Happy Winter Solstice

Trish said:
Happy Solstice @Capt Lightning

How do you celebrate? Have you ever joined the celebrations at Stonehenge? It's not something I follow but I find these things interesting and I have visited Stonehenge, I imagine it to be quite magical to watch the sunrise there.
Click to expand...
I think it has to be on the exact day, but then magic only happens when you make it. If I went to Europe, Stonehenge would be on the top of my list. I only know two people who have been to Stonehenge. It was shocking to hear them describe it as their biggest disappointment, but they are fundamentalist Christians, and I think what they were really saying is they find nothing spiritual in Pagan worship.

Unfortunately, we can only guess at who built it and why. Some guesses are better than others, no doubt, but whoever did it seemed to know what they were doing and had a better understanding of "the heavens" than the average person. Imagine! Ancients having that much data about the cosmos seems profound. I would just like the opportunity to sit there and wonder about those people, if only for an hour or two.
 
Every year, although at the equinox, my sister sends me pictures of a Chicago event called "ChicagoHenge." It seems that the original surveyors that laid out the streets were quite pedantic about getting everything exactly east to west and north to south, which results in:

Chicago Henge.JPG

You can google "Chicago Henge" for images if you're interested.
 
JustDave said:
I think it has to be on the exact day, but then magic only happens when you make it. If I went to Europe, Stonehenge would be on the top of my list. I only know two people who have been to Stonehenge. It was shocking to hear them describe it as their biggest disappointment, but they are fundamentalist Christians, and I think what they were really saying is they find nothing spiritual in Pagan worship.

Unfortunately, we can only guess at who built it and why. Some guesses are better than others, no doubt, but whoever did it seemed to know what they were doing and had a better understanding of "the heavens" than the average person. Imagine! Ancients having that much data about the cosmos seems profound. I would just like the opportunity to sit there and wonder about those people, if only for an hour or two.
Click to expand...
Definitely. I guess it depends on what you are expecting but, I agree with you, I found it quite an experience. :)
 
I've seen Stonehenge, and as JustDave said, we can only guess as to why it was built, but there was obviously a good understanding of astronomy. There are many other stone circles and perhaps more significant than Stonehenge is the Callanish stone circle on the Isle of Lewis. This is one I have also visited and unlike Stonehenge, it is in a wild and desolate setting.

The Calanais Standing Stones are an extraordinary cross-shaped setting of stones erected 5,000 years ago. They predate England’s famous Stonehenge monument, and were an important place for ritual activity for at least 2,000 years.

We don’t know why the standing stones at Calanais were erected, but our best guess is that it was a kind of astronomical observatory.

An aerialview of the stones.

scotland-callanish-aerial_orig.jpg

The Aurora over the Callanish stones.

Callanish-Stones-Aurora.jpg
 
That is beautiful. I had heard of other similar man made monuments besides Stonehenge, but never looked them up or have seen pictures. But Stonehenge gets all the attention. The one on the Isle of Lewis would be even more interesting to me.
 
JustDave said:
That is beautiful. I had heard of other similar man made monuments besides Stonehenge, but never looked them up or have seen pictures. But Stonehenge gets all the attention. The one on the Isle of Lewis would be even more interesting to me.
Click to expand...
Me too. It looks amazing :)
 
winter-solstice-poster-vector-k35km.jpg
 
What I like about this day is that going forward, day by day, minute by minute the Light is coming back!
A close friend and I visited Stonehenge many years ago. In early morning hours, we were alone there .It wasn’t a day with any events, but the mood & the energy present there is unforgettable.
Tingling!
 
Geezerette said:
A close friend and I visited Stonehenge many years ago. In early morning hours, we were alone there .It wasn’t a day with any events, but the mood & the energy present there is unforgettable.
Tingling!
Click to expand...
Maybe like you, any spiritual-like associations could never happen to me in a group of people. What many people think are spiritual experiences are something I only experience in solitude. I would not want to visit Stonehenge while people were gathering in ritual celebration. I know this is not the way most people worship. It's just something I could never do, even in church as a young person, I could never make that connection. Put me in the middle of thousands of acres of wilderness in Montana by myself, and good things begin to happen to me.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top