Daisy: May 2023

It’s my final day in Phortse. I walk with Pema up the mountain to the Valley of Flowers.

When we get there, we climb up the track to where the scree begins, looking for the first glimpses of Meconopsis horridula . It takes a while, but at last Pema finds a rosette of the prickly leaves, nestling against a sun-warmed rock, protecting a tight bud at their centre. The little plant seems so fragile, yet at the same time so resilient, a tiny shoot of life among the expanse of weathered grey rock. To me, it embodies the Sherpa spirit and offers inspiration in this changed and changing world. The pandemic has been a lesson – a reminder that we need to practise building our tenacity every day so that when the time comes for it to be tested, we are ready to meet the challenges with the same qualities by which the Sherpa people live their lives: a fierce compassion; a gentle, good-natured strength; and a kind-hearted determination.

The breeze carries the faint sound of yak bells up from the pastures beneath us, at once both harmonious and discordant, reminding me of that old joke again. It applies to my life as much as it applies to music. Before I stepped out of my comfort zone and on to the path of the unknown, perhaps I wasn’t playing all the wrong notes – I was playing all the right notes, just not necessarily in the right order. Maybe that’s what Jack and I were both doing. We were playing the right notes, only it was the wrong tune. A bit like his anagrams: we knew all the letters we needed, we were just using them to spell out the wrong words. But now I think we’re starting to get it right.

As if I’ve conjured him with my thoughts, my phone buzzes as a message from Jack lights up the screen. He reassures me that all’s well at home. He’ll be at the airport to meet me in a couple of days’ time. Though, he adds, in a car this time, not a boat.

His message ends with a line in capitals: I LOVE YOU, DAISY LAVEROCK. I contemplate it for a moment, wondering if it’s another anagram. But then I realise the letters are in exactly the right order, just as they are.

Pema and I begin the walk back, stopping at the place on the path where Violet first glimpsed the village. It’s also the place where she is still remembered, in the flutter of the prayer flags and the carved flowers on the mani stones that are her memorial. I add another string of flags to the skeins already wound around the stones. This one is for Davy, as well as for Callum and Violet.

As I thrust my hands back into the pockets of my jacket, my fingers close around a folded sheet of paper. It’s the last letter Violet wrote. But this one was never meant to be sent. It was tucked into the back of her final journal, addressed to her daughter, Themi, and her granddaughter, Pema. The ink may be smudged and the lokta paper it’s written on softened by age and by the hands that have held it and read it, but Violet’s words still resonate clearly down the generations:

Darling Themi, darling Pema,

When I’m gone, please keep my legacy safe. It’s here in these jars and they should be protected until such time as they’re needed. In my lifetime, I’ve witnessed great changes to the world we inhabit, and I fear for its future at the hands of those who can’t see what’s happening. The day will come when the contents of these jars may be needed. I’m confident that you’ll keep them for me, and that you will know when the time is right to share them.

I still have faith in the future, because it’s populated by the two of you, by the likes of our friends in Phortse, and by those who will come after you all. Surely they will have the wisdom to learn the lessons of history from our mistakes and make this world a better place? Surely they will keep alive the traditions that matter but be brave enough to make changes too? That spirit of adaptation has got us here. Surely it will endure in the face of challenges still to come?

We live in a place that’s both brutal and fragile. But those very characteristics have made us resilient, like the plants that grow here.

There is something very beautiful about that resilience. I know it will see you through when I am gone. When all that remains are these words and my everlasting love.

Violet xx.

I run my fingers across the surface of the paper, feeling the embedded fragments of the plants from which it was made many, many years before. And, silently, I promise Violet we’ll do our best not to let her down.

Far below us, where the sky fills the valley, sunlight glints on the newly constructed greenhouses. People are already at work, planting out peppers and tomatoes grown from seeds and nurtured on windowsills, which they’re trying out as new summer crops: another form of adaptation, while they still preserve what they can of their traditions in a changing world.

The world has changed so much since the first time I stood here, but there’s still so much beauty in it. Each of us is here to protect it for only a short time. These stones are a reminder of that, of the duty we have to care for it and pass it on to future generations. They’re a reminder, too, of the legacies of Violet, Callum and Davy, which have become interwoven in ways they never could have imagined.

And what will our legacy be? How will we heal ourselves and the world? We don’t have all the answers yet. But we do have the will. Because, like the tiny blue poppy the colour of the sky, discovered by Violet all those years ago, humankind is a beautiful, fragile, surprisingly resilient thing. It holds all kinds of untapped potential. And surely that’s worth protecting.

I reach out my fingertips to trace the flower carved into the mani stone one last time and as I do so I glimpse the sungdi, the length of red string encircling my wrist. It’s almost completely faded now. But it’s still there to remind me every day that we have to be brave enough to walk the path of the warrior, stepping out into the unknown.

What does the future hold?

There’s only one way to find out.

My stride is strong and my footing sure as I take the first steps.