A wandering through Jade Koltai’s Inis Oírr in Second Life.

The tide was already going out when I reached the harbor.
Not quickly—nothing here moved quickly—but with the steady patience of something that had done this longer than memory. The water peeled itself away from the rocks, leaving dark lines behind, as if the shore were keeping score.

A gull stood on the lamppost, watching.
Not waiting. Watching.

Behind it, cranes rested mid-gesture, arms raised as if interrupted. Whatever they had been lifting was no longer there. Or maybe it never had been. It was hard to tell which absences were recent and which were simply part of the landscape now.

I walked anyway.

There was no path, exactly. Just stone worn flatter in some places than others, shaped by feet that didn’t hurry and didn’t leave much behind. Walls cut the wind where they could. Where they couldn’t, the wind passed through unbothered.

Further inland, a single structure remained upright. Not defiant. Not proud. Just still.
It stood where it had been left, and that seemed reason enough to remain.

No one had told it to fall.

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The lighthouse came into view slowly, as if it preferred distance.

It didn’t rise dramatically from the land. It didn’t claim the horizon. It simply occupied it—striped stone against low cloud—fixed in a way that suggested routine rather than heroism.

A bird crossed the sky once, then again. I couldn’t tell if it was circling or returning. Both felt possible.

Closer now, I noticed markings in the stone: a carved knot, worn shallow with age or weather or touch. Someone had taken the time to leave it there. Someone else had decided not to erase it.

I wondered how many decisions like that had shaped this place.
Small ones. Ordinary ones.
The kind that don’t feel important until they’re all that’s left.

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At the water’s edge, the light reached the rocks and stopped.

It didn’t fail.
It simply didn’t go any further.

The sea held what it held. The shore accepted what it was given. Between them, the lighthouse kept its position—not promising safety, not offering guidance—just marking that this place existed at all.

I stayed longer than I meant to.

When I finally turned back, the gull was gone, the tide already shifting its mind. Nothing had changed, and somehow everything had.

Some places don’t tell stories.

They let you leave one behind.

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Owl’s Note

This story takes place in Inis Oírr. A Second Life region created by Jade Koltai, inspired by the real Inis Oírr (Inisheer) of Ireland’s Aran Islands. The region invites wandering rather than explanation, and this piece reflects a single passage through it—no map required.

More photos from my visit are on display at Cloud Galleries in Second Life.

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• Jade Koltai builds– Panjin (faded away not forgotten)
• virtual photograph

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Visiting Inis Oírr in Second Life

Region: Overland Hills
Build: Inis Oírr
Landmark: Visit Inis Oírr
Builder: Jade Koltai
Inspiration: Inis Oírr (Inisheer), Aran Islands, Ireland
Flickr Group: Inis Oirr Photos

Further Reading

• Simtipp: New Inis Oírr by Susann Decuir
• Jade’s Inis Oírr in Second Life by Inara Pey

~Owl