THIS month marks nine years since I began writing this column. I know it has changed and evolved over these years, I suppose just as my life circumstances have too. I have been privileged to hear from, and sometimes meet, many readers, some of whom have become my friends.

In my own life, I live and breathe the importance of stories and how they convey inheritance and identity. Being allowed to write every week and share stories, thoughts and reflections or the history of places and people has been such a gift.

I’m a storyteller by trade, but it’s not just a job; for me it’s a way of life, or perhaps more accurately a way of seeing and appreciating what life and the world around us means.

Each storyteller has their own thread of life experience and interests woven into their art. Some stories interest us more than others, or speak with greater relevance to our own situation. Yet there is no one way to be a storyteller, no one way to tell a story, no specific set of stories that are more important than others.

We all have different stories close to our heart and sharing them is part of what makes us human. They impart inheritance and identity, give voice to our inner self. Stories can also help us speak of our vulnerabilities and fears, while giving us the protection of metaphor. Being a listener of the stories of others is just as important. Without this listening, our understanding of the world can be narrow.

I say this as I plan to take you, via the Courier, on a journey through part of Scotland over the following weeks.

It will be a journey of stories and the places associated with them, with characters whose stories are as important as those of the places.

It will be part of a novel called Road of Legends that has formed in my mind over the past 10 years and more. Some of the stories will only be fully heard and understood at the journey’s end, perhaps even later. And like all tales, there will be different truths spoken to different people.

It seems a good time to take you on this journey. We remain confined to our homes and locality, but we can still travel in our mind’s eye. I have been doing a lot of this kind of travel recently, and not just because of the travel restrictions.

Not so long ago, I thought I would never again be able to walk without pain in my favourite hills, or climb another mountain, due to problems with my knee. It sounds dramatic, but the pain was such that hillwalking seemed to be out of the question. I think this was partly my motivation for returning to my favourite places in my imagination. But after losing nearly six stone since summer, that pain has miraculously vanished. I don’t know if it is permanently gone, but I’m hoping so.

I have to say that I look like a more wrinkled, skeletal version of my former self, and when I meet people who haven’t seen me for a while the shocked look on their face means I have to reassure them that the weight loss is intentional.

Now I long to test my legs on the braes of my favourite Highland hills. But that will have to wait.

So instead, the journey will be in story on these pages. It will begin next week and bring us into spring, when I hope there will be new opportunities for us all to travel safely in the physical sense.