The summers that changed our lives for ever
Three authors take trips down memory lane
‘Will I spend the entire week alone?’
‘A Greek island helped me find lifelong friendships’
As I lay in my single hotel bed in Athens and stared at the ceiling, I wondered if I’d made a terrible mistake. It was June 2009, and when the writing holiday I’d signed up for had been cancelled, I’d somewhat warily transferred my booking to a ‘holistic holiday’ for single travellers instead. I wasn’t entirely sure what a holistic holiday was, but I was certainly single. After four years of being stuck in a relationship that wasn’t working, I’d finally made my escape. It was the right decision, so why did I feel so lost?
The truth was, I no longer knew who I was. Friends had drifted away and my confidence was at an all-time low. So my nerves built as I boarded the coach from Athens the following day, taking me and my fellow holidaymakers to the ferry for the last leg of the journey.
‘Will anyone like me?’ I asked myself as I found a seat next to the window. ‘Will I spend the entire week alone?’
‘Hello!’ I looked up from my seat to see a lady with sparkling eyes and a broad smile. ‘Can I sit here?’ she asked.
My trepidation began to fade away as Jo introduced herself. She was married with two children under 10. She and her husband believed that the secret to a happy marriage was one family holiday a year and one holiday each, alone. As we chatted, the women in front of us turned around to introduce themselves. One was Birgit, a single mother to two daughters. She worked in the City and fancied a holiday but all her friends were too busy to get away. Heather, sitting next to her, was a lawyer.
‘I thought everyone else was going to be a hippie!’ Jo said. She wasn’t the only one who laughed with relief.
The laughter continued as we boarded the ferry and sat on the deck with the wind in our hair and sun on our faces, light sparkling like crystals on the azure sea. When we arrived at our home for the week on the island of Skyros, our jaws dropped. The complex was nestled on the edge of the bay, the
air rich with the scent of rosemary, as goat bells clanked in the distance.
There were squeals of excitement as we were shown around: the kitchen area where we’d help prepare food, the hammocks, the huts in the goat fields where we’d sleep and the ‘magic circle’ where we’d do yoga, have daily meetings and take part in expressive dance. Jo and I both shook our heads at that, but an hour later found ourselves milling around that very circle, hugging strangers and giving them compliments as part of the welcome ceremony.
Over the days and nights that followed we formed a little group, me and the other hippie rebels. We took part in some of the activities – learning to make stained glass, attending writing classes – and neatly avoided the rest (there was no way I would do expressive dancing). We went paddleboarding and we stayed up late.
I didn’t know it then, but I was making friendships for a lifetime. To this day, the four of us are still incredibly close, and meet up as often as we can. But it’s not the only way that trip to Skyros changed my life. On the last day, we were asked to choose a pebble to throw into the sea that represented everything we wanted to leave behind. I hurled my charcoal pebble as far as I could throw it and when I looked at my new friends, I felt something I hadn’t felt in a long time.
I felt accepted. I felt liked.
And I felt like me.
Her Last Holiday (Avon) by C.L. Taylor is out now