Category: Reflections
Slaughter
29th February 2024 Network Rail has been busy cutting down trees beside the Macclesfield stretch of the West Coast Mainline. The result is not pretty and affects a nearby walking route that I often use; death is everywhere to be seen. Many tree trunks have been denuded and left to look lifeless; others have been cut away to the top of their rootstock as if to finish them off. If life restarts on the former, the devastation may be softened, but that is not within sight just yet. It perhaps is too early in the year for that.
While I can understand that windthrow is a problem for trees next to a railway line during stormy weather (my recollection of the aftermath of Storm Gerrit makes me appreciate that), the devastating aftermath of the ongoing cutting looked sad to my eyes. It is one thing to trim back overgrown vegetation, but this is something else.
Shelter was removed, and it may be that walkers do not need such a clear view of the railway anyway; most of us are not train enthusiasts or spotters in any case. It all caused a trail that has something of a bucolic aspect to appear more industrial than it used to do. One wonders what that does to the attractiveness of the amenity in the long run.
The time of year hardly helps, with all the leafless trees and bare ground after the winter. When you hear any birdsong, it all sounds all the more poignant when you realise that bird nesting sites are being toppled. Maybe things will look less brutal during the coming growing season.
For now, though, there is a lot of carnage that needs healing. At times during my life, I have had my misgivings about tree cover when seeking photos of scenic spots, yet that is not how I feel about this ongoing aftermath. Anytime that I hear chainsaws working is sickening to my sensibility at the moment; it heralds destruction for me.
Consolidation
27th February 2024 The magazines Cumbria and Lakeland Walker have been combined, a move that makes me wonder about the wisdom of remaining a subscriber. The strictures at the height of the pandemic saw me subscribe to a number of magazines, mainly to cut down on shop visits and also to contribute to keeping them going through a tough time. Lakeland Walker was one of these and had its uses for getting ideas for Cumbrian outings, especially among the Lakeland fells.
Since then, there have been a number of changes. Firstly, the world has turned against plastic, so many magazines are mailed in paper envelopes, not the best for keeping them dry during some of the deluges that have beset us during the last twelve months. My preference is for waterproof wrapping materials derived from plant matter, which some have been using.
What once was a title printed on A4 paper now is part of a combined title printed on what appears to be A5 paper, an increase in the size of the once smaller format Cumbria magazine, though. So, we have the perhaps clumsily titled Cumbria and Lakeland Walker magazine. In some ways, the combination is reminiscent of The Scots Magazine, which also has an outdoors section, albeit without maps. Thus, the merged entity can work and there may be a finite number of walking ideas among the Lakeland fells anyway.
Lakeland Walker had lost its long term editor John Manning too, so there may have been editorial instability. Only time will tell how things will out for the new title and if I remain a subscriber, for there can be too many magazines and not enough time to read them all. Current market conditions are challenging anyway, which ultimately may explain the merger.
Records matter…
25th February 2024 
The last time that I tried writing an extensive trip report from a while ago, I found myself struggling to recall details. That is the trouble when you leave things for too long. Thankfully, having plenty of photos does help, even if trying to manage too many has its own drawbacks. Viewing them all is one thing, and then there are the tasks of picking out the best for sharing with others and pre-processing the images as well.
It might that having plenty of video footage would help even more, but I have my qualms about intruding on the privacy of others; after all, no one goes for a walk to be in a video recorded by another person who they do not even know. Like working your way through too many photos, you also have to spend time watching the footage as well. Thus, it may not be the panacea that it appears to be at first. Then, editing footage and creating video for internet broadcast is another time-consuming effort altogether.
The ultimate solution would be to take notes like the professionals must do. However, is that taking what is an activity pursued for enjoyment a little too far? That has got in the way of my journaling as I go, and I am not a diary person. Part of the solution is to note brief descriptions in the upcoming trip reports page, and I am inclined to put out some brief reports just after a return as well. The best solution, of course, is to write up the detailed descriptions when everything is fresh in my mind, something that has been faltering in the last few years. Well, they do say that blogging needs motivation...
Thinly spread
15th February 2024 There is a saying or proverb in the Irish language that becomes the following when translated into English: the sandpiper cannot attend to two beaches. This and other pieces of wisdom are to be found in The Little Book of Celtic Mindfulness. In fact, the title likely is a misnomer, at least to me, for wisdom fits the contents better than mindfulness, though the greater fashionability of the latter possibly won out in this case.
As someone who has divided his life between different places for so long, the phrase with which I open this piece resonates more easily with me. With family remaining in Ireland and work taking me to the U.K., there always has been a sense of there being different shores. Add explorations across two different continents to the mix, and you very easily can end up without a sense of permanent abode.
Maybe that is one meaning of the Christian wisdom about gaining the world only to lose one's soul, even if the idea of pilgrimage is baked into that tradition as well. Sometimes, too much application of logic and reason to the ways of life can show you that nothing retains self-consistency, no matter how hard you try.
There is something ongoing in my life at the moment that reinforces the opening point. It causes me to remain focussed on that, so I cannot go further afield, Nevertheless, there remain opportunities for wandering that I can take, and their descriptions may follow at another time. Whenever the weather offers, my body goes wandering too.
Thinking back to last year, my wandering took me to Ireland, Scotland, Wales, the Channel Islands, France and California. This is quite unlike the pandemic years that grounded me in my local area, allowing for many deeper explorations. That is being rested these days when I can see other parts. North America remains tempting, as does seeing more of Scotland. Other places may feature yet because life's plans cannot be set in the stone. The explorations continue.
A spot of refinement
20th March 2023 A matter in Ireland weighed heavily on my mind for longer than expected until its recent completion. There are others to follow, but I hope that their execution will not turn out to be so injurious to my emotions as this one. There is more letting go to be done before burdens are relinquished. It can be difficult to transition them to someone else; they have to be wanted first.
None of that helped with my taking advantage of any fleeting episodes of dry, sunny weather that came our way since the start of the year. That there were a lot of grey, outcast days too meant that I never got to feel too badly about what was left to pass. It is all very unlike this time last year, when I embarked on a Pennine walking project in and around Marsden. Maybe it is better that way for now.
None of this stopped me from refining some of the content that got on here, though. Photos got enlarged, many posts had their writing improved, and some early redundant posts were removed. The photo overhaul took quite a lot of time since there are so many of them, even if it also was an automation project of sorts. It does not help that this is a fiddly exercise too.
Now, I am starting to think ahead a bit more as the rain falls outside the window. Easter is coming, so my mind starts to ponder possibilities for a much-needed getaway, and there may be time for another one or two in May. Those aforementioned matters will take me to Ireland again and again, so that might add more walking opportunities too.
It feels a bit premature to start thinking of trips to other parts of the world yet, but that cannot be discounted either. Usually, it is best never to discount what weather windows can facilitate. There are times when it is better to let any opportunities arise organically.
