A many splendored thing

These are the Simonside Hills near Rothbury. The distinctive stepped ridge is visible from all over south and mid - Northumberland. I used to look for it as I travelled on the coast road from Newcastle to Whitley Bay. It marks the beginning of the wilder northern part of the county, the Cheviot Hills running up to the Scottish Border. I reckon I was 8 or 9 when we got our first car and this was a regular weekend day out for us. We'd scramble all over the hills, racing each other to the top, and then taking in the view back to the coast and the chimneys of Blyth Power Station a good 20 - 30 miles south.

They felt like they were our hills. There was a Northumberland National Park Visitors' area and car park with forest and nature trails but we rarely went there. We would park at the side of the road and strike out through the heather on the most direct route to the top. I associate it with my dad and our dog, Moss. After dad died I don't remember going there as much.

This is a poster for a romantic weepy film that was a favourite of my mam's, starring her no. 1 heartthrob William Holden. I guess you're wondering why this connects to a small hilly ridge in Northumberland. I was on a train this morning, and looking at the hills in the distance sparked a memory. In the film William Holden plays a war correspondent covering the Korean War (I think) and Jennifer Jones is the woman he falls in love with in Hong Kong. Their love is conquering all (I can't remember the particular obstacles - maybe something to do with her being Eurasian and society's disapproval) when he goes back to the war and is killed - bummer. I watched it a few times on Sunday afternoons when I was a kid, and the scene that always got to me was at the end. The couple have a favourite hill where they meet

and when she hears that he has died that's where she goes. Then she sees him walking down the hill towards her, and he waves, and it's confusing and great and then in one of those manipulative heart-wrenching tricks of cinema he fades away and she's left, bereft.

This scene had an impact on me long before I'd really experienced loss. My dad died when I was 13, and when I was 14 I started going out with a girl at school. We were together, on and off, for the next 6 years. When I was 15 her family bought a holiday caravan on a site in Rothbury, a mile or so from Simonside, and we'd go there for walks. Her family tended to follow the trails, and one day I had a yearning for the old days so I went off-road and headed in a straight line for the top. As I did I thought of Love is a Many Splendored Thing and I couldn't shake off the idea that when I got to the top he'd be there, even if only for a few seconds before fading out of view.

I walked all over that summit, choking on huge sobs. There was nothing. No sign, no sensation, no presence to bring him back to me even for a moment. Love is a many splendored thing, which makes losing somebody you love all the harder to understand and accept.

Funny what you see when you look out of a train window.