12th May 2024

 May your winters be beautiful, springs bright, your summer unfading and your autumns rich and fair.

A rather good blessing.  It is at the end of Horatio Clare's book  - The Light in the dark, A winter journal.

He is a fine writer, lyrical explains his writing better. A prose poem that like the Illiad captures words - his words fall like snow to the ground.

What he did do however was that he explained to me the dreariness you find in these steep valleys, the overwhelming feeling of being hemmed in.  When I see other people's photos of the moors above, I find them bleak places.  The ruined grey farmhouses, blank windows, roofs that no longer exist, small fields clustered around derelict houses.   Of course it is not all like that, there are still working farms up there, as there are small terraces of houses amongst the trees, telling of earlier histories when people worked in the mills and took the pathways down through the trees to the towns.

There are good people today (they call themselves The CROWS) who work up on the moors relaying the paths, gritting the boggy parts.  And of course 'Slow the Flow' volunteers wind the fast flowing streams down the hill, so that they slow down their force and enter the town in a more genteel manner.

This world has of course been lit up the last couple of days by the out of space Universe conducting a light show for us.  Sun flares from the sun whirling away through the darkness to spark colour into our world. It can be rather frightening when we contemplate the Universe, with its millions of stars echoed by the millions of questions we want answered on its being.

It is said that the bright creatures, young or old, who grace Hebden Bridge town, are from hippy eras, the slightly offset people who do not quite sit in the Yorkshire Style but come from those other glittering places like London or the South.  As a 'foreigner' myself, I just like to observe.  What I do see is people actively looking after their small territories.  They moan quite a bit, the closure of the road to Rochdale was particularly funny.  And as for dogs and cats going missing, blame it on a town squashed up tight with no gardens to the houses. 

When I go shopping to Lidl, my eyes are always raised to the trees that climb to the moor, a particularly beautiful sight at this time of year in their fresh greenness, the moors edge can be seen also as can that funny lump of a hill in the following photo.  You will see a large building in the centre of the photo.  This is Tod College, owned by the town and given over to many different things.  Volunteers man it, the Makery resides here, where my spinning wheel got mended.  You can bring anything to be mended, bikes, computers and household goods.  People are kind, the one word spread around town. 

 

I haven't said anything about the book but it is about being depressed in the dark days of winter and the accompanying SAD, which can only be lit up by artificial light.  Also because it is Horatio Clare the mind bending event in his dark days as he battles against the troubles that besets his  mind.

But funnily enough I am not aware of it as I read only the landscape which is the background to its writing.  

Then there is 'Kindness' a theme of Tod, as today Sunday, the volunteer gardeners will be tending the public spaces of the town and then eating lunch up at the church.

And on a meditative note: A far cry from capitalism and privatisation ;)

10th May 2024

 All is well in this quiet spot of the world.  The geese have flown over to their daytime home on the canal.  Someone even suggested a simple solution to the problem of the water leak at the garden centre which has blocked the road there.  Catch the 590 bus up to it, walk the 100 feet or so round the problem and then catch the next 590 bus to Rochdale.  But I am sure there will be grumbles anyway, I call that slow living.

Yesterday my books came through from WOB (World of Books). Four to be precise, one was free, but it cleverly balanced the parcel up nicely.  You pay about £3.50 for paperbacks, often in a very good condition and you can return them and get some of your money back.  A bit like the leaving of books on public benches started up a few years back.

I have collected books  for years, and over the last few years have had major clear outs.  At one stage in my 20s had a love affair with Victorian writers.  Carlyle and Ruskin come to mind though William Morris wrote plenty.

You will see in the rather bad photo that three are by Horatio Claire, he is an excellent writer.  His lyrical prose flows so easily, especially in the book I have started to read 'The Light in the Dark - a Winter Journal' catching that terrible gray coldness in this part of the Yorkshire landscape.  For someone who is used to the soft creamy tones of Bath's building, the grey round here brings the soul to a sad place. Three books by him and another by Olivia Laing.

On top of the books is one I could not give away, 'Aesop's Fables' by Samuel Croxall.  A small book of silly tales dated 1847.  The other old books kept back were the six small volumes of the Illiad, probably for those word that appears somewhere in them - "his words fell like snow upon the ground".  Melting away into one's consciousness I think.

A painting by John William Inchbold, A study, in March 1855 taken from Christa Zaat compilation of artists that runs through her F/B site. She gives a detailed account of this artist.  I see he is moved by the Pre-Raphaelites style but develops his own in the end.  I am not snobby about the Pre-Raphaelites;) I know words like 'drippy females' are given to the paintings but they were painting, and writing very dire poetry, in a time when there was a breakaway from the 'brown studies' of the earlier painters.

  

The following words taken from  Christa Zaat site.

"Inchbold was one of several young landscape artists to be inspired by the Pre-Raphaelites. The praise and patronage of Ruskin launched him on his career in 1855, but by the late 1850s he had moved away from the tenets of strict observation towards a more personal style and a looser, more experimental technique. Like the painter AW Hunt, he was also a poet, and he found it hard to make a living by his watercolours. In 1886–7 he made his last long painting tour, exploring the Mediterranean coast from the south of France to Naples; "

And now for coffee.

Edit: I had forgotten to write about the roses Lillie brought back from Aldi last night. Three bunches, pink, yellow and a deep red. They are for you granny she said and to make the house nice. So as I record the roses I love through F/B has she understood that one can love flowers for their own sake. She is a very giving child and hardworking as well. As she goes off to Beavers or Scouts a couple of evenings a week. Then working at the cafe over the weekend, though she has her full grant for uni.

9th May 2024

 Lillie comes into the kitchen excitedly we've got to get the bus up to Bacup she says.  Transport has gone awry once more.  The Rochdale road is closed after Riggs, the nursery centre, because of a water leak.  You can drive through Riggs car park and go round the centre and out the other side.  But hey this is the main road to Rochdale and there will be terrible confusion.

This comes from the fact that all transport out of Todmorden has only three road exits through the narrow valleys.  The only other option is to go up over the 'tops' or the moors.  My daughter who always travels by train, can't catch a train because they are on strike today, so rather than come home tonight she will sleep over at Tom and Ellie's house.

The infrastructure is definitely creaking, and who were the persons who could not be arsed to get HS2 up here, can we please have any of the money left over from that debacle to upgrade.  Firstly, our roads, then the bus system and then the railway.  Cars (going into deep waters here) are a nuisance, everyone for a start wants the ability to draw their car right up to where they want to go.  Complain bitterly about the price of car parks.  I join with Andy Burnham here modernise the transport system.

When I have my tablet out early in the morning I watch little videos of other countries.  This morning it happened to be Russia.  High up in the tree covered mountains, a little old lady of 96 years cooked the meals for herself and her son.  She spun wool quietly I expect from the goats outside, cooked on a Russian stove and generally coped with the life given to her.  The other family featured  obviously had more wealth in animals.  Two horses, cows, chickens and cats and dog.  Obviously wealthier as a farmer he also had a tractor used for clearing the snow, piles of which grew taller than the houses.

The farmer's wife, cooked a large chicken till it browned beautifully, made strange little flat dough cakes which she solemnly ate with her old mother and a friend, after having said their prayers.  Do you remember when we had to say Grace when young.  It is a good habit, overstuffed supermarkets have taken away the act of being thankful for food, but it is wise to remember that supermarkets are but two days (or maybe more) away from empty shelves when we all panic.

But all I heard in the news that someone 'had crossed the floor' yes they are deserting the conservative party.  Well not exactly only two have crossed over for the moment.  One very right-wing, so it will be interesting to see how she fares.  I expect when she has stopped bobbing up from behind Keir Starmer, she will gracefully exit towards the back bench.

Give me strength!

8th May 2024 - Reincarnation must not include 8 legs!

 And so the stories begin: This morning I rescued a spider. The female element in this household screams when they see one.  It was small about 8 millimetres, not 8 centimetres, which even I would have had trouble with.  It is now safely outside and not sucked up by the vacuum cleaner which I think is a terrible death.

The above photo is of Paul and Moss in a church porch, I think probably in Maldon in Essex, for there are flints on the wall.  I remember having read of the Battle of Maldon, a poem in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles and been intrigued as to where the island was on which the battle was fought, I have written about it elsewhere.  I framed this photo because it caught Paul's smile and Moss's eagerness in our exploration of churches.

But what came to mind today was the cockchafer Moss brought into the house one morning in May many years ago.  A large, what I thought at the time was a beetle,it is a  type of beetle but classed in a different classification  and has plenty of stories to tell through time.  Of course it eats our crops therefore war was declared on it, though I think they now use a nematode mixture on them.  And if you read the article in the Wiki above you will find it will metamorphise into different stages of egg, larvae, pupae and adults.  It is also called the doodlebug, and when in later years I looked out for it, it did indeed have a slow bumbling flight.

The common cockchafer

It falls under the classification of Scarab beetle, and the link with Paul is that he always wore a Scarab beetle gold ring when going out, which he had bought in Egypt.

Which brought to mind the other story of a beetle I had written about, this is the Tamamushi beetle in Japan its vibrant colour used as decoration in the early Asuka shrine, the beginnings of Buddhism in Japan.  Paul had one in his collection of minerals and paint materials, you can see how it gleams.

Painting with flowers

T.J. Maher - artist, gardener and Buddhist, he lives in Ireland, Wicklow I think.  His garden is based around colour and I found him on F/B a few weeks back.  He is obviously in love with the growing of plants blending their colours together.  He says in the video that he loves the animals and insects that are attracted to his garden.  And only yesterday I heard that it is our gardens with their mélange of plant life that is the most popular with our insects and birds.

I lost the text of what I was writing, on a hunt for Claude Monet's painting of Irises at Giverny, but he was the only one I could come up with.

Joy in life and of course the 'now' of life is expressed in the word Maher chose to call his garden Patthana and I notice he offers a retreat this summer.

The site can be found here. 

7th May 2024

Ricki Sunak says the results last week were 'visually disappointing'.  A slight understatement but come on Conservatives gather your forces and enter the battle with noble hearts!  The thing about the British mercurial voter is they play around with their vote.  But I am just happy for the fact that the mayors are Labour here in the North and that devolution has begun.  Taken from this link. 

I hope before the Grim Reaper takes me, to see more Independents running for office and government taken more seriously, less in-fighting and hopefully a stop put on the Stock Market selling our assets and utilities as a way of making a profit for the few.  For letting those same utilities fall short of good working conditions is a disgrace.  Like the fly-tippers, water companies have now used our rivers to dump sewage.

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Listening to Olivia Laing's book this weekend and doing some research work on her.  She lives in a small village in Suffolk, with her husband Ian Patterson, who is a poet.  They have bought the most idyllic house called Magnolia House, 18c with a garden, which is not particularly big but has 'rooms'.  It was designed by a previous owner, Mark Rumary,  a garden designer.  There is a 'paradise garden' which has a quatrefoil pool and a library garden.  When first bought, not so long ago, the garden was neglected but Laing worked tirelessly on it and it can now be seen on those special garden days (9th June) when gardens are open.  The link is here.  A gorgeous photo of a rose covered front to the house, but who gets up there and deadheads I wonder ;)

I have finished Horatio Claire's book Heavy Light. A good description of a book that covers madness.  I think the author has done a very  perceptive account of his illness.  But the last few chapters, exploring the medication of mental illness is very striking.

4th May 2024

 We seem to be in a period of nostalgic music in our particular corner of blogland but for me the following Victorian Garden Suite by Paul Reade is still a favourite.  I loved the television programme many years ago and this music captures the melancholic notes of a garden.  There is a delight when spring comes around, everything is fresh and vital, pale green turning to a darker hue and then that moment in August as the dustiness starts to dry out the leaf and death takes centre stage, but it is a long time coming.

Yesterday I found Olivia Laing's - Garden Against Time on Audible so shall listen to it.  In the first chapter I recognise old names as she sweeps from Sissinghurst to Great Dixter.  Vita Sackville, Christopher Lloyd and of course Gertrude Jekyll and just to remember my favourite gardening book W.Robinson as he ponderously writes in the late Victoria era about the 'The English Flower Garden'.

Interesting news: Not exactly.  Marc Quinn a modern visionary, taking in several art forms has an exhibition at Kew Gardens of giant bronze flowers, bonsai and other things.  Listening to him this morning, he made the excellent point that flowers look very large to bees.  But a bit like another artist who pickled poor calves in formaldehyde, he uses blood to smear on his statues?  You should read what he did to his head??

Something calmer anyway.

Hands across the water

 The Family:  Lillie is off camping in Harrogate with the Beavers for the weekend - 60 of them and approximately  half that number of adults.  She is a scout leader.

Four days away, a rather large amount of luggage, and for the last few days, most of her wardrobe which had been washed hanging around in the kitchen, ready to be taken.  Luckily she desisted and took what was required on the list.  But this morning a large white carrier bag was on the table with the blow-up mattress.  The bag had gold leaf writing and sported the name that it was Prada.  Who shops at Prada I asked surprised the bag was of course from Ben, who is often over in Paris buying stuff for his clients, he is an up and coming stylist and it struck me this morning that he looks a lot like Paul MacCartney in his younger days.  This was courtesy of Tasker putting on the album of PM.  I will put the link down below, it seemed such innocent days then.

I brooded on the brother and sister relationship, Ben and Matilda in London, out to seek their fortunes, one dark haired the other blonde.  They will be a help to each other, Matilda is aiming for fashion journalism, so they are always going to be fairly close.  She has just finished her exams and messages came through she had voted, though they had not wanted to see her ID at the polling station.

Lillie of course was demanding we all vote, I did postal.  It will be interesting to see the restructuring of political parties today.

And here is Tasker's link to the music, which I will probably play all day! Not forgetting to listen out for the Amazon driver who has a parcel for Lillie.

Post script: Today I woke up miserable had had an unsettling phone conversation with someone in authority yesterday, but there again I have been watching older people talk of finding peace in their world - balance one against the other!

Edit:  Book on my must buy list Olivia Laing - The Garden Against Time

There is a guest essay from her in The New York Times.

Creating a space

Thoughts drawn together; Or, "clearing the mind and sliding into that created space"  I have two pretty granddaughters both entering the world as independents.  They are not defenseless but well aware of the world around them but then things do happen. Lillie came back  last night she was worried about a man who sat down beside her on the bus when there were plenty of empty seats, this wasn't the first time he had done it.  Matilda got harassed by someone on the internet, luckily she is a student amongst other students who come from the good and worthy families of this country.  And one of the fathers had a contact with the FBI and the wretched  man  disappeared off the net.  So no matter how careful we are, our young are vulnerable.

But earlier that day I had been perusing my F/B page and looked at Rebecca Solnit column and found out that there is an ongoing thread about bears, comparing the danger of bears killing woman - 8 and men killing women - 12000.  This of course in America.  It led me back to Smokey the Bear, I have copied Gary Snyder's Smokey Bear  here. 

Most men act round women in a normal day to day way, but there are a very small percentage who view, and a great deal larger amount in other countries, who see women as inferior (no jokes there please).  Picking up the thread who view women as prey.  I doubt that it will  be otherwise, and for all the talk of cancel culture, wokeness it will always be there.

Actually yesterday I listened to the problems of teenage boys on Woman's Hour as to how to approach females when they wanted to go further then a chaste kiss - always there are more problems than answers!

Still it brought me back to Gary Snyder and his poetry - 'Mountains and Rivers Without End'

And just something musical.  A rather sad but silly green protest on You Tube

Bits and bobs

 

In the darkness

This is a print by Jane Tomlinson and though it has a childish element, it reflects some of my life.  It represents the birds, animals and megalithic stones that slowly revolve round in my head.  I can see Silbury Hill, Wayland's Smithy long barrow, the Uffington Horse.  Though I have never quite worked out the white oxen (which you can't see for reflection).  Jane also does maps, and has even won an award for her Shipping Forecast one, which you can find here.

The basket, it has turned slightly asymmetrical but normally it has a straight top

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The other thing I have been looking through are the churches we visited, and now I have worked how to get photos up on my blog.  The ones below was an ideal talking point, in my head at least;)

So what caught my  attention this morning.  It was pudding stone in Essex.  Essex as a county, as is most of the Eastern side of England, a megalithic stone desert.  Yet they do crop up here and there, like Alphamstone church (but is it a stone circle???) which is presumed to have a small glacial outcrop of stones down y the River Stour.  And here at Little Baddow church.

Now if you are building a great cathedral or abbey, the stone would be quarried from one place, there would be an uniformity of design, yet in these small country churches you used whatever was to hand.  Old tumbled down Roman villas, Saxon churches and any local stone you could find.  This of course was flint, and its neatness was banded into the wall. But there are also courses of pudding stone.  From a distance it looks like mussels clinging tightly to the rock.

In the link below, the archaeologist refers to possible sites of ritual significance in prehistoric time, and it is definitely one of the things to look out for when walking round churches.

I think the Pewsey church in the Pewsey valley in Wiltshire the most sacred of spots with its old Yew tree and the wooden covers that hide below the great stones that once may have been a stone circle.  One religion crushing another.

 

Christianity makes it slow progress to convert  the heathens

Pope Gregory's answer to a letter from Augustine in the 7th century as they tackle the native paganism in England, converting the Anglo-Saxons.

"Because they (the English) are in the habit of slaughtering much cattle as sacrifices to devils, some solemnity ought to be given in exchange for this. So on the day of the dedication or the festivals of the holy martyrs, whose relics are deposited there, let them make themselves huts from the branches of trees around the churches which have been converted out of shrines, and let them celebrate the solemnity with religious feast.
Do not let them sacrifice animals to the devil, but let them slaughter animals for their own food to the praise of god, and let them give thanks to the giver of things for his bountiful provision."

Alphamstone: Were these ice age rocks an ancient sacred place? - BBC News

29th April 2024

 We had a power cut this morning.  For a short time we had the fun of candles, though of course it was getting light.  Also, the Aga produced tea and toast without any problem and then of course the power came back  at 7-0-clock.  It knocked out the internet, but was eventually righted by turning the router off, leaving a couple of minutes, and then turning it back on.

Our willow lessons went off very well, now I have a small basket for my patchwork, but will admit that Joe our teacher wove much of it.  It is much more difficult than I expected, the different stitching seeming to change every ten minutes or so but our teacher Joe was superb, and so patient.

The willow classes are had in the Willow Cafe, so we can get any drinks or food downstairs, I had a delicious Vegan puff pastry, when I crashed out yesterday with hunger,  I have a tendency to faint, if I am not fed regularly;)

Weirdly enough there was someone from Bath there.  She said it with a short 'a' in typical Yorkshire way, I say the long 'A', which of course sounds more pretentious and is always picked up by someone who will mimic me. But believe me it goes against every grain in my body to speak in a flat tonal.

Joe was obviously a great expert on willow, and she sees it as having a spirit of its own.  One thing she said was that climate change is affecting the willows as well.  There were some lovely colours,  from a coppery one, to the shiny grey edging on mine and a dark green band in the centre of the basket.

26th April 2024

 I did a silly thing yesterday, deleted (by accident) my links on the side bar.  But there is always a silver lining to be had when you make foolish moves.  I found extra Paul's blogs.  His most important one being the Megalithic Poems one.  He collected them over the years on The Modern Antiquarian, though I see the idea has happened elsewhere, or at least they have copied the idea but that is good, it puts the poems out into the world.

So over time I shall remember the names that used to be on the side and trace them, I have already started and it is a very enjoyable journey.  Over the weekend I do my weaving course in willow basketry at the aptly named Willow Cafe.

25th April 2024

 Well this is not a rant but an observation.  In this household, people order things. Parcels come to the door regularly and as I am the only one in the house I have to be on alert to hear them.  So slightly worried I have notes stuck to the front and back door, one which says 'knock loudly'  the other please slip the parcels inside the door.  All our 'eco' stuff comes through the post, so it is not all frivolous stuff.

So, when the two came back from Switzerland last Monday, my daughter had ordered a takeaway for tea. My granddaughter answered the door to the driver and he mentioned the note.

Well lots of the drivers make jokes to me as well and it doesn't worry me at all, but Lillie was obviously embarrassed and said why did we have to have to notes on the door. 

We could have a bell I suppose, but there are strong stone pillars on either side which are terrible to drill in, as we found out when I demanded a number on the door for said drivers to find us! Someone mentioned a wireless doorbell but I rather fancy the CTV camera in which you can watch your dog use the doorbell which tickles me but we haven't got a dog only a resident deaf cat who can't be let out.

I feel for these drivers as they stand on the doorstep in the pouring rain, trying to keep on schedule for a heavy workload, it is hard labour and we should speak out against it for better pay and working conditions.  Technology has given us good tracking systems so that a delivery can make its way straight to your door through Google guidance. 

We have in this town pick-up points for parcels, at Morrison and Lidl supermarkets, the train station and 'One Stop' so the underpinning of another change in how we live is slowly being evolved.

24th April 2024

 Sometimes just sometimes I could scream at the internet.  Today is one of them.  QR codes, can I upload from the medicine company I am trying to establish my ID with - no way.  It all began...... when my  BP pills prescription had not come through.  So I thought to order privately, a hopeless task and probably by tomorrow or next day the order will be cancelled because of zero ID and hopefully I should get my money back.  On phoning the doctor's surgery, they had never received my prescription but have promised my pills in two days.  Wonder if someone nicks the prescription forms out of the box, I do like a drama ;)

The other thing that has happened is that when I went to have the lenses in my glasses changed, only one lense on two pairs of glasses, the girl who did it on my two pairs of glasses got it wrong, so now my short sighted glasses have changed to my long sighted ones.  So another trip on the bus to Hebden Bridge.

Actually if I want to go on the train alone without a family member I am stuck if I do not have my train ticket on my phone.  But A) I don't know how to do it and B) my phone seems to go dark when outside and I need to change my glasses - this is followed by a lot of swearwords!

I managed when we changed gas years ago and I managed when we went on the metric system but I am damned if I can manage my phone!

Minor rant over.

Hocking Hills State Park

Then I went downstairs for lunch and found a postcard from a dear friend in America which cheered me up.  So thank you Loie, I know you sometime read my blog.  Sadly in this country the mink you mention would probably be shot.  Eating local creatures and especially the water vole makes it a vicious predator.  I see they are American, the mink in England got out because unfortunately the mink were in fur farms.  They were released by people to give them freedom and have colonised our river banks ever since,

But indeed the park is an incredibly beautiful place with all its waterfalls.

22nd April 2024

Inclusive or Exclusion?  Guardian article

"Lord Pannick, a British barrister and a crossbencher in the House of Lords whose opinion was commissioned by several members of the club, said that the pronoun ‘he’ is interchangeable with ‘she’ in the law, meaning the club’s current rules already allow women to join."

That made me chuckle this morning.  There has been some action over the male only Garrick club in London, and everyone has been getting their knickers in a twist over it.  Several outstanding females have been proposed to join the club, including Dame Mary Beard.  Though she has said should the male members of the club rule otherwise she will accept it and not legally challenge.

There is an argument for women joining the club, though I am sure its austere interior and subdued talk will not go well with the ladies tinkling talk, but that is just a small matter.  There does seem an unfair advantage when the 'great and good' males of the country exclude women from the top jobs that are obviously discussed and commented on within its austere walls.

I am listening to Nick Drake at the moment to banish from my head the Abba songs.  These earworms are such an annoyance and I shall be glad when the BBC stops reminding me of them.

Voice From the Mountain 

21st April 2024 - this and that

Cabinets of Curiosity: There was and is, a great desire to collect bits and bobs.  It doesn't matter what but a good way of displaying those small finds was a cabinet and I see that there is a small exhibition at The Folklore Centre just round the corner.  I will give you the title and then explain a couple of the words....... Museum of Monotropism by Tzipporah Johnston.

Monotropism is a "Monotropism is a theory of autism that explains how autistic people tend to have their attention pulled more strongly towards a smaller number of interests"

I think many of us might be so inclined but it is one of the things identified over the last few years.  And now for that gorgeous name, how do you pronounce it for a start?

"Tzipporah is a feminine name with  Hebrew origins, originating from the name Zipporah and is ultimately derived from the Hebrew word Tzippor meaning 'bird'."  

Well there's the explanations, learning something every day is not a bad thing.  As I went to a meeting yesterday I did not look at the exhibition (it is very small) but listened to the speaker dutifully.  And learnt what I had already thought that there wasn't much of a history about springs on this side of Yorkshire, or their magic.  There  again it would probably take a few more years of my life to track the necessary history down.  Michael Dames said something relevant about the logical and analytical work of the archaeologist as opposed to a much freer reign of thought.*....

 "the historian R. Hutton, summarises the beneficial effect of the analytical approach to the goddess, favoured by pre-historians: ‘She has been blown to pieces for ever by them. There is no possible answer to their analysis.’  Analysis again!"

It is very true that archaeologists abide by their discipline and do not stray into the land of imagination, and definitely from their secular views into the house of religion.  But the once head of English Heritage, Geoffrey Wainwright moved to the Presceli mountains in his retirement and listened to the music of the stones ;) though of course in reality he was trying to find the exact quarry where the bluestones of Stonehenge came from.

* That statement is not quite accurate, after all there are books written on the 'warrior' cultures and the prehistoric cultures of religion but they often follow each other ideas and there is only a few archaeologists that seem to break out of the mold of recording the physical finds, which is probably a good thing anyway.  After all who wants woo-woo ;)

19th April 2024

Here I sit drinking coffee with Mollie glaring at me sitting at the window.  What have I done? Given her one of the tins she doesn't like.  So when she gets cross, she will do something wicked in her estimation.  Either claw the settee or the carpet.  If I tell her to stop, I sometimes get an angry very loud reply.  The battle of food has begun!

A name came to mind this morning, an author I had read years ago, the word esoteric would perhaps be applied to him.  He is described as a mythologist, spanning the world between archaeology and myth.

I read a lot at one time, and because of my blog was able to record the books I read.  Perhaps a name would be in order, Michael Dames, he published a lovely book on Ireland which I can still remember, and he tackled Silbury Hill as well. It is his book on Silbury Treasure that I must have read, it is full of imaginary vision.  Making Silbury into a mother goddess and whether you want to believe that or not (I don't) but it definitely stretches the mind.  

I wrote a lot about it at the time, especially as English Heritage was tunnelling into the hill to mend a hole that had mysteriously appeared at the top.  Alisdair Whittle had written a book on what was found inside, a concise thorough archeological survey - Sacred Mound, Holy Rings - which I managed to get from the library, he listed the plant material, you will find it here, the plants buried beneath the chalk material of the hill.  You will find that there were 'strings' radiating across an inner barrow which was outlined with small stones.

 

 

North Stoke: Tuesday and memories

North Stoke: Notes on the word Kennet

North Stoke: Miscellaneous

North Stoke: Silbury Hill seeds

The Silbury Monument Michael Dames (artcornwall.org)

20th April 2024 - Springs

Rabbiting" Richard Armer:

"You don’t grow old in Yorkshire.

The Dales are ageless too.

You’ll walk amongst the heather, drift into a different age.

The gorse and bracken timeless they free you from the cage.

The rivers, streams and tarns will forever fill your dreams.

So take a walk up the fell and be a child for good.

A day amongst the Yorkshire wild will leave you feeling how you should." 

Later today I am going to a meeting on Springs and Wells at the Folklore Centre so I thought I would look up a couple of 'sacred' wells that I had been to. The first is 'Old Wife's Well' near to Wheeldale and just before you go past the supposed old Roman Road...... taken from here

Signs of modern day acknowledgement of 'sacredness' with the clooties hanging

The other one of course is the Swallowhead Spring in the Avebury area, with a great deal of sanctity with modern day pagans.  Springs are quite interesting there are some around Silbury Hill which maybe one of the reasons the mound was built.  I shall have to study spring lines which seem to go through the landscape joined together?  It makes you think of ley lines if you are that way inclined.

The two streams or river and stream that meet here belong to the winterbournes, which means they only appear in winter.  I love this willow, a true Tolkien tree, but not for its clooties which I find rather ugly.  Unspoilt nature is what I prefer.  I remember coming to this spot and a good Christian had put up an angry typed missive accusing paganism of goodness knows what. I took it away.

The configuration of Swallowhead Spring can be found on the map on Michael Dames thesis here 

It's all about stones

This is not really interesting to most blog readers, but Jennie asked a question and I started pondering;) 

Taken from the following site

The Oxenham Arms Standing Stone

The other day I came across on a website a large standing stone within the building of a pub on Dartmoor.  So intrigued I went looking, not much information on it, I think because archaeologically it is impossible to gain any insight into it.  It had obviously been there when the house was built and embraced in a wall rather than take it out.  It is a large stone and there is, written down, talk of it going 26 feet deep.  The Rudston Monolith situated in Yorkshire had similar depth I believe.

Rudstone Monolith

The story goes that there was a religious site on it and in the early 14th century the land was taken over by the Burgoyne family and it became a manor house.  Turning now into a very fine pub.  Though I looked for archaelogical stuff on it, there was hardly anything, frazzled by Pastscape and when did British Online History devolve to encompass everything I did not need to know? 

The stone stands there mysteriously in the wall, enormous for this end of England which is Dartmoor but surprisingly near to other prehistoric bits and pieces, which includes a stone circle and a ceremonial path way of stones.

All intriguing of course, did some religious person centuries ago come on this great pagan stone and decided to Christianise it, and slowly it became a focus to build round it.  Just like the Rudston Monolith of course, posed so near to the church.

There are always a lot of questions to be asked and answered in the prehistoric world, Tom provided one the other day when he said how did they manage to balance a heavy capstone on two support stones on the Carreg Coetan Arthur cromlech.  I expect it  was slippage of the other two stones, and the weight bearing of the capstone just settling down over the centuries.  In fact the stones went down another metre into the earth, or probably to be more accurate it was accumulation of soil on top through time.  What we see today is not the 'actuality' of 5000 years ago. 

Someone's impression on it on The Modern Antiquarian site

The Pointed Stone in the Icy Corner

16th April 2024

A moss garden.  Not to be walked on but a place to contemplate and meditate

Mostly this is family news.  How I wish that people all over the world could sit down and write with joy about their family, the heartbreak is almost unbearable.  Tensions come and go.

We had raclette for tea last night, the Swiss poor man's cheese and potatoes dish we all love, though Lillie cooked some steak on the top of the raclette oven.  Eaten with pickles to breakdown the cheese in your stomach, never forget to do this, and drink wine or tea as well.  End of raclette sermon.

My daughter is off to Switzerland over the weekend with Andrew, she will be carrying English extra mature cheddar for her aunt who has requested it.  The cheese basket in the fridge was so heavy when I lifted it out yesterday I thought she was going to start a cheese shop.  Karen brings back the Fondue and Raclette cheeses and chocolate; chocolate which is so expensive and I am not sure that it is any different to good chocolate you can buy in this country.

Nestles, as I remember, was in Vevey, and there were plenty of British expats around who worked there.  And of course 'grandpa's church' where he was church warden. 

The only other thing of interest (to me) is that we are due to have elections of mayors.  Andy Burnham, mayor of Greater Manchester is standing for re-election again.  Sure he will get in.  I noticed from his last missive that he belongs to The Labour and Co-operative Party which I presume is left of centre and a step down from Kier Starmer's more right wing presence.  Also, another mayor to watch is Tracy Brabin, again a member of the above political party.  Is this a move away Up North from the stridency of Starmer.  We belong to a group of wards and have five candidates to choose from, my choice will be between Tracy Brabin or the Green Party member.

Will we have the old values of the Co-op resurfacing round here in our mixed communities?  Devolution maybe, okay I am joking, but Manchester could rival London any day.

Another two members of the family are out in Japan, Tom and Ellie are spending two weeks there, both in Tokyo and Kyoto.  I can see their photos on Instagram.  Paul said I would never cope in Tokyo with the great rush of people in the city and the packed trains. I get rather panic-stricken in big cities and towns much preferring the little country towns, especially round North Yorkshire.

An old blog

Cloud bushes - Imperial Gardens

15th April 2024

I have been slightly down the last few days, life is quiet and the news in the background holds  a threat.  I get told to get out of bed by 7 0 clock in the morning by Mollie, so that she can sleep on it in peace and quiet and I begin to wonder should I be ordered around by a cat. 

I have been watching lots of The Last Homely House videos on quilting but somehow I think it is more a way of life they are projecting a bit like that American old series - Little House on the Prairie, but the family have comforting overtones.  The other video I am watching is about 'at home surviving in the wild' and about a Scottish couple, who are looking after a small cottage on a tiny island.  What is rather magical about it is the layers of history in this small snapshot of an island that is just off the land by a loch.  

The first thing you notice is to live the self-sufficient life you need an awful lot of stuff to survive, and expensive videoing equipment to record their daily life and support it.  Yes, well........ I suppose the pioneering spirit still lives on.

Outside the wind rattles away and the rain falls heavily on the Velux windows and the weather gets colder.  I have been doing a bit of sorting out.  Each year I make a note of the clothes I have and see what else is needed, obviously another rain mac would not come amiss.

We all wait, not exactly with baited breath, for a date for the next election.  Lillie wants it after the 10th June, her birthday, when she will be 18 and ready to vote.  Andrew Rawnsley says we should not be too worried about Labour getting in and the money needed to be spent.  Perhaps we have all turned into worryguts over everything, but £16 for olive oil from Waitrose? okay that was a joke, Lidl sells it at £6.

Magpie habit of picking things up

Things I pick up along the way, or taking a leaf from someone's blog .....

The Buddha of Eternal Light

 “When the wind blows, the downy willow seed floats away” is a Zen koan 

Guess what these scissors are used for?

Chateau.......? Think Byron

Nature's first green is gold,

Her hardest hue to hold.

Her early leaf's a flower;

But only so an hour.

Then leaf subsides to leaf.

So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day.

Nothing gold can stay.

~ Robert Frost

And perhaps Bede for I love the story of the sparrow flying through the Saxon hall telling us that nothing really changes.

“The present life of man upon earth, O King, seems to me in comparison with that time which is unknown to us like the swift flight of a sparrow through the mead-hall where you sit at supper in winter, with your Ealdormen and Thanes, while the fire blazes in the midst and the hall is warmed, but the wintry storms of rain or snow are raging abroad. The sparrow, flying in at one door and immediately out at another, whilst he is within, is safe from the wintry tempest, but after a short space of fair weather, he immediately vanishes out of your sight, passing from winter to winter again. So this life of man appears for a little while, but of what is to follow or what went before we know nothing at all.”

 Bede - The Ecclesiastical