Avebury

The village of Avebury in Wiltshire is home to the largest Stone Circle in England. The Circle is approached by a long avenue of paired standing stones called the West Kennet Avenue. Imagine the large ceremonial processions of robed Druids and followers who must have walked its length at one time! As shown in the following photo, enough stones still remain to give you a feel for its past glory. On the morning we were there, cows shared the Avenue with us, munching grass as we walked by.

Unfortunately, the ancient Circle and Avenue are today bisected by a roadway leading to the village of Avebury. So a few of the Avenue's stones now find themselves isolated across the road, like this one:

At the end of the Avenue is a huge tree. Walking past it, you come to two great megaliths which form a ceremonial entrance to the Circle. One of these stones has a large indentation like a built-in seat. (You can see it in the upcoming panoramic photo of the Circle). Druids and pagans call this stone "the Old Woman" (a clear reference to the Crone Goddess) and say that "sitting in the lap of the Old Woman" brings good luck and fertility. Like everyone else, I took my turn sitting in the lap of the Old Woman but phew! I'm not pregnant yet, LOL! Rather predictably, Christians and non-pagans call this indentation "the Devil's Chair."

In the following panoramic photo you can see how the Circle is bisected by the road. The road was built in an era when the Circle was not being preserved. In Puritan England during the 1600s, many of the standing stones were systematically toppled, buried or destroyed as evil pagan symbols. In the 1720s, an early champion of preservation angrily wrote:

And this stupendous fabric, which for some thousands of years, had brav'd the continual assaults of weather, and by the nature of it, when left to itself, like the pyramids of Egypt, would have lasted as long as the globe, hath fallen a sacrifice to the wretched ignorance and avarice of a little village unluckily plac'd within it.

Avebury still retains its "henge" or ditch that encircles the Stones. Our guide, Mara Freeman, said that in Druid times, the turf would have been cut away completely to expose the chalk "bones" of the earth. In those days, Avebury Circle would have been enclosed by a pure white henge.

Most of the Stones have official names and distinct personalities. I don't know their official names, but I think of this one as "Grumpy Old Man Stone" --

[All photos taken by my Rare One except for the panoramic shot of the Circle, which I found on the internet.]

The Standing Stones

It has been almost a year since my Rare One and I went on our spiritual pilgrimage to various sacred pagan spots in England. I've already blogged about our magickal, Goddessy, King Arthury experiences in Glastonbury and Cornwall (if you missed those posts but still want to read them, just click on Travel over at the sidebar's labels cloud). So now only one other subject remains -- our visits to the ancient Stone Circles at Avebury, Stanton Drew and Stonehenge. Our Druidy experiences, so to speak, among the Standing Stones.

That will be my topic all this week and a bit of the next -- so tomorrow, please join me at Avebury!

[Painting by D. Bruce Bennett of Bennett Celtic Art]

Cats in the News (#1)

Simple dreams

My Rare One and I watched Brokeback Mountain again the other night on TV. It was kind of frustrating because the CBC broke up the movie's flow with a gazillion commercials, bleeped out most of the swear words and cut the two most graphic sex scenes. But even so, they could not diminish the film's tragic story nor blunt its emotional impact. More than a week later, Jack and Ennis are still on my mind.

The first time I saw the movie, the lingering image that I could not shake was the final shot of their two shirts on the wire hanger in the closet. This time the story's tragedy was epitomized for me in a single line of dialogue.

Throughout the movie, Jack is presented as the dreamer, the unrealistic one. At one point he says to Ennis "What if you and me had a little ranch together, little cow and calf operation, it'd be some sweet life." What a modest dream this is. Such a small dream really, not grandiose at all. But utterly unattainable for a gay couple in his time, culture and circumstances. That is the poignant tragedy of Jack's simple dream. He might as well have wanted the moon. He couldn't have that either.

Batman Funnies, Part 2

By the time I was a teenager, disturbing questions and rumours about Batman's sexuality began to circulate.

Was he straight?

Was he gay? Was Robin more to him than just a sidekick?

What else could possibly lurk in Batman's bat-closet?

Batman Funnies, Part 1

When I was a kid, my favourite superheroes were Batman and Robin. Spiderman was okay too, in a pinch. I didn't like Superman at all -- he was too perfect and prissy for my taste. But I still read Superman comics if that's all I could lay my hands on.

As an homage to the Dark Knight, here's a few miscellaneous funnies that make me laugh. I hope you like them too:

Yeah, Baby, That's Me!

As a blogger, I've been taking it pretty darn easy for the past couple of months: not writing a lot, just swiping LOLcat gags off the interwebz and reposting them here, maybe sticking in a video or two for variety, etc. But this month I'll try to add a bit more substance, especially in the spirituality area. I'm going to do a series on the stone circles we visited in England. I also intend to start a series on labyrinths I have known and loved. But don't worry, there'll still be lots of goofy stolen stuff too. Especially this week.