Yesterday I took a drive through the countryside, heading east, away from the sea and into the hills. It's always interesting what you see, what you learn, when you have no particular destination in mind.
Unbidden but not surprising in this land of many ruins, I came upon the outline of a building that had once been a church (I think) with a graveyard. What was surprising was that quite a few of the more modern (the oldest one was 16th century) graves were actually inside what would have been the church but is now grass. Jesus once said, in response to a man who would delay following him in order to attend to a parent's funeral, "Let the dead bury the dead." I have often wondered whether Jesus later regretted those words as unfeeling or whether he meant them, literally as well as figuratively, making his case that his work, his mission, was more urgent than even the social, cultural and familial obligation to lay the dead to rest.
It's also more than a little disquieting to see, in what the young so often perceive as a dead place, the literal dead resting within the walls of a church.
Leaving the wee village of Old Dailly (not to be confused with Dailly), I headed towards Barr. On the way, I came to a stop before a man standing in the road. Looking farther down, I saw why he was blocking traffic: his partner was bringing along a heard of sheep, moving them from one field to another. It is that season and it reminds me of home and my friend Ginny's blog on the dirty work of actually getting it done:
It's a Dirty Job, which has kept me smiling all week.
And there I was, watching the herd measuring time not by clocks but by when the lambs are born, when shearing time comes, and by their movement from one field to another. It was a good few minutes in a life to simply sit and watch the herding of the sheep.
On one stretch of the road, I went first up and then back, and was reminded that you see different things and you see the same things differently depending on which side of the road you're on.
A train track ran parallel to the road for quite some time, but going in the first direction, I didn't even notice the tracks. Headed the other way, I was surprised to see a two-car train running parallel to me on the road and only then noticed the tracks. A good reminder that just because I don't notice something doesn't mean it isn't there; just because I don't know something does not mean it isn't true.
Throughout the drive, especially in the wide open fields, I saw the gorse in full bloom. It's beautiful to behold, but you don't want to stick your hand in there - it's a thorny and hardy bush -- very hard to kill.
Finally, I made my way to Barr, a tiny village nestled in the valley. Looking forward to a light lunch, I headed to The King's Arms, whose sign proclaimed them open, but whose locked door proclaimed otherwise.
Laughing, I got back in the car and headed home.
