Borg Queen: Brave words. I’ve heard them before, from thousands of species across thousands of worlds, since long before you were created. But, now they are all Borg.
Lieutenant Commander Data: I am unlike any lifeform you have encountered before. The codes stored in my neural net cannot be forcibly removed.
–Star Trek: First Contact (1996)
“Crepuscular rays are rays of sunlight that appear to radiate from a single point in the sky, specifically, where the sun is. These rays, which stream through gaps in clouds (particularly stratocumulus) or between other objects, are columns of sunlit air separated by darker cloud-shadowed regions. The name comes from their frequent occurrences during crepuscular hours (those around dawn and dusk), when the contrasts between light and dark are the most obvious. Crepuscular comes from the Latin word “crepusculum”, meaning twilight.” – Wikipedia
Not surprisingly, perhaps, this spectacular meteorological phenomenon has often been connected with spiritual beliefs. It is known colloquially as ‘Jacob’s Ladder’, referring to Jacob’s dream of seeing a ladder to heaven in Genesis. The ‘ladder’ also has significance in Islam which revers Jacob as a prophet. It has inspired spiritual leaders of all faiths.
“God is the Sun and when His rays fall upon your heart, not impeded by the clouds of egoism, the lotus blooms and the petals unfold.” – Sri Sathya Sai Baba
The movie Jacob’s Ladder (1990) starring Tim Robbins tells the story of a vietnam veteran haunted by visions. The story deals with questions about life and death, heaven and hell, and the film’s promotional poster shows a staircase spiralling out from Robbins’s face, like rays of sunlight.
Jacob’s Ladder is also a song written by Bruce and John Hornsby first recorded by Huey Lewis and the News. In the song, a fan dancer rejects evangelism in favour of a step by step, one day at a time, progression through life:
All I want from tomorrow is to get it better than today
Step by step, one by one, higher and higher
Step by step, one by one, climbing Jacob’s ladder
Today I thought I’d share some images taken at Dunstanburgh Castle on Northumberland’s beautiful Heritage Coast. The castle is the largest in Northumberland. In 1313, Earl Thomas of Lancaster, cousin of Edward II of England began construction and John of Gaunt added to it later in the century.
During the Wars of the Roses, the castle was badly damaged and it slowly fell into decay. The castle is now owned by the National Trust and in the care of English Heritage. It is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and a Grade I listed building.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunstanburgh_Castle
This beautiful and evocative ruin can hardly fail to inspire, perched on a rocky outcrop above the coast and the plain below. Some great painters have immortalised it, including Turner and, one of my favourite contemporary artists, Michael Morgan.
Lilburn Tower, the most intact of the castle buildings, seems to demand a moody black and white treatment. Can you imagine a knight riding along that path, perhaps to rescue a princess from the tower? I kept thinking instead of Macbeth, riding to meet the three weird sisters, perhaps because Roman Polanski’s film, Macbeth was shot in the area.
Dunstanburgh Castle is reached via a footpath from Craster, a sleepy fishing village to the South. Or via the beautiful sands of Embleton Bay to the North.
I chased down a rainbow there on our visit, only just managing one hasty exposure before the colours faded, from which I made this, rather more painterly than usual, image with a little help from Topaz Simplify:
For all that I enjoyed the, admittedly rather over the top, colours of the last two images, it remains, for me, the black and white images that suit this location more. If you get the chance to visit this atmospheric ruin, I thoroughly recommend it.
Bees are super pollinators. We all know that. But sometimes the evidence is as plain as the nose on your face or, to be a little more literal, the pollen on their face.
Just a little on this busy honey bee, but what about the bumble bee in the next image?
Sometimes I wonder how they can even see where they are going.
I couldn’t resist using the title of the classic Cagney, Bogart, O’Brien movie for these images. Classic movie, classic critters.
Yesterday I posted a shot taken in August 2009. In August 2008, we were somewhere rather different. Our trip to Hawaii has to be one of the most memorable holidays we have enjoyed so far. And one of the stand-out highlights was the helicopter flight over the beautiful Garden Isle, Kauai. This view is of the Na Pali coast, which recently featured as the setting for a surprisingly good thriller, A Perfect Getaway. We didn’t meet any crazed serial killers on our trip, thankfully. The helicopter ride was thrills enough! If I am ever lucky enough to go back, I want to do the doors-off flight. Now that’s one thing I never thought I would say.
Ants are some of the trickiest subjects for my trusty lens. Apart from being very small, they are rarely still. They do however strike some appealing poses, however fleetingly.
What’s down there?
In an earlier post, I mentioned my discovery that the study of ants is called myrmecology and that, according to Greek myth, Achilles’s Myrmidon warriors were said to have been created by Zeus out of an ants’ nest. The Myrmidons were known for their ferocity and loyalty. In this passage from Thoreau, a war between rival ants is described in appropriately epic terms:
One day when I went out to my wood-pile, or rather my pile of stumps, I observed two large ants, the one red, the other much larger, nearly half an inch long, and black, fiercely contending with one another. Having once got hold they never let go, but struggled and wrestled and rolled on the chips incessantly. Looking farther, I was surprised to find that the chips were covered with such combatants, that it was not a duellum, but a bellum, a war between two races of ants, the red always pitted against the black, and frequently two red ones to one black. The legions of these Myrmidons covered all the hills and vales in my wood-yard, and the ground was already strewn with the dead and dying, both red and black. It was the only battle which I have ever witnessed, the only battle-field I ever trod while the battle was raging…. On every side they were engaged in deadly combat, yet without any noise that I could hear, and human soldiers never fought so resolutely.
Henry David Thoreau
This is steep!
Perhaps it is not surprising that humans have tended to anthropomorphise ants, and also to view their apparent relentlessness, and hive mind, with some apprehension. Does anyone remember the 1954 sci-fi classic movie, Them! in which nuclear testing causes ants to mutate into giants? 1954 was a bad year for ant-PR: in The Naked Jungle, Charlton Heston has to defend a cocoa plantation against a 2-mile-wide, 20-mile-long column of army ants. Perhaps you may have seen Phase IV, the, now cult, 1974 movie in which ants evolve into the dominant life form on Earth? Other sci-fi villains, like Star Trek’s Borg, appear modelled, at least partly, on ants.
Ying yang ants
The more I photograph ants, the more fascinating I find them. But I am glad they are small.
The shadows now so long do grow,
The brambles like tall cedars show,
Molehills seem mountains, and the ant
Appears a monstrous elephant.
Charles Cotton, ‘Evening Quatrains’ (1689)
Focused Moments 