My body all worked out from an overnight flight and a 20-min walk with shouldered luggage, I'm happy to be indoors with a savoury breeze coming in teasing my nose and my own bed under my arms. The freshness of Edinburgh air is much appreciated after Boston's hot, muggy haze.

Trekked to a wedding in Beantown this past week: a best friend married a great girl. Had an absolute blast. Saw loads of old friends, made some new ones, got fueled up by it all.

During the ceremony, I read the following, on request:

And therefore I say that I do not know, after so many years, whether the lessons I learned when I crossed a daunting river, when I danced around the skull of an ox, when I bathed my body in the cleansing water from the topmost heights—I do not know whether these lessons welled forth from me in order to be imparted to many others or whether it was all a message which was sent to me by others as a demand or an accusation. I do not know whether I experienced this or created it, I do not know whether it was truth or poetry, something passing or permanent, the poems I experienced in this hour, the experiences which I later put into verse.

From all this, my friends, there arises an insight which the poet must learn through other people. There is no insurmountable solitude. All paths lead to the same goal: to convey to others what we are. And we must pass through solitude and difficulty, isolation and silence in order to reach forth to the enchanted place where we can dance our clumsy dance and sing our sorrowful song—but in this dance or in this song there are fulfilled the most ancient rites of our conscience in the awareness of being human and of believing in a common destiny.

(from Pablo Neruda's Nobel lecture)

Though it was given to me by chance, it turned out to be a meaningful passage for me. Some misguided effort to "pass through solitude and difficulty, isolation and silence" is what brought me to Edinburgh. I should have stayed; but then for sure, this Edinburgh journey has led to a bunch of unexpected twists, things that will add to the future me. I've befriended people here I'd never have expected to meet. There is no insurmountable solitude, perhaps. Visit me, please, Unknown. In whatever way.