The village hits different when you come for a visit, and when it’s on your own terms. Or when you jump at the suggestion to just step away and take some quiet time in a village so remote even local Poles tend to mispronounce it. Normally villages aren’t my thing, especially not on big days, because traditionally NYE eve had to be spend at a great party, meaning you actually liked the people you’re with, because they would be the ones (or like the ones) you would be seeing all year.

Which was precisely the reason I’d decided to spend the Millennium in Edinburgh. The destination was thrown in the ring, seemingly at random, so I jumped on it, figuring that no matter what I’d end up at some kind of party anyway despite not knowing anyone (youthful optimism is the best). It was way better than fretting over whether I’d get to ring in the millennium with the same person I’d been with six years prior in a repeat of what had been to date The Best NYE Ever (bar none)! For the record, the B&B we stayed at had tickets to the street party, so we went (again, with me figuring I’d meet people). there was a commotion at one point, I asked a group of people who looked like locals what was going on, they said they had no clue, heard my accent and we got talking. The outcome? We got invited to their place, but not before saying hi to a friend of theirs who was working somewhere that night, so we all traipsed down some long corridor to a club where they greeted someone in a kilt (among the many kilts present) before getting into a cab and heading God know where. We got back to the B&B safe and sound and followed up on the owner’s invite to spend the first day of the year with her family, which led to awesome conversations and hope in relationships actually lasting when we met an 80-year-old man who told us he was renewing his wedding vows with his wife in a few weeks to celebrate 60 years of marriage. It was the perfect way to ring in the new year, even more the Millennium. Though even I wouldn’t have predicted that the following year took me away from where I’d been living, a choice I never regretted. 

That NYE six years before the Millennium is still the wildest I’ll ever have, and maybe I’ll write about that some day when I have the time and emotional capacity to rekindle but also deconstruct the emotions attached with that particular night (again being young and in a country where you barely speak the language at a party where you only know one person, is something only young minds really jump into without weighing the odds in any way, shape or form, and by young minds I mean mindsets regardless of biological age). 

So this NYE hit different, best and most original ever, because we’d never done that before just shutting ourselves away from everyone to shut the world out and chill. I knew the village we were going to, I’d been there before. The first time towards the end of summer, for less than 24 hours, which still left enough time for a dusk bike ride by the reservoir. Then came a three-day stay where we got to explore all five stores the village had to offer, rehome a feral cat and rekindle old bonds with some locals enjoying the last of their summer days there before heading to their main residences in various areas of Poland. By NYE we were pros at setting up the stove heater and even made it to the nearby town, a project we’d been planning since the first trip down there (only a brief train ride away, even though steps on Polish rural trains are nothing to joke about, and there seems to be no adaption for any sort of disability, effectively disqualifying those unable to take a huge step from train travel). We didn’t interact with any of the villagers, just brought food from home, bought some more in the nearby town and just planted ourselves in front of the TV the rest of the time enjoying the life out of Polish reality soaps (their “godawfulness”, being the whole point). No pressure, except maybe to keep the oven on, and get enough wood in for heating, though running out of that would only entail the inconvenience of having to put on a coat and take less than eight steps to the garage.

It was an illusion, of course. Village life is no more idyllic to those who live it than the city is to those who admire it. But it was there for us, it was a safe space to turn to and be in when we wanted to get away from the fireworks and everything else we felt we needed to get away from, though it still allowed us to view them from the front door, wrapped in our Polish-bought-for-use-in-Finland winter gear. And coming from a consummate extrovert, who recharges with people (driven by the mantra of the more the merrier), doing a village escape once in a while is an excellent idea. Because family doesn’t have to be blood, but really is everything. 

I was looking for the perfect song to highlight the event before realizing that I had the perfect song right there. For no other reason than as we were standing there watching the fireworks, I suddenly suddenly started belting it out, singing along to pretty much the first video I could get to on Youtube in a hurry. I honestly don’t even remember if and how we sang it during the Millennium celebrations in Edinburgh, though something tells me we must have. Maybe Edinburgh / Scotland will become a thing again throughout the year, important in some way, shape or form. Though I haven’t been back there since that Millennium celebration. I ended up in Wales for a year, spending my time between Cardiff, Bridgend and Porthcawl. Though I dare say that never would have happened if I hadn’t decided on spending the time between Christmas and the Millennium in Edinburgh. Because it resulted in me being allowed to pick a book for our traditional NYE present, which resulted in typing a certain name into Google, which made me rework an ancient story, which ultimately made me change my life. Funny how things work out sometimes, though I always knew the person I was writing about, even as a child, would get me out of my rut and lead me to answers for questions I wasn’t quite sure I had.