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WINTER SOLSTICES
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MEL GIBSON
Dom Smart. Email: dom.s@ntlworld.com. United Kingdom.
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WINTER SOLSTICES
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Here I attempt to display as many pictures as I can of Winter solstices (usually 21st December each year) from as many different places as possible. Ideally the places should have some kind of spiritual identity, if not for everyone, for me and possibly my family. I am not religious in any registered way, just a religion that goes on in my head. I don’t try to force my religion on any one. My religion is for me and no one else, not even for my wife. I think press ganging a religion on some one destroys the whole idea of religion. I do like celebrating the solstice though, and I do believe there are lots of Gods, as the pagans did. But hey, rock’n’roll, we’re gonna cram it down your face - five for the number one band in the world - The Tubes! And dig OUT some of these pictures.
This picture was taken at dawn on December 21st 2007 on route to “The Old Man of Wilmington” in East Sussex. This Man is a giant stone man drawn on the side of the hill by some ancients. Alas, on this day it was foggy, as you can see, and so the “Old Man of Wilmington never appeared! Pictured here is my dog, lil’ Piki, half way between the fog and the chalk man himself. A nice photo anyway.
Pictured below is The Downs photographed from the top of Whitehawk Hill at dawn on 21st December 2008. Alas, no sun, just bleak old England. Whitehawk Hill is just next to where I live. Other than that there is nothing really special about it, other than the modern day cavemen in the basin of a rough old council estate, Whitehawk, that I’m sure one day will remain neolithic in the history books of the future. The photo consists of three photos stitched together by me using my computer.
As usual I didn’t feel up to travelling a long distance for the Winter Solstice 2009. A friend of mine and I nipped down to Brighton Seafront early morning and took this photo of Brighton’s East Pier.
No sun for 2010, just ice and nothing much else, on the start of the first cold/white winter in many years, so I decided to give this spot to a bunch of ducks, coots and geese making the best of some broken ice on their pond; Queens Park, Brighton, 21st December 2010. Little did I know that just around the corner a large group of atheist Brightonians were celebrating a ritual known as “the burning of the clocks”. I hope to visit this in 2011.
2011 and I made it to the Burning of the Clocks. A festival unique to Brighton and Hove, England and run since 1995 by children. We marched around the centre of Brighton, East Sussex, ending on the seafront where the paper clocks were burnt and there was a bit of a fireworks display. It was a fun evening although I didn’t manage to catch a brilliant shot. I guess the photo to the left shows a bit of the fun. A great little Pagan festival.