Ramblings (of two kinds)
I haven't been on here in ages, but thought that since I'd written a long facebook note, I might as well put it here as well.
After a Saturday night out in the Angel, with gales blowing the rain horizontal, and with Jamie away for the weekend, I stayed at my parents' house in Durham. This morning the sun was shining on the frost and it all looked very pretty, so in spite of the fact I was wearing the clothes that I had gone out in the night before, I decided to walk the four miles or so home. The walk is nothing special - there are some nice views and in the summer pretty fields of poppies look cheery, but the only possible route is mostly along the main road.
As I got to the crossroads in Sacriston, on a whim I turned off to the right, and instead of going home took the footpath across the fields from Plawsworth road up to Waldridge Fell. The path goes over a stream and is dotted with little copses where a few snowdrops are coming into bud.
If you caught the news, you might have heard that Arne Naess, credited as the father of deep ecology died this week, and Val Plumwood died about a year ago. Both of these people, along with others (Rachel Carson, Aldo Leopold, Henry Thoreau etc.) were thinkers whose work was directly and intensely immersed in nature. I've often questioned, as someone who takes great enjoyment from natural things, and who studies environmental ethics, why seeing the first snowdrops, or growing and cooking my own food, does not feed into my own work all that much.
Part of the reason, I think, is that there is something in my brain that stubbornly resists this. Natural things, especially plants, just are. They are not about anything or trying to convey anything (intellectual or otherwise) and while that is not necessarily part of their beauty, it is certainly part of the beauty that I see in them. Bringing them into rigid academic frameworks seems to take away that pure 'isness' Even taking too self-conscious an enjoyment of them can ruin whatever quality it is that I seem to see on a long walk or on my allotment. I realise I'm committing this very crime right now, but it is almost impossible not to. It's a bit like a spot that the sun leaves in the corner of your vision. You can't help but notice it, but try to look at it and it goes away.
Waldridge Fell was stunning this morning. I was getting very odd looks from dog walkers for being an incongruous character in tight leathers who didn't seem to be accompanied by another walker, let alone a dog that would justify my presence on the moorland. The surrounding gorse and heather were blasted by the kind of wind that takes all the breath out of your lungs and stings your face and turns your hair into hundreds of tiny whips. Icy puddles cracked under my feet. The winter sun was so strong I had to screw up my eyes against the glare. The sheer intensity of every sensation was compounded by the physical ache of having walked about seven miles uphill with a slight hangover. I was overwhelmed by a dizzying sense of the fell's complete indifference to my presence.
I felt an arrogant need to try and capture this and take it with me. I got out my cameraphone and snapped myself standing with a particularly wonderful view in the background. I looked at the screen, and saw a leather clad figure on a hillside with blonde hair blowing against a bright blue sky. Yes - it looked like a still from a Europe video. Once again I'd ruined something by putting a frame around it.
The Angel: http://www.angelpubdurham.co.uk/
Rachel Carson: http://www.rachelcarson.org/Biography.aspx
Europe: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=5k1hS2OF8Rg
Aldo Leopold: http://www.naturenet.com/alnc/aldo.html
Arne Naess: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/jan/15/obituary-arne-naess
Val Plumwood: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2008/mar/26/australia.world
Henry Thoreau: http://www.thoreausociety.org/_news_abouthdt.htm
Waldridge Fell: http://www.durham.gov.uk/durhamcc/usp.nsf/pws/Durham+Wildlife+Sites+-+Waldridge+Fell
After a Saturday night out in the Angel, with gales blowing the rain horizontal, and with Jamie away for the weekend, I stayed at my parents' house in Durham. This morning the sun was shining on the frost and it all looked very pretty, so in spite of the fact I was wearing the clothes that I had gone out in the night before, I decided to walk the four miles or so home. The walk is nothing special - there are some nice views and in the summer pretty fields of poppies look cheery, but the only possible route is mostly along the main road.
As I got to the crossroads in Sacriston, on a whim I turned off to the right, and instead of going home took the footpath across the fields from Plawsworth road up to Waldridge Fell. The path goes over a stream and is dotted with little copses where a few snowdrops are coming into bud.
If you caught the news, you might have heard that Arne Naess, credited as the father of deep ecology died this week, and Val Plumwood died about a year ago. Both of these people, along with others (Rachel Carson, Aldo Leopold, Henry Thoreau etc.) were thinkers whose work was directly and intensely immersed in nature. I've often questioned, as someone who takes great enjoyment from natural things, and who studies environmental ethics, why seeing the first snowdrops, or growing and cooking my own food, does not feed into my own work all that much.
Part of the reason, I think, is that there is something in my brain that stubbornly resists this. Natural things, especially plants, just are. They are not about anything or trying to convey anything (intellectual or otherwise) and while that is not necessarily part of their beauty, it is certainly part of the beauty that I see in them. Bringing them into rigid academic frameworks seems to take away that pure 'isness' Even taking too self-conscious an enjoyment of them can ruin whatever quality it is that I seem to see on a long walk or on my allotment. I realise I'm committing this very crime right now, but it is almost impossible not to. It's a bit like a spot that the sun leaves in the corner of your vision. You can't help but notice it, but try to look at it and it goes away.
Waldridge Fell was stunning this morning. I was getting very odd looks from dog walkers for being an incongruous character in tight leathers who didn't seem to be accompanied by another walker, let alone a dog that would justify my presence on the moorland. The surrounding gorse and heather were blasted by the kind of wind that takes all the breath out of your lungs and stings your face and turns your hair into hundreds of tiny whips. Icy puddles cracked under my feet. The winter sun was so strong I had to screw up my eyes against the glare. The sheer intensity of every sensation was compounded by the physical ache of having walked about seven miles uphill with a slight hangover. I was overwhelmed by a dizzying sense of the fell's complete indifference to my presence.
I felt an arrogant need to try and capture this and take it with me. I got out my cameraphone and snapped myself standing with a particularly wonderful view in the background. I looked at the screen, and saw a leather clad figure on a hillside with blonde hair blowing against a bright blue sky. Yes - it looked like a still from a Europe video. Once again I'd ruined something by putting a frame around it.
The Angel: http://www.angelpubdurham.co.uk/
Rachel Carson: http://www.rachelcarson.org/Biography.aspx
Europe: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=5k1hS2OF8Rg
Aldo Leopold: http://www.naturenet.com/alnc/aldo.html
Arne Naess: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/jan/15/obituary-arne-naess
Val Plumwood: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2008/mar/26/australia.world
Henry Thoreau: http://www.thoreausociety.org/_news_abouthdt.htm
Waldridge Fell: http://www.durham.gov.uk/durhamcc/usp.nsf/pws/Durham+Wildlife+Sites+-+Waldridge+Fell