Today I sat in a beautiful cairn circle. The curlews were screeching, the sun was shining and everything in the world was perfect.
I thought to myself about what the MA site has achieved.
We live in these overcrowded little Islands, even our agriculture is industrial yet these sites survive. They are at the margins but they're here.
They force us to leave our cities and roads and get out onto the moortops and fells and discover them. Each time we find one of these sites we have completed a journey and found ourselves a little.
It fills me with wonder and a little envy to read about AQ's adventures and 4W's projects but we are all adventurers.
It reminds me of Ewan Macolls lyric to the mass trespass anthem The Manchester Rambler, "I may be a wage slave on Monday, but I am a free man on Sunday"
Look at this site, it's fuckin amazing what we have achieved.
AREN'T WE BEAUTIFUL
on this beautiful morning as i pack the lunchboxes and prepare for the hideousness that is the school run! i read your post and thought how right you are! on this site i feel lucky enough to share in people's journeys, hopes and dreams.. and at last through the love, acceptance and honesty that breathes through the words of all these beautiful people, i feel i have finally found a place where i can be brave enough to share some of my own... who'd have thought that some ancient rocks would be able to inspire all this?!
let's all enjoy the journey!! peace x
You're right, they're like little pilgrimages. you never know quite how the journey's going to turn out, what you'll find when you get there, or if you'll get there at all.
I was having similar thoughts yesterday as I crossed the car park in the sun (not as romantic as on the moors), thinking about how although this site is just a 'virtual' thing, it links people with shared ideas together in their own visits to very real places. Much more real than bloody cities. 'snice.
You've got me all excited now.!
Off to Wales early tommorrow morning to to a bit of Stone Hunting, got myself a nice new OS map, got a few plans , but basically just gonna wander and see where it gets us.
I hope to be sitting in some windswept circle, with no-one around at this time tommorow, just taking it all in.
sorry we know that this isnt relevant, but "are you local" to the cleveland area that is? Its just we noticed that you seem to have some good books about the area and there are some sites that we wouldnt mind more info on.
Cheers!
Fitz- you are so right.
Folks have knocked the MA site in the past- 'it's not quite *the* best at this, not quite *the* best at that'. so fuckin what. What this site does (and no other site has) is to further inspire my sense of wonder in the monuments that have been left to us by our ancient ancestors- our greatest grandmothers and greatest grandfathers.
I used to think I was very alone in my need to visit megaliths (jeez- this sounds like megalithomaniacs anonymous- 'hello- my name's Martin and I am *have* to visit old stones on a regular basis'!!), but no- there are others who constantly dirve me on. All of my journeys to megaliths feel like pilgrimages- I think I've said it in the past- but even those I travel to within Edinburgh on our local buses- the getting on of the bus feels sacred.
The thing is- even if the MA didn't exist- I'd still be doing all this- I have for as long as I can remember been interested in megaliths. I'd still be out in the hills and fields in all Seasons, but nobody else would ever read my fieldnotes, no one would ever see my pics. We have this wonderful site in which to share all of these- I like nothing better than reading other folks fieldnotes of sites I have visited and knowing what they got from the place.
The MA is one of the first things I check every day- keeping up to date with FourWinds latest postings, readin about RiotGibbons trips, AQ's huge eruditic entries, checking out the latest entry from any of the Scottish Posse (a personal interest ;)).
I was writing up my fieldnotes from my latest trip up North- my wife was joking with some folk- 'he travels round looking at old stones then goes away and writes to all his imaginary friends on the internet'- made me laugh! But only last week I was in a wood in the shadow of Dunsinane having my head beautifully fucked by a monolith in the centre of a circle, my eyes blinded by sun filtering through trees and I too though- yeh this is so good- I can't wait to tell other on the MA about this......
I have spent the last two weekends visiting various sites The Hoar Stone and the Rollrights etc a couple of weeks ago and a tour of some of the Aberdeenshire sites with Moey last weekend and it never ceases to amaze me just how fantastic these places are. And this can be in scale, location or sensation for example The Standing Stones of Stennes encapsulate all three - (and I have never felt so calm and relaxed in my life as I did sitting against one of the Stones at Stennes one sunny evening taking it all in, months of tension and stress evaporated almost immediately)
I have been to some fantastic places maybe some that I never would have imagined myself going to because of the Modern Antiquarian. I saw Copey a couple of times on his TMA promotonal tour and he said that one reason for writing the book was to get people out of the cities and exploring the countryside in my case its mission accomplished although I don't get out nearly as often as I would like.
My mission for this year is to get out exploring as often as possible especially as most of last year was a washout due to the Foot and Mouth thing.
Anyway thanks Julian for writing the book and thank you to you all for contributing to the TMA site as it is an invaluable tool in conjunction with the book in planning expeditions.
See ya
Joolio
You know, drude, only the cold-hearted and the cynic can honestly believe the search for stones is but an eccentric pastime. As you sat inside the cairn you were looking for that moment of vision to let you get through another week working for the man. I was asked recently 'why visit so many stone sites'. The answer is so clear to me but it needed some kind of elaborate reply. The truth is, it is the best excuse to get OUT THERE. But deep inside us the 'human' in us remains dusty and rejected. How many folks these days freak out in pure bliss on a plot of empty land without the need for empty fun or entertainment gadgets? This is what humanity's been most famous for in the universe and yet, only a century or so ago, things changed and we are as distant from our glory as we are ignorant of our planetary neighbours.
Every trip to the stones reveals an intricate world of devout faith to the earth and inter-action with the natural, a Game played by our ancestors until recently that consisted of the only raw materials available. Every single drop and every single chip of stone adored. You know, I was taken recently to an ancient copper-age mine near an intense dolmen area, I was thinking, hell, too scary to go down the hole, etc But the place was a small open recess in the hill that showed an intense blue and green tinge that *blinded* me in my XXIst century plastic mind. You could even scrape it off the surface!
It is this intensity to appreciate every single moment of our lives that is so simple, so innocent and yet so pure that the ancients relied on and made evident in their monuments. The godlike visionary genius we all possess is not lying in some unknown corner of our brains or some alien-given gimmick, it is just the patience to unwind, turn off ALL of the lights and gaze at the gorgeous stars that people our skies every single day of our lives. And we have, almost without knowing, turned ourselves into a Megalithic Mystery, boring ourselves into oblivion.
A big space "WOW!" at your post Fitz. Such posi-affirming thoughts are welcome round the Cat Pod and you post was a joy to read.
I gotta admit, in reference to TMA I don't get to see a microfraction of the sights I wanna see. I don't drive and at the moment at least I have very little of your earth monies.
But I do try and take time out to at least scrabble at the hemline of some of the daily wonderment out there, whether its taking pics of it or just being in the same airspace.
It can get a bit overwhelming on here sometimes with the hardcore explorers with GPS's and a billion exploits under their belts & so on - but your post at least (re) awoke me to the travels and wonders I see, no matter who microcosmic the scale.
Funny really....while obviously this portion of HH is designed to look at MEGA liths.....perhaps my second looks at raindrops on a table ain't so small after all.
Nice one dudester. x
A songwriter once said quite simply "the secret to life is enjoying the passage of time"
And that just about sums it up in a nutshell!!
You (and most of us here I think) have the secret of life, finding true enjoyment, enjoying the ride.
Some say after a certain age "it's all down hill"; well that can be positive, I'm all for travelling down hill as opposed to up!
Best