Possibly the most interesting talk I have ever heard
Published: Wed, 09/06/17
Finally made it back from Mercian Gathering late on Sunday night. It has taken a couple of days to get accustomed to actually being here in Beverley but we are settling down. Mercian Gathering was very good this year for some reason. There were some very good speakers and there was a certain seriousness of purpose about the event. The morning meetings were quite deep reflections on what it means to live on this earth and show reverence for this planet which nurtures and sustains us. There was also some very good entertainment in the evenings with Damh the Bard on the Saturday night (who was even better than when I heard him at the Spirit of Awen camp a few weeks before.) Also, rather late night story telling sessions around the campfire, my version of the life of Heimdal went down well on Friday night and led to a specific request for a telling of Frey and Gerda leading to how Thor lost his hammer on Saturday. I realised that I had
not really done any story telling for far too long.
My talk on spirituality seemed to go down well, I did get comments like. ‘Possibly the most interesting talk I have ever heard.’ I talked for about 40 mins and then discussion went on for as long again. I will write the talk up as an article for my website as soon as I can get around to it. Morning Stav sessions were less popular, we had about 8 the first morning but the second morning 3 people returned, a father with his two children so V and I gave them a detailed session on self-defence which they seemed to enjoy.
Part of the reason why the MG was such a good experience is probably down to the fact that I wasn’t too rushed and frankly exhausted to enjoy it fully as I was with the Druid and Spirit of Awen events. The previous week V and I had a holiday in Norfolk, partly at Hunworth which some readers will know from the camp a few years back and 2 nights on a boat on the beach not far from Blakeney. The boat is an ex lifeboat bought by V’s grandfather when the ship was scrapped in the early 1960s. It has a shed built over the hull and is affectionately referred to as ‘The Ark’ and it really does look like a child’s depiction of Noah’s famous craft. Most of the time the Ark is marooned on sand dunes but you have to walk about a mile from the nearest parking place and wade a creek (pretty much swim it at high tide). The sky is huge and pretty much the only sounds are the noises the seals make and the sea birds. We slept, walked on the sand at
low tide, picked, cooked and ate Samphire which grows all around the dunes. I also had time to read, think and write a first draft of a new booklet, the contents of which will eventually provide a chapter for a book. In the meantime I hope that my writing might provide a good introduction to Stav by focussing on the Hagl rune and the stories about Heimdal, if you would like to read it then here is a link to a PDF version, http://www.screencast.com/t/GtGtqp1USOq let me know what you think, I would value your feedback.
Next we are hosting the Stav camp here in Beverley between the 15th and the 17th of this month, it should be good but we could probably accommodate one or two more if you would like to come.
regards
Graham
PS If you are stateside then you might be interested in the course in Illinois at the end of the month. But if you seriously want to come then please pay for your place so we know whether or not to book my plane ticket. More details http://iceandfire.org.uk/usasept17.html