published authordom, and of how many others, sooo much better than me, more accomplished and talented, would have been grateful and relieved and joyful given the chance of seeing their book on shelves in bookstores around the world, but it just didn’t seem very much. It wasn’t very much.

And I said so. I took a deep breath and told Jenny, my wonderful agent, who had secured a deal for me with a Top 5 publisher, me, a completely wet behind the ears novice, a novice without a completed manuscript or the first clue of how to write one, I told her it wasn’t enough.

I have no idea from where this chutzpah appeared. The audacity. The nerve of me, to go Oliver Twist-like, cap in hand and ask for more. But the more I think about it, of course I know where it came from. It came from my inner moxie. A moxie so engrained it is printed, Blackpool Rock-like, around my very being. Moxie, moxie, moxie in every cell, in my aura, in my soul, deep into my DNA, my middle name is Moxie.

Lesson 1 - Never underestimate your own moxie, always be prepared to back yourself. Muster that self trust and have faith in your instinct, it’s there for a reason.

A determination to survive, blended with courage, sprinkled with verve, and served on a bed of mettle. That is what my moxie looks like. It is why I am alive. It is how I survived, the breast cancer treatment, the hysterectomy for another cancer, the three surgeries and months in hospital with a broken back, and the heart surgery for a tumour in my chest, diagnosed at my fifth year signing off post cancer mammogram.

‘This is a headfuck’, exclaimed Professor Harvey sitting behind his desk, tapping his pen, discussing my scan.

I have to say I agreed with him. And then I had to get over all of that, the pain, the drugs, the constant appointments for oncology, neurology, cardiology, endocrinology etc etc and try and find my way in life. A life that I hadn’t planned or bargained for. It was a struggle, I lost my job, my home, my identity, my relationship and the future I had dreamed of.

It took all my energy and gumption and moxie to start again. To move to Scotland, alone, with nothing, and begin a new life.

This was my story, my one and only story and I was only going to tell it once, I have no other story to tell, and it was to be a story to help every other woman who has been through something similar. The story of my life now had a value attached to it - pounds, shillings and pence, what was it worth?

Lesson 2 - Think about the hours and hours poured in to your creative process. It is your blood, sweat and tears, in my case - literally. Do not sell yourself cheap. Consider your worth, and value it.

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And so Jenny went back to the negotiating table. My moxie won out, the numbers were adjusted, and I signed the contract with Hodder & Stoughton, an imprint of Hachette. It was August, the champagne was finally poured, and I sharpened my pencil and set to.

Then, the second headfuck began.

You receive your first tranche as an author on signing your contract with the publisher, this is the initial slice of your advance money, normally paid in three parts, and then the clock starts ticking.

I had to deliver an 85,000-word ‘acceptable manuscript’ by January for the publishing timetable, and in order to trigger the second tranche. I was a novice who had never written a book before, and I had around four months in which to do it.

Stephen King’s book became my bible. His advice was my religion, well, one very specific piece of advice. Write. Then write some more. King can write four books a year. He writes one for each season. He writes 2,000 words per day. In my ‘wet behind the ears’ novice brain there was absolutely no reason why I couldn’t do the same. Thank goodness his was the only book in the library, and not some other famous author painfully squeezing out 200 words per day.

I just about had the time if I got a wiggle on. There was to be no staring into space, chewing my pencil, waiting for the right word or phrase, just head down, flex the muscle and the words will come.

Lesson 3 - Muse or no muse, you have to treat writing like a shift at a factory. It quickly learn that waiting for a ‘muse’ was a luxury for I could not afford, professionals on the clock must just show up and do the work, however excrutiating or exhausting. The coal face is where it’s at.

By January, against all odds, I managed to hit the word count, and happy with what I had written and achieved, the manuscript was delivered. I was exhausted and very emotional. Digging deep had been gruelling.

Shortly afterwards, I was invited to London to visit Carmelite House, Hachette's impressively glittering headquarters on the Thames Embankment. To say I felt like a small-town girl, a country mouse out of her depth, is an understatement. It felt intimidating, all glass, steel, and beautiful bright young publishing professionals. I met my team, all so accomplished and enthusiastic, sitting around a boardroom table, I felt like a candidate on The Apprentice. I smiled, and nodded, while a voice in my head screamed, ‘They are going to find you out, you don’t belong here, this isn’t your world’

Lesson 4 - Imposter syndrome doesn't care where it rears its ugly head. You might feel a fraud, and constantly have doubts, but always ask the question: is that fact, or is it just opinion? We only deal in facts.

There was lots of food for thought on the train back to Scotland, including, how funny, why are these people wearing masks, whatever next..

Lockdown, that was the whatever next. And a global pandemic.

Almost overnight, the vibe changed completely. The glitz of Carmelite House vanished. Hachette immediately shut its physical doors. Staff were furloughed, office systems were thrown into chaos, and communication became a sporadic trickle.

Suddenly, I wasn’t a debut author on a pedestal working with a powerhouse team. I was completely on my own in Devorgilla Cottage. It was hellish. The silence was deafening, the anxiety was heavy, and the world outside felt bewildering and frightening…

Watch this space for Part III coming up next week.

I have also just opened my ShopMy shop front, there are lots of sales on, and I’ve curated a lovely Strawberry Summer Collection too, with lots of lovely summery gift ideas, and treats now that summer is here.

and here is the link to the Posh Book Club, within it. I shall be adding a few fab new choices each week for your TBR pile.

Do feel free to suggest and recommend your must reads…

Do feel free to ask me any questions. Are you writing, have you published, how was your experience?

Leave a comment

Look out tomorrow for the latest gossip from the Community Shop, winging its way to your inbox.

Share, re-stack, please help me get my Words from the Hart out in the world.

Sending love and fairy dust from Pilgrim Cottage. XX

Kathleen x

I was considering a wee power nap, because in the early hours Scotland kick off in the World Cup in Boston against Haiti. I’m usually awake around 4am anyhoo, so I don’t know whether to try and stay awake until the 2am kick off, or to go to bed now and get up two hours earlier.

Apparently, according to social media, news reports and Substack, the vast majority of folk in the US are blissfuly unaware of:

• The World Cup

• Football (soccer?)

• The Tartan Army

• Irn Bru or Tennents lager

• What a Scottish man wears under his kilt

To be fair, there’s not much of a song and dance about it here in South West Scotland either.

I have been for a wander this afternoon, and counted just one solitary saltire en route. (Can you spot the swallow emerging from the eaves?).

But perhaps the quiet on our streets is just a collective holding of breath. It has been twenty eight long years or 10,217 days, if we are being precise, since Scotland last stepped onto a World Cup pitch. (Twenty eight years, can you remember what you were doing that summer? I’d prefer not to!)

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Back in 1998, the Scottish team faced Brazil and Morocco. Tonight, in the early hours, they return to the grand stage to face Haiti. It seems fitting that the long-awaited return happens across The Pond, where the locals might not quite understand the gravity of the Tartan Army invasion, or the sacred nature of an ice cold can of Irn Bru, but as one of the most famous Scottish football managers of all time, Bill Shankly, once said:

‘Some people think football is a matter of life and death, I assure you, it’s much more serious than that.’

Shankly was born in Ayrshire, just over the border from Galloway, and Pilgrim Cottage. He was obsessed with the game. On his wedding day in 1944, he took his new wife Nessie to a local football match, foregoing a honeymoon. He was the manager at Liverpool FC for 784 games. It consumed his life, as it did in a similar way, Albert Camus, himself obsessed with the beautiful game.

The French philospher and novelist was the goalkeeper for Racing Universitaire d’Alger for two years, and his time between the goalposts had a profound impact on his own worldview:

‘What little I know about morality, I learned it on football pitches’.

Camus found in soccer, several metaphors for life: to embrace the effort and find joy in the struggle itself, regardless of the ultimate outcome, whether win or lose. It taught him the humility of playing in a team and being accountable to others. And one lesson I particulary pay heed to, when he noted:

‘I learned that the ball never comes when you expect it to.’

In other words, life is unpredicatable and rarely plays out according to our expectations, a bad bounce of the ball, a poor refereeing decision, a sudden storm, we don’t know what’s around the next corner. All we can do is adapt and evolve. (I really enjoyed this radio play on the BBC about Camus and football this week).

So people of Boston, and the United States, enjoy, embrace this game, more important than life and death, the lessons it teaches, the bagpipes, the kilts, and the need for subtitles for that wonderful Scottish accent.

I think that’s my decision made. I shall try and stay awake. If the Tartan Army can travel thousands of miles to make history, the least I can do is keep the home fires burning from my armchair.

And speaking of Tartan, did you know that tartan is a neutral in Scotland, just as leopard is a neutral in the wardrobe of Trinny and the ladies who lunch?

It is worn with everything, treated like a staple, and relied on to get us through all kinds of weather. You can find it used for carpets, and wallpaper, wellies and dog coats. And since I’ll be sitting up to watch in the chilly small hours, I’ve gathered together a few of my absolute favourite, beautifully crafted tartan pieces to bring a wee bit of heritage and Scottish culture into the everyday, it’s my own quiet nod to the home team.

Because as the saying goes: No Scotland, no party. Even if it’s a party of moi, at 2:00 AM, with a hot water bottle.

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Are you staying up with me, dear reader? Or will you be saving yourself for the replay?

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Until next time, with love from Pilgrim Cottage, thank you for reading my Words from the Hart. xx

First of all a huge thank you to the fabulous Jo Thompson of The Gardening Mind, whom I have known since way back when over on ‘the other place’ for so generously recommending Words From the Hart.

And here you are!

Welcome, I hope you enjoy our lovely community and my missives from Pilgrim Cottage in Galloway.

I’m feeling rather fatigued if the truth be told. How about you? Perhaps it’s the weather, which however dull it is to continually mention - like a broken record - is still dismal in Scotland.

It’s more likely to be the late night burning of the midnight oil here at the cottage, I’m trying very hard to keep several plates spinning. The plates however are not of the finest Spode hand-painted ‘vetted by Henry Sandon’ variety. No, they are more like the stacks of clunky white every day fare piled high at Ikea. The everyday, common or garden, inoffensive, bland crockery that equates to the type of plates I’m spinning.

I suppose what I’m trying to say is, that my late nights are not down to designing the next royal tartan. Or inventing a device to stick on the end of a motorbike exhaust pipe, to deter the middle aged man in leathers (you know who you are!) from revving along at 3000 decibels down my lane at silly o’clock. Or writing the best, most eccentric, complex and memorable characters since Charles Dickens.

What is actually keeping me up until the cows come home, and the birds start singing - around 4am at this latitude - is a rather less glamorous list.

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(Gosh, just had a pang of nostalgia for coming home myself at 4am following some wild night out, and sitting with Mr Barnaby the Baker in Hale as he set up for the day with sausage rolls, pork pies, cheese and onion pasties… I always left with a paper bag full of warm pastries for breakfast…)

No, what is actually keeping me up are the following:

• Irish passport application form so I can escape the Scottish Narnian winter for longer than 3 months. (Where are the birth certificates of the grannies?)

• Substack, Shopmy, Pinterest, Instagram website shenanigans.

• Scottish Power utility bill fiasco.

• Latest book proposal - how deep should I dig? It will get personal.

• Will writing and the guarantee for the air source heat pump, which I’ve just had fitted, (and is so loud it would wake the dead).

It’s easy to look at life in a cottage near the sea, and imagine the romance of it - the picnics on the beach, the writing studio, the antique treasure hunting, but the grit of living independently in remote rural Scotland can occasionally be challenging. That’s not to say I would ever swap it for my old life, and if you are thinking of jumping ship, or making a move that will change your life, or maybe just tweaking it a little in the short term, don’t be deterred, just bear in mind adapting is the key word. There is a period of transition. And that can feel uncomfortable, but the good news is, nothing stays the same, so please don’t hesitate. You think you have time, but it’s later than you think.

So just when I decide that a big paperwork bonfire would sort it all out, despite the wild fire warnings (how, exactly, with the gazillion gallons of rain that are currently tumbling from the sky?) - I remember where the Irish passport forms are. In the shed. At then end of the garden.

I eventually fall asleep, under the warmth of my favourite blanket, aided by raw organic cacao dontcha know, only to be woken not by the fragrant trilling of the resident blackbird, but by the Exploding Motorbike, machine-gunning its way northwards, away from the shushing sea.

I do wonder what sort of a thrill that gives. The throbbing, vibrating, deafening surge. I’ve been a pillion passenger; had a few sorties oot and aboot. I didn’t get it. The homo-erotic leathers, the outer space helmet, the German marching boots, the gatherings at burger vans around the county, comparing engine size and exhaust sound.

Of course I am here to be persuaded otherwise. I was actually quite emotional visiting Cloud’s Hill in Dorset and learning about T E Lawrence’s (Laurence of Arabia) motorbike crash, and how the crash helmet was invented as a result.

And If it isn’t motorbikes in the front garden, it’s the local coos in the back.

The cattle in the field at the end of the garden are being particularly boisterous at the moment. Apparently they are hand-reared, curious and friendly, and they have a scratch that needs to be itched, for which they’re using my drystane dyke. They have already managed to knock off the top layer of the wall, and I am seriously concerned about all the new plants recently bought and placed with care and huge effort in the garden of Pilgrim Cottage. It’s been back-breaking getting them in, well we have to suffer if we want beautiful borders a la Vita Sackville West, right?

Between the local mole, hailstones, the relentless slugs, and the wandering livestock, I don’t fancy their chances. Recommendations welcome!

Wednesdays are a favourite, as you may know from a previous post. It is Community Shop afternoon, which means cake, conversation, and the hunt for good old Scottish cashmere. There were only two of us musketeers this week, and the shop was very busy with visitors from as far away as New Zealand, Ohio, and Durban in South Africa, (the lady from Durban was in search of a three tier cake stand).

Donations were coming in over the door thick and fast. We had a large box of Enid Blyton and Roald Dahl paperbacks. A magnificent silver-plated ice bucket, complete with tongs which I thought would make a lovely planter. (Does anyone still use an ice-bucket?)

A carrier bag full of OS maps and guides to hill-walking. There was Lego, camping gear, jigsaws, a selection of bikinis - unworn, a rather nice antique rush seated rocking chair, a zimmer frame, golf clubs, and a few rolls of carpet. Oh and this sweet tea cosy, again does anyone actually use a tea cosy any more? Which arrived with a selection of jade fruit.

I tidied up the books, the folk of Wigtown love crime, ‘murdah’! and the bookshelves are full of it, to which romance runs a close second. I once found Pride & Prejudice in the chick lit section, not best pleased by that, but I suppose Austen invented the genre!

What I didn’t find was cashmere. Well I suppose it’s unlikely in June. Although I’m wearing more thermal layers now than I was in the winter…

I did try on a Guernsey fishermen’s sweater, but it was very heavy, and quite itchy. So I passed on that. I have included a photo of me in the softest thrifted cashmere jumper made in one of the Scottish border mills. There is a link attached to one similar you might like. There are several links in this letter. I’ve gathered these and a few of my other favorite pieces over on my new ShopMy page, which is essentially my curated shop window for all sorts of treasure I recommend, own or aspire to, from what I wear to wild swim, my favourite skin care, and my cottage wishlist. Which means if you choose to buy something, I earn a tiny commission at no extra cost to you. It’s a wonderful, simple way to help support the writing of this newsletter, and keep that midnight oil burning!

I stopped on the way back to the cottage and watched the clouds scud by and the skylarks trill their pretty song. Murmurations sighed and soared, and the cows… don’t mention the cows….

Thanks for reading. Sending love from Scotland. Best foot forward. xxx

Over to you in the comments:

Perhaps you are trying to spin your own stacks of everyday plates this week, or maybe you’re thinking of jumping ship? Let me know below, and please, send your best coo-deterrent advice for my garden borders!

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Don’t forget to subscribe, and recommend or restack, thank you in advance. x

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I hope you’re having a more productive day than me. I’m dithering and faffing, and in denial about the 12 items on my list that I should be paying attention to.

Such as: bills to pay, stairs to hoover, and most importantly chapters to write.

Voltaire certainly had a point when he declared that ‘perfect is the enemy of good.’ Sometimes I have to literally drag myself away from my desk when I finally come to terms with the fact that I am never going to write the most memorable opening line in literary history (‘it is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune…’ obvs! Jane, you have a lot to answer for).

And so instead of chewing my pencil and tearing my hair out I have now learnt to step away. Normally I step away in the direction of the fridge, but today that proved pointless, a proper Old Mother Hubbard moment, because, guess what, Number 8 on The List is ‘go and do a proper shop involving vegetables, not cake, chocolate or extra thick double cream’.

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Today I decided to get on my bike, and as the hooleys have finally upped sticks and departed Galloway, it is now safe to cycle without being blown into the hedge. I took a bag with my journal, pens, gloves, flask, and a dodgy biscuit I found in the bottom of my swimming bag and set off.

I headed to a favourite spot which never fails to provide comfort and inspiration. And there I sat on an old wooden bench covered in frilly lichens, with the sound of the sea shushing in the background, and gulls overhead wheeling and shrieking at a solitary crow, invading their space.

I chose one or two coloured pencils, opened my notebook, and began to sketch. A clump of quite majestic irises caught my eye, and off I doodled, then I added a few words, descriptive words, in response to the beauty of these flowers, a bit more doodling and as if by magic, phrases appeared, then sentences followed. A good friend suggested this tip. It lowers the stakes. My laptop feels official and serious. A crisp blank page in a tactile journal invites, it is a safe place to scribble - until the engine warms up.

And speaking of ‘done is better than perfect’, I have been invited to join ShopMy, and I wanted to share a few of my recommendations with you. In a nutshell this is my virtual PoshPedlar boutique where I can curate wonderful treasure, and show you what I am going to be buying for Pilgrim Cottage, the Potting Shed, and My Wardrobe. I’m still navigating it, but we all know now what the enemy of good is, so I’ve jumped in with both feet, otherwise I’ll still be thinking about it this time next year. Your feedback would be most welcome.

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I shall start off sharing a couple of items I had in my bag today, they are highlighted and linked above.

Until next time… back to the list…

With love, best foot forward,

Kathleen x

Ps do subscribe, you’ll get my letters from Scotland on a regular basis, straight to your email inbox.

Flaming June, it is not, but we live in hope, and fingers crossed we have some warm weather before the longest day of the year coming up soon. This year has flown by. I still feel as if I’m just getting over Christmas, and here we are half way through. And ‘not a baby in the house washed’ as my lovely Irish grandmother might say.

The reason I am waffling on about tempus fugit is because I was shocked last week when I realised that my memoir, and first published book, Devorgilla Days was five years old.

Blink and I missed it. Those five years form the basis of Devorgilla Days 2.0 which I am currently drafting. The working titles for this fluctuate between ‘Devorgilla Slays’ and ‘Devorgilla Gets Laid’, neither of which my agent was too keen on, she was far too lovely to say so, but I just had a feeling, and don’t forget:

Lesson 1: we must listen and pay attention to - our gut, instinct, and intuition this year.

If you have any suggestions for titles, do feel free to share in the comments:

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So my letter to you this week is both a birthday celebration, and the first of a four-part series running throughout June about the publishing process.

Hurrah, a series.

Don’t say I never treat you.

This week I shall be talking to you about how I went from scribbling notes in a tatty old journal in Wigtown Library, to being signed by an agent, and selling my book to one of the Top 5 publishers in the world.

I have documented the how and why I moved to Wigtown all those years ago (I wrote a book about it!), so I shall cut to the chase. Here is Devorgilla Cottage, named after a 13th century Scottish noblewoman who had gumption and nine children, built bridges and Oxford colleges, and seemed like an all round good egg. Hoping that gumption would rub off, I named my cottage after her. I moved to Scotland following a decade of really awful ill health. And the main reason I moved here, to Wigtown, was to swim in the sea.

The move was completely random, serendipitous and totally out of character. But here I was. I didn’t know a soul, the cottage was derelict, I had no furniture, job, income or any clue about what I was going to do next. So what do we do when we’re floundering, directionless, and in freefall?

Lesson 2: We start to keep a gratitude journal, that’s what.

Each day I would shuffle along to the library, still very poorly, and write a few paragraphs about being glad to be alive. After a while the writing flowed and began to include local characters, the landscape, nature, birds, and swimming in the sea. (Please note that future series will include journalling practice, and coldwater swimming!).

I was also spending time on Instagram, sharing my life in Scotland, and posting snippets and photos of my daily routine. Several followers suggested I write a book, which I dismissed immediately, until one night, for whatever reason, sitting in front of the fire in my freezing cottage, I googled ‘Who is the best literary agent?’ in Scotland.

And here is the best literary agent in Scotland. Jenny’s name popped up on the screen in front of me, and recklessly, with no thought for any consequence I sent her an email with a sample of my writing. I immediately regretted it. What was I thinking?

Lesson 3: Have the courage of your convictions.

I went to bed that night wondering what on earth I was doing, but early the next morning, as I was burning my porridge, the phone rang.

Lesson 4: A bowl of porridge is brain food, good for mood swings, brain fog, and energy crashes. Eat more porridge.

It was Jenny, and she wanted to meet. She had been on a train when my email landed, and she read my chapter straight away. Her email address was only open for two weeks per year for submissions. I had caught her on the last day of that window. Out of 500 submissions, Jenny only contacted three would-be authors, one of whom was me.

I couldn’t quite believe what I was hearing.

But I knew what I was feeling. Utter panic.

Jenny came to Wigtown to meet me. We had coffee and cake at a cafe in the town, she asked me how much of the book was already written. Narrative non-fiction does not have to be a complete manuscript to be touted to a prospective publisher. Even so, I think I muttered something about the book was finished, completed, all done, whilst thinking about my journal, scraps of paper, bits of torn envelopes stuffed with seaweed, feathers and the odd poem.

Lesson 5: Fake it until you make it. Pretend to be confident.

Jenny wanted to take me on, we shook hands, hugged, cried and then Jenny left, back to Edinburgh to formulate contracts, and draft a list of prospective publishers, with a hope that one might bite. I made my way back to Devorgilla Cottage, lay on my bed and suffered the most extreme bout of imposter syndrome known to woman.

Next week I discuss how to choose a publisher, meeting your editor, and writing a book during Covid.

To make sure you don’t miss an episode of this series, or if you simply want to help keep the midnight oil burning here at Pilgrim Cottage—please consider becoming a paid subscriber today.

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Until next time, do share/restack this letter, stay well, best foot forward, and buy porridge.

Love from Kathleen xx

I am utterly blown away. To every single one of you who has opened my letters and ‘Words From The Hart’, shared your wisdom in the comments, and even stepped up to support this space as a paid subscriber, thank you from the bottom of my heart. We are building a lovely community here together.

And speaking of community….

Wednesday afternoons in Galloway are sacrosanct to me and fiercely protected, marked by a large black felt tipped X struck through my bright pink A4 Page a Day diary. Because on Wednesdays, we do CHARITY. It’s not just any charity, mind you, it’s my weekly session at the local Community Shop.

And so for three hours each week myself and two lovely ladies, my fellow musketeers, are left in charge of the town’s fund raising.

What larks.

We sell anything from silk ties and sewing kits to wedding dresses and wellies. The money from each item sold goes directly to local groups and organisations on the Machars Peninsula. This might be a new bench for the bowling green, a day out for the October Club pensioners, or flower pots on the roundabout. Tens of thousands of pounds are distributed twice a year, which I still find astonishing, bearing in mind that the average cost of an item is around £3. The shop is known in the area as the Harrods of Wigtownshire, and if we haven’t got it, you don’t need it.

Many of the customers are holiday visitors staying in caravans and cottages, they like to peruse the kitchen section, usually for a corkscrew, or jigsaws. We sell so many jigsaws. It does rain a lot. Our more local customers buy books, clothes and shoes. The nearest shoe shop is miles and miles away, and shoes are VERY difficult to buy online, especially if you are someone like Ted, who doesn’t even own a mobile phone. Ted lives in Wigtown and comes in regularly, he likes to buy a sporty biography, or a DVD, he enjoys a good old fashioned Western. He occasionally drops by with Wilma, who likes to browse the jewellery and scarf section; she is very glamorous, with a magnificent blonde up-do, and Barbie pink lippy. The local folk enjoy a blether, it usually opens with a remark about the weather, rain or no rain? That is the question.

And each week I laugh along, chat, gossip, learn, create and give a bit back to this generous and welcoming community.

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Apart from sitting behind the desk, taking the money, my other task is to change the mannequins. We have three full sized models, one wears a shiny nylon scarlet wig, often askew, and is quite slender, the other two are headless, and more curvaceous. I take an hour or so, selecting items from the rails. This began several years ago, when I first started volunteering. I started to notice that someone was regularly dressing the dummies in mauve. This offended me no end, a hang up from my days in Cheshire when a ‘friend’ commented on my lovely, or so I thought, Armani twinset. She described it as Menopausal Mauve, and to this day every shade of purple and lilac and indigo and violet and lavender has been banished from my wardrobe. Which I suppose says a lot more about me than my ‘friend’.

Perhaps I should have adopted the stance of the woman in the Jenny Joseph poem ‘Warning’:

‘When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we’ve no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I’m tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along the public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick the flowers in other people’s gardens
And learn to spit….’

Perhaps not.

Anyhoo, the Three Silent Graces get the Posh treatment whether they like it or not. It’s only a matter of time before the Chief Window Dresser for Harvey Nichols is on the phone, inviting me to be part of a guest collaboration. I have definitely missed my vocation. This week one of the mannequins had to suffer the indignation of a full length, two piece leopard print Marks and Spencer negligeé set. We three behind the desk wondered who in Wigtown might have donated such an exotic item.

Just as we were pondering this enigma, the door opened, and a lady walked in wearing a felted hat, smeared spectacles and an oversized navy cagoule, dripping wet. She was on a coach trip from Macclesfield and in search of knitting needles, so I showed her our impressive selection, and asked her what she was knitting. She wasn’t. She hated knitting, but wanted the needles for her garden, to mark out the spring bulb planting. And here’s the thing, she told me that charity shops in England are no longer allowed to sell knitting needles.

Were you aware of this?

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Apparently, according to felted hat lady, they are now classed as an offensive weapon. My mind drifted to the Knit and Natter Circle in the church hall, would they now be known as the Knitting Ninjas… as she bought a bundle of needles and left the shop to find her bus.

Each week it’s a struggle not to buy anything. I failed straight away this week, with an immediate purchase. Can you spot it in the picture below? No not the ‘Rosé Made Me Do It’ book. (However, if the title had been ‘Limoncello Made Me Do It’, well, that’s a different story, for another time, in a quite different letter from Scotland.)

I’ll put you out of your misery, it’s an antique miniature Satsuma vase. I couldn’t resist it, the detail was so intricate. If you like, I can share more about this treasure in a post over the weekend?

Suffice to say, I have committed myself lately to ‘one in one out’ policy, so something will be leaving Pilgrim Cottage shortly, (be afraid crystal drinking glass collection, very afraid). Not the cashmere though. I am partial to vintage knitwear (not mauve Armani though, obvs), made in Scotland in years gone by.

This area was once famed for its wool industry, and I have several lush tartan blankets from local mills, and mohair shawls, in bright jewel colours, most useful as bed jackets (what have I turned into?) in the winter months. The older cashmere from slightly further afield in the Scottish Borders is fabulous. The mills there now produce for Hermés and Chanel, but the retro cashmere and wools are marvellous, in that they wash differently, don’t pill, and aren’t so appealing to moths. Again, there will be a post soon all about this, (I bet you can’t wait, but I’m at the coalface here in Scotland, or woolface, so you might/will enjoy it!)

I shall tell you in Part II about the tall man with a grey, greasy beard who was looking for a kilt pin. And the lady who brought in a bag of books with her arm in a sling, she had just collided with a sheep and dislocated her shoulder. And about the cake and coffee brought in each week by the kind ladies in the café next door. And the chap with the cheery smile who bought a jam pan to make fruit leather.

But for now, I’m going to share with you the ‘so what’, the point of all of this, why I do it, and why I think you might want to do it too. I share these moments with you not just to tell you about my jolly afternoon, but because I think we are all quietly yearning for that kind of simple, face-to-face authentic connection. In a world that is so frenetic and unyielding, perhaps the real magic is to be found on our doorstep, right under our noses, it’s there if we look for it, and the rewards for self, and for community are well worth the effort of seeking it out.

The science behind volunteering:

The “Helper’s High” (A Physical Reset): When you volunteer and connect with others, your brain releases a rush of dopamine and endorphins, while also lowering cortisol (the stress hormone). It physically calms the nervous system.

The Ultimate Antidote to Loneliness: Research consistently shows that regular volunteering is one of the single most effective ways to combat the modern epidemic of isolation. It builds “weak ties”—those casual, repetitive daily interactions with neighbours and strangers that make us feel securely woven into the fabric of a place.

A Healthy Dose of Perspective: Stepping outside of your own head and into a community space acts as an immediate mental circuit-breaker. It gently shifts your focus away from your own internal pressures, deadlines, or creative blocks, and anchors you entirely in the present moment.

A Natural Sense of Purpose: Engaging in a shared, collective effort creates a deep sense of belonging and meaning. It reminds us that we are part of something larger than ourselves, which is incredibly restorative for anyone navigating a personal crossroads or a period of life transition.

I would love to know, where do you experience your own sense of belonging and community, what do you do to combat that sense of panic, of isolation? Do you collect anything in particular at your local thrift or charity shop, or do you avoid them like the plague?

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Sending love and special fairy dust from Scotland.

Do pop by and say hello, in the comments or by sharing my work, and restacking.

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It all helps spread my Words From the Hart.

With much love from Kathleen

✨ Support the Village: If you felt a glimmer of connection in today’s letter, please consider upgrading to a paid subscription. For the cost of a monthly cup of tea, you unlock my private diaries, early fiction book chapters, and the warm, exclusive space where our community truly gathers.

The above is a passage from my memoir, Devorgilla Days, describing the drive from Whithorn, (where Pilgrim Cottage is now called home), to the coast. Because so many of you have asked for the keys to this enchanting and alluring kingdom, I have put together a taster for you, a wee guide to some of the best and most beautiful places to go.

So put the kettle on, put your feet up, and let’s have a wander together through the stunning Scottish countryside:

Home is where the Hart is: Whithorn

Steeped in layers of intriguing mystery and fascinating history, Whithorn is at the beating heart of the Machars peninsula, and home to my ancient stone cottage, named Pilgrim Cottage after the centuries of pilgrims who have walked past my front door in the footsteps of St Ninian. Ninian founded Scotland’s first Christian church here around about 397 AD. The town now has a quiet and peaceful air to it, and the main street is strikingly majestic with its pastel painted grand Georgian townhouses, hinting at the status of Whithorn as a thriving, bustling destination in times gone by. The ruins of the medieval priory, once the Cathedral Church of Galloway, with its carved stones and curious Celtic crosses are tucked behind the main thoroughfare via an impressive 17th century pend.

• The PoshPedlar Insider Tip: Walk down past the old priory towards the reconstructed Iron Age Roundhouse and take time to contemplate the centuries of wanderers that have walked this same path, from pirates to milkmaids, kings to monks. Buy the famous Pilgrim Socks from the Museum shop. The Faith, Hope and Charity Shop on the main street has a shoe box on the counter where you can leave your prayer request.

  

The Wide Horizon: Rigg Bay (A favourite Swim)

Tucked into the sheltered shoreline of the Galloway House estate, Rigg Bay is a sweeping, crescent-shaped beach mantled by ancient woodlands, and scented in spring by a zillion indigo hued bluebells. The water here is frequently calm, and warm (!) due to its shallow depth heated by the sand on an incoming tide. This is a favourite spot for a wild sea swim, (although my swimming is definitely more tame than wild) especially if you can set your alarm for sunrise, and admire from the water as the sun’s first rays embrace the bay. Don’t forget your tide timetable book, available at local shops, and a flask of hot tea, and look out for jellyfish: the small ones with alarming purple gonads are harmless.

• The PoshPedlar Insider Tip: following your swim, take the coastal path to nearby Garlieston, once the realm of smugglers, sailors and soldiers. You will find, midway along an elegant curve of Regency houses, (which face the fishing boats and shimmering bay), a cafe called The Hive. Treat yourself to a mug of hot chocolate and the most delicious scone, with cream and jam, obvs - you will have earned it by then!

The Secret Walled Garden: Cally Estate

Tucked away in the historic grounds of the Cally Estate in Gatehouse of Fleet, this magnificent brick-walled garden feels like stepping into a land that time forgot, with its 15ft high walls, mushroom house and vinery. Crunch your way along the gravel paths, and take in the heaving herbaceous borders and apple orchard. The whole garden hums with the sound of contented bees.

• The PoshPedlar Insider Tip: Keep an eye out for other local garden openings under Scotland’s Gardens Scheme (the famous ‘Yellow Book’). Visiting on a Yellow Book day adds a wonderful layer of community spirit and shared horticultural passion to a summer afternoon, especially when the proud hosts offer their own wonderful, and often rare, plants for sale.

  If you’re enjoying this meander through Glorious Galloway, do make sure you sign up so as not to miss out on future letters, guides and musings and become a free or paid subscriber!

The Literary Haven: Wigtown

At the centre of the Machars Peninsula is Scotland’s National Book Town. Wigtown is home to around 12 independent book shops. Most of them curate to a theme, such as crime (‘murrdah!’) folklore and fable, first editions etc. Kindles are frowned upon, in fact Kindles are shot at, and the second hand book is revered. The exotic, rather French, rather gothic County Building overlooking the garden square is home to the library and small museum. There are cafes and gift shops aplenty, and if you arrive at the right time, Mrs Dill’s new tatties are not to be missed, even if they are the MOST expensive potatoes you will every buy.

• The PoshPedlar Insider Tip: Walk along the old railway path to the birdhide and listen for starlings, and onwards along the River Bladnoch to the whisky distillery, also named Bladnoch, where I’d recommend a guided tour of the stills, and a wee dram to finish.

Be Your Own Outlander : Torhouse Stone Circle

Hidden away amongst the drumlins just outside Wigtown, this 4,000 year old Bronze Age stone circle feels entirely untouched by the modern world. Nineteen lumpy/dumpy granite boulders stand in a perfect ring on a low ridge, observed usually by a herd of jet black Galloway cattle. Take a small gift or token to place on the recumbent central stone, I might leave a wishing stone from the beach, a feather, or a shell. The stones feel warm to the touch, and you never know, linger long enough and Sam Heughan himself might just appear (he lives locally!)

• The PoshPedlar Insider Tip: Unlike the crowded site at Stonehenge, you will almost always have Torhouse entirely to yourself. Visit at dusk when the low sun casts long, eery shadows across the tussocks. The silence here is uncanny. You might meet the White Witch here, she often charges her crystals on a full moon.

To The Lighthouse: The Mull of Galloway

Scotland’s most southerly point is literally breathtaking, particularly in times (almost all the time) of wild and stormy hooleys. It is a windswept peninsula where towering cliffs meet the colliding tides of the Irish Sea and Solway Firth. On a clear day the views stretch all the way to the Isle of Man and the Mountains of Mourne in Ireland, which makes me nostalgic, as my grandmother would sing to me of those mountains when I was a small child. Occasionally when I pluck up enough courage for a full moon swim, miles across the bay, the water is scanned by the full beam of the lighthouse. It’s both eery and very romantic.

• The PoshPedlar Insider Tip: Seek out the bird warden, Our feathered friends on the cliffs are many and various, from puffins to osprey. And look out for the ‘Nine Tides’. This phenomenon occurs just after low tide when the sea rips and rages violently. Legend has it that this maelstrom is the work of nine local witches, who once cast a spell to sink a boat allegedly carrying a ‘witchcatcher’ from Ireland.

P.S. For those who choose a paid subscription or join as a Founding Member Posh Patron, thank you for helping me keep the midnight candle burning at Pilgrim Cottage, and allowing the ink to continue to flow. xx

I hope you’ve enjoyed my whizz around Galloway, I have hardly scratched the surface, and these are just a few of my favourite jaunts. If you’re visiting, or thinking of planning a trip, do let me know how you get on. I haven’t added links to all my suggestions, you can find opening times etc with a simple www search.

I will be writing regular wee guides like this, subjects I have in mind are:

Pros & cons of a stone cottage and accompanying garden - the romance v reality

The anatomy of a slow morning - the perfect tea and the blank page

How to start again at 50, and then again at 60, life expands, it doesn’t shrink

The Scottish wardrobe essentials - from hiking boots, to posh thermal knickers

Local what’s on guides - fairs, festivals, theatre, whatever takes my fancy

Supplements I take post Breast Cancer and Heart Surgery

My skin care guide using home made products and potions

And so on, what do you think, I’m open to suggestions…?

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We're warming up a little here in Galloway, the countryside finally emerging from the shock of a Narnian winter, the coos frolicking in warm sunshine, the lambs slumbering in the afternoon heat, and my father, newly arrived from way down south doing pretty much the same.

Which is no mean feat at 90 and counting.

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Here we are in Wigtown, Scotland's national book town, sitting at the bowling green, watching a fierce competition unfold, following coffee and cake at a local café.

My dad is wearing his new sunglasses, purchased on his latest cruise, an epic voyage of 47 days, all of which he manages himself. From booking and uploading documents online, to ordering an Uber to take him from Euston station in London, to the docks at Tilbury, Patrick is fiercely independent.

He cooks every day from scratch and will ring me occasionally to ask for advice on how to braise a steak, or steam asparagus. He monitors his step count daily, aiming for 5,000 at least, which takes him via morning mass, the library, and the local supermarket. His latest accomplishment is the ‘Too Good To Go’ app on his phone, my dad loves a bargain, and especially a yellow sticker, and will drive at 8pm to the nearest Marks & Sparks to collect his goody bag.

He's staying for a few days, and I'm going to sit him down later with a list of questions, on life, the Universe etc, so if you have any good suggestions for an insightful interview on getting to 90 and still going for it, let me know in the comments:

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I collected him from Dumfries train station, where he was now new best friends with a family from Argentina en route to Edinburgh, and the train guard, a fellow Everton supporter. We stopped off at Kirkcudbright for lunch at the Scran Van, serving posh fish and chips on the quay next to the fishing boats. Whilst we were waiting for our order a lady approached, and asked me if I was Kathleen Hart. ‘Er yes’, I answered tentatively, as she proceeded to tell us that she had read my book, enjoyed it so much, and felt bereft when it ended. She left to collect her crab sandwich, and my dad was fascinated as to how she knew me/recognised me.

He is very proud, and diligently tells anyone who'll stand still long enough about his daughter in Scotland, and how they must ‘Buy The Book’.

Which brings me to Devorgilla Days. It's her big birthday. My book is five years old on May 27th, and there will be an extended letter all about it, from the proposal to the publishing process, the highs, and many lows.

Devorgilla Days with her very own step in the local library, the literary equivalent of a Hollywood Star!? Local authors are celebrated in the County Buildings, with their books featured on the staircase up to the Bird Room, which is where I wrote, to keep warm and frostbite-free. I shall do so again, starting next week. Deadlines, deadlines.

Later today we’ll head to the beach with a picnic and the crossword. These days are precious. At 90 I can see Patrick slowing down, not so spritely, taking his time, catching his breath. And if you know me, you'll remember how sick I've been. It flits through my mind when I allow it, how long do you have… will it come back… the panic to just do it, survive, recoup lost time, and preserve those days to come. So yes, precious days to be treasured. And my next letter to you will delve into that father/daughter relationship, how it develops and evolves, the tensions, and the said and the unsaid.

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So don't forget to look out for my next ‘Words From The Hart' on Devorgilla Days’ Birthday and the Hart to Hart with my pa.

Please spread the word, re-stack, share and subscribe.

In the next few days I'm uploading my Top 10 Guide to Galloway, all my best recommendations, favourite things to do, best bookshops, and a secret place you must tell no one about!

Best foot forward, sending love from Pilgrim Cottage. X

I have to say, it did make me chuckle when I heard Grayson Perry being interviewed besides one of the impressive show gardens. When asked his thoughts on this year’s efforts he responded, ‘it’s Glastonbury for people who wear linen.’

The weekend sale was held in the gardens of the museum, a very brave decision holding any event outdoors in Galloway before July, but despite the towering clouds it stayed dry. Not that a wee bit of rain would have deterred the local hardy gardeners in attendance. The beautiful Victorian building is the former St John’s Reformed Presbyterian Church, built in 1878. When the church doors shut for the final time a hundred years later it became a jeans factory, and then latterly a museum packed with an eclectic collection of items from costume to ploughs. (It’s only £3 to enter, highly recommended. Watch out for my letter from the museum on its way soon.)

Despite my early start, there was already a throng of the green-thumbed as I arrived, all busy filling cardboard boxes with assorted plants, bulbs, shrubs and pots. This is a serious gathering of experts, and to be honest, I felt rather out of my depth. Galloway is home to several prestigious National Collections from fragrant hostas to heritage irises, and these folk know their stuff. But I loitered, and eavesdropped, it’s a whole new vocabulary to a gardening virgin like myself, and signed up to the Plant Heritage conservation group who organise open garden visits, which are great if you’re really nosey curious like me.

I bought some lupins, realistically I don’t fancy their chances in the Force 5 gales that sweep across the majestic lawns of Pilgrim Cottage, but ever the optimist I’ll give it a go.

And then I headed to the Pimms Pavillion to buy a keepsake tea towel and tote bag.

In my dreams obvs, because this isn’t a froo froo flower show for corporate clients or slebs or ladies what lunch, it’s for gardeners and plantsmen and plantswomen with dirt under their fingernails, wearing Gore-tex, not linen, and venturing out at midnight in a thick haar with wellies and a torch on slug-watch, praying to St Fiacre (Patron Saint of Gardeners, (and haemorrhoids)) for the safe delivery of their peonies.

Perhaps I am speaking out of turn, I have been to Chelsea Flower Show only once, back in the Dark Ages, and my opinion of it now is gleaned only from what I read in the press, Monty’s TV coverage, and Grayson Perry’s withering put downs.

What think you?

Did you go to Chelsea this year, do you have a local flower show, could you care less?

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In the meantime, I’m off to draft Sunday’s letter to you, which features a VERY special birthday.

Thank you so much for your lovely comments and encouragement, and please if you can, spread the word, share and restack, and subscribe!

Lots of love, Posh x

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My letter comes to you this week from Pilgrim Cottage in Galloway, where I have been fluctuating between manically busy and ridiculously lazy. Busy, because I’m still catching up after my travels down south, and preparing for a visit from my father, Patrick, later in the week. And lazy, because I’m still catching up after my travels down south, and trying to recharge my battery before my father, Patrick, arrives at the end of the week! But more of that to come.

There has been rather an undertow of restlessness this week in the cottage. According to my friend, the White Witch, it’s entirely down to new moon energy, which I’m prepared to accept, although it feels more like change is afoot. There is a slight sense of foreboding, loose ends to be tied, lines to be drawn, and plans to be made. I wander aimlessly from room to room, trying to place this feeling, an uncertainty, is it doubt maybe, perhaps a querying?

Yes that’s it. A querying. (What a word - from the Latin quaerere meaning to inquire or to seek). I feel unsure, and I’m looking for answers.

There’s been rather a lot of that about, since I returned from London recently. The ‘woulda, shoulda, coulda’ loop doing full blown cartwheels between my ears, so what is it I wonder, that I am unsure about? Almost everything it would seem, from what paint colour to choose for the hall, stairs and landing; to whether I need a coat, (it might rain, then again, it might not); to shall I cut my hair, have salmon for supper, order a new fridge, weed the borders, get a dog, sell the cottage or maybe rent it, or just keep it and get a grip.

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I have doubts. So what do we do when we have doubts? We listen to our instinct that’s what, this is something I have been paying attention to this year, we pay heed to our trusty gut. My gut said have a cup of tea and a slice of toast, and maybe a boiled egg. But guess what, we were all out of eggs. So off I went to the farm.

The photo above is taken on the lane to the farm. I stopped the car to admire the view and leant on the warm granite stones.

And felt the sun on my face.

And listened to the lambs bleating.

And the wind ruffling the scented lemon gorse.

And heaved in the clean, clear salty air.

Did you know that doubt is dissolved by clean, clear salty air? You do now.

And I reminded myself of a quote I had written in an old diary -

‘You are too blessed to be stressed’

With that in mind I continued on down the lane, collected half a dozen large brown eggs, and returned to Pilgrim Cottage, grounded with clarity and resolve… and burnt the toast. But that’s ok. I had a crumpet instead.

I wonder if maybe the unsettled feeling arose because of, and following a spontaneous trip to London to stay with an old friend… Many memories of long ago were suddenly unlocked and released from the ‘Life in London Box’, buried deep down below the ‘woulda, shoulda, coulda’ cartwheels tumbling around my brain.

I have lived in London twice, once in my very early twenties, as a child bride, living in a most elegant apartment on Chepstow Crescent, frequenting Notting Hill and Portobello, before moving to a pastel pink house we had renovated opposite Harrods. (The Food Hall became my corner shop, back in the day when the Food Hall was a sight to behold). London beckoned again later in life, I was then a thirty something, not so childlike divorcee, and I lived then not a million miles away from the terrace in the image above.

These are the stories and episodes to be unpicked and dissected when the ‘Life in London Box’ is next allowed out, and I will write it, warts and all. But for now, my trip to London was a wee surface scan of those days. A little scratch and tickle around Brompton Cross and Sloane Square and all the old haunts. A curate’s egg; some of it just the same, the bones, the architecture, the buses, cabs, ladies who lunch, some of it very different, Bibendum gone, the Conran Shop, closed, and others disappeared likewise.

It left me with a dollop of melancholy and a bittersweet sentimentality that I am still pondering over now, and sieving through, and making sense of. As Robert Frost famously said: ‘Life can be summed up in three words - it goes on’.

Shall we discuss this further when my leader and master - my instinct and gut - says so? It may involve many more cups of tea, and slices of toast.

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And finally a brief word about the Spring Book Weekend I attended recently in Wigtown, which I hope you know by now is Scotland’s national book town, (or you should do if you have read my book - Devorgilla Days - available to buy here). The theme was women crime writers and covenanters. I have written about the covenanters and their fate in a previous letter.

The first talk attended was held one evening in the Wigtown Ploughman, the town’s recently opened community pub. Mark Lawson interviewed the son of author John McNeillie, who wrote a book in 1939 also called the ‘Wigtown Ploughman’. This caused quite the stooshie way back then, as his writing called into question the morals of the local farming community. (I’m saying nothing!) This promised to be an entertaining and fascinating talk. And I’m sure it was, but not for those sitting at the back of the bar area, once the two microphones had given up the ghost.

The Weekend Supplement:

A random selection of the magic I’ve been making over the past few days...

Sourced: A stunning Orkney - Isle of Sanday - wool jumper. Vintarge! Pics to follow, it’s still Baltic here, so I’m wearing it.

Eaten: Large brown eggs from the farm down the lane with excellent sourdough toast from the Earth’s Crust in Castle Douglas, and best butter.

Bookmarked: A crochet lesson next Saturday at the Community Centre, my dad is here, will he join me?

Listened to: Newly arrived swallows, russet throated, swinging on the wire above the pottering shed, chattering and chuntering away.

A Tiny Note on Housekeeping...

Before we open the floor to our weekly chat, I want to say an enormous, heartfelt (Hartfelt) thank you.

After just a few weeks here on Substack, we are currently sitting at 927 fabulous readers here in Pilgrim Cottage, just 73 away from our very first major community milestone of 1,000 subscribers!

So if you enjoy these weekly letters, please forward this email to a kindred spirit who would enjoy these Words from the Hart from Scotland. And if you remember, please do restack my posts and notes to spread the word.

And one last thing…

Because email filters can be ruthless, could you do me a wee favour and hit reply to this email right now just to say hello? Letting me know where in the world you are reading from “safelists” these Words From the Hart, ensuring my letters always land safely in your primary inbox instead of a forgotten promotions folder.

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I would love to know: have you been feeling that restless, querying ‘new moon’ energy this week too? And where do you go to dissolve your own doubts… what works for you, is it the sea air, a wander round the garden, or simply a hot crumpet and a fresh perspective? Let me know in the comments below, I read and cherish every single one.

Have a super week ahead xx best foot forward. Kx

My letter comes to you this week from the bird hide, the wooden building you can see just behind me in the photograph below. The hide overlooks the River Bladnoch, (from which water is scooped to make our famed local whisky), and the Merse. (Merse is a Scottish word for a salt or mud flat), and the swathes of lowland beyond the hut are often covered at high tide, making it rich and fertile, and ideal for the grazing of sheep. During the winter, when there are fewer tourists in the town, the hide is rarely visited, and I have often used it as an alternative place to write. It’s somewhere to escape to with a flask and shortbread when the four walls of the cottage are closing in, and always inspiring, especially when squadrons of geese are swirling above their winter feeding grounds.

It looks rather beautiful in the soft spring afternoon light, swallows swooping above it, shushed by the flowing river beside it, but its beauty belies a torrid tale.

On May 11th, 1685, two local women were drowned on the mudflats by the Scottish Episcopalians. Margaret Maclauchlan and Margaret Wilson refused to swear an oath of loyalty to King James VII of Scotland as head of the church, and betrayed by a local man, they were arrested and then tied to stakes on the mudflats (just beyond where I am standing in the photo), as the freezing cold tide swept in. The younger Margaret was deliberately positioned behind the older woman and had to watch as her companion drowned before her, it was hoped she would relent, but the ruse failed and both women died.

It’s hard to imagine such barbarity on a tranquil Sunday afternoon, but sometimes, when I am alone writing in the hide, and it’s blowing a hooley, with windows rattling and creaking, and the wind wailing and moaning across the merse, I’ve felt the ghostly presence of the two Margarets and thinking about the cruelty of their fate is overwhelming. A sadness decends. I don’t linger when this happens.

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So tomorrow marks 341 years since the Wigtown Martyrs were drowned at the stake, and I shall wander up to the monument which you can see on the plaque below commemorating the two women and ponder a while.

I will also be making a trip to the bird hide, I’m on the clock to hand in a proposal and I’m dithering and procrastinating like it’s going out of fashion. So today, instead of knuckling down to a thousand words or so, I decided to drive to Kirkcudbright (Kur-coo-bree) because why not? It also helped that the monthly car boot sale arrived back in the square after a very long winter break.

It’s one of my favourite things to do in Galloway, after swimming in the sea and cake at The Hive. I have some lovely friends there who are regular stallholders, and always, always have something special for me. Today didn’t disappoint, a Persian rug in pretty pink and pistachio, a petite French crystal chandelier, and a selection of plants, from hostas (why? literally fodder for my slugs!), to a crab apple tree. I will share pictures soonest.

There will be an extra letter from Scotland this week, on Thursday.

I haven’t yet reported back on my wedding down south, or my trip to London, or the festival in Wigtown. Lots to tell. I’m now getting used to the rhythms and vibration of Substack, and will be delving deeper, discussing the nitty gritty, not that two woman drowned at high tide in punishment for their beliefs isn’t nitty gritty….

Please do subscribe, and if you can, restack my notes and posts.

But in the meantime, I’m off to open that proposal and sharpen my pencil. Send fairy dust!

We finally have temperatures in double figures, and the sun has decided to put its hat on for three days in a row now, which must mean Spring has arrived in Galloway. Thank goodness, it was long, and harsh that winter, despite the fact that I managed to avoid half of it by scooting off to France and Italy, (but more of that in Words to come).

So here I am, as self-conscious as ever, as my good friend Becki Bees (I met this lovely lady at the West Galloway Bee Club, there’s a clue in her name), attempts to take a natural-ish photo of me in my Pottering Shed. This Pottering Shed is very important to the story of Pilgrim Cottage, because it’s the only reason I finally settled on the cottage as my home. (The garden of course was also important, the first time in many years I have had my own wee garden, a feudal strip with bags of potential). The cottage of course has its own merits, double fronted, stone, solid, as you will see in future Words, but there is something very romantic about a garden building, and novel.

The Shed is not very big, but spacious enough, with built in wooden shelving against the patinated corrugated walls. The window you can see behind me is precariously hanging in there. Putty is non existent and the frames are crumbling. Sneeze and we’re in trouble. On the shelves to the side you can see tupperware boxes, full to the brim with a fine assortment of shells from the beach where I swim. Of course the idea is to turn the Pottering Shed into a grotto, a little like the one at Woburn Abbey, where mother of pearl dolphins adorn the ceiling. Watch this space for Seamus the seal in situ.

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An electric cable runs along the belly of the hard-working guttering in lovely Heath Robinson fashion, threaded over the old washing line, then tucked under the wooden door into the scullery across the courtyard. My spark nearly keeled over when he saw it, but I reassured him I didn’t use it, and I don’t much, unless it’s to pop the radio on, or some pineapple shaped fairy lights I found at the Community Shop. Where, incidentally, I also found my vintage cashmere polo neck, I’ve got quite the collection going, although protecting it from the moth is challenging. Suggestions please!

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I have notions, as Mary, my Irish grandmother might say, others might say delusions, that this potting shed will soon be rammed with grapes, rife with peaches, stacked with seedlings and groaning under the weight of a kaleidoscope of vegetables. Rather like it was decades ago, when the old lady who owned the house before me grew a peach tree espaliered against the back wall, she called her glasshouse ‘The Vinery’ and her planting thrived because of the rich, fertile black soil beneath. Soil once used as ballast on the ships arriving from across the Atlantic centuries ago. This is me against the espalier wall, still looking self-conscious and not very peachy.

You will note some rather sad looking geraniums, and a hydrangea paniculata lollipop tree, which has been battered during the latest storm. Not terribly abundant or kaleidoscopic - yet. And yet is the key word here.

Yet is a very powerful word.

I haven’t finished painting that shed door (yet).

I haven’t added putty to those ancient windows (yet).

I haven’t become what I thought I’d become when I was 18 and was going to rule the world (yet).

You can see where I’m going with this. These things haven’t happened so far but the possibility is that they might. We are not writing anything off. (Yet!). There is no finality, we’re still writing in pencil and the chances are that eventually, with time, patience, and determination, the Pottering Shed will be overflowing with produce and plants and maybe the odd peach. Rome wasn’t built in a day, my neighbour reminds me, when he drops off my post, looking askance at the unruly celtic jungle lawn, wait until he sees it during No Mow May.

I’ll update you on the PS progress, and all the other jobs gathering dust on my to-do list, which you can see me peering at in my journal. Journalling is something I do each day. To get the pen flowing and the brain warmed up. In the weeks to come, I’ll share my journalling practice and tips with you. It has really helped me to focus and hone in on priorities.

And now I shall sign off. Thank you for joining me on this journey, I’d love some feedback, as I’m just finding my way here, there’s lots to consider, but I’m already loving the potential of being able to write, and then write some more.

So goodbye for now, it’s been quite the week, a wedding in Cheshire, a special wedding, my son got married and it was a very happy day. I’m delighted for them both and will share photos soon, as well as insights and musings, more from the Pottering Shed, a glimpse of the Cottage, and a fabulous festival coming up in Wigtown, Scotland’s book town.

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Ciao for now lovelies. Be good. Choose to be happy. And always make room for the magic xxx

‘Hello, and a very warm welcome to my first proper letter from Pilgrim Cottage, Galloway, Scotland.’

If you’ve followed me as @poshpedlar on Instagram, you know my world usually comes in square photos and short captions. But lately, I’ve felt the need for something... more. More depth, more conversation, a quiet, calm place where I can write and the ‘gritty’ and the ‘glossy’ of life can sit side-by-side.

Why now? Last year was a whirlwind. A big birthday, a move to this ramshackle cottage, three months of soul-searching in Europe, and a deep realisation that no matter what life throws at you, whether heart wrenching breakups, health scares, or devastating family fallouts, it is never too late to start again.

I’m currently writing two books (when I’m not being distracted by my unruly garden or a cold sea swim with Seamus the seal), and I wanted a place to share the stories that don’t fit in an Instagram caption.

What to expect here: Every week, I’ll be sending you a letter from Scotland. Sometimes it will be a ‘Dear Posh’ advice column, sometimes an update on the cottage and garden, perhaps a travel tip from my wanderings, or just a quiet reflection on finding the glimmers, the magic in the mundane, it will always be encouraging and Poshitive.

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“Ways to support my writing,”:

• Free Subscriber: Receive my weekly letter from Scotland, containing stories from the cottage and the coast.

• Paid Supporter (£7/month): The weekly letter, and join the inner circle for deeper “Dear Posh” chats, full access to my archives and ‘how-to’ guides. Audio chapters from my latest writing, and early access to my curated shop drops.

• Annual Plan (£70 per year) all of the above at a yearly discount.

• Founding Member (£180): For the truly kindred spirits. Along with full digital access, I will send you a Provenance Parcel from my home to yours:

  • A signed copy of my memoir, Devorgilla Days and lovely tote bag.

  • A hand-picked Solway wishing stone from my morning swim.

  • Your name in my next book.

  • My eternal gratitude for keeping the midnight oil burning at Pilgrim Cottage

I’m very glad you’re here. Whether you’re a free subscriber or a founding member, you are part of this new chapter.

Pull up a chair, the kettle is on, let’s make room for the magic.

With love from Scotland,

Kathleen x”