Kilnaboy is an ancient village in the Burren and these days it is famous for only one thing. There is a ruined Norman Church from the 11th/12th century and like nearly all ruined churches in Ireland, the roof is gone but most of the grey walls are still standing. God gave the Irish two colors: green and grey. There are some interesting carvings within the ruins and outside of the church in the ubiquitous graveyards which cover Ireland like a stone mantle. Over the east entrance to the old church, in a kind of Tympanum there is a stone carving which the weather is slowly dissolving - if you don't know what it is you are looking at you will probably not make it out, but when you come prepared the bas-relief pops out at you and slaps you in your old Christian sensibilities. It's a Sheila-na-gig where "sheila" is a generic Celtic term for woman. Depicted in stone is a small grotesque figure of a grimacing female spreading and holding open a huge vagina, a pussy, a cunt. Proportionately, the orifice is the size of a bushel basket. These figures survive on over 100 Saxon and Norman churches in the British Isles. Locally, there are stories of old-timey brides being led to the images and forced to recite ritualistic prayers on the way to their weddings. There were once many more of these "grotesques," but over the years the Cromwellians and Protestants have smashed most of them off the walls of the churches and cut them out of the choir stalls - in the past 1000 years, in the Christian Eon of the Second Fish, they have become obscene to modern eyes and their original uses and meanings have also dissolved like most of the carvings on most of the stones in this wet island at the end of the earth.
The image to the right is the Kilnaboy Sheila while the scan above is from Paris. There are certainly links with the Celtic tribes but most agree that the image itself is much, much older than the Celts in Northern Europa. Marija Gimbutas has shown that the Icon is Paleolithic and one of man's earliest attempts at defining the Sacred.
We did this mission on Solstice to make it rhyme with the rhythm of the Seasons and the Great Round of the Year. There are 2 Poles for the Great Round - Summer and Winter Solstice. Both are propitious days for Conceptions. It's always been unlucky to Marry in May, but June is the month of Nuptuals.
It pleases Kenny no end that the term Shekhina has connotations of Nests, and Nesting Birds. The Îlot des Mouettes was covered in Cormorant nests and walking between them was a balancing act, very much like the Algonquian root for the word Raccoon. Any false step and there would be fewer black birds on the Island.
It was like walking on a sponge, god knows where the earth lies on the Island but it wasn't within a foot or so of the surface. While the Landing Team unpacked the boats and started carrying things up the beach to the Installation Site, Skippy took his Digital Still Camera and roamed the Island documenting its charms. Thomas Aquinas was working the Digital Movie camera and for the first few minutes no one even tried to make a sound. The Gulls were getting used to us and the constant Stuka attacks were ameliorating in ferocity if not number.
That's Cairo carrying the Seedstone up the beach. Though the surface he is treading on is certainly not beach and not even ground. It was Lunar & bouncy. The greenery you see rings parts of the island and besides some stubby grasses nothing else grows in such strange soil. That rock near Cairo's feet, the one pooching up out of the "soil" is setting on the rocky strata of the Isle a full foot or more under the surface. Slowly the Gulls and Cormorants and maybe even the bones of a savage pack of Raccoons are raising up a hellish sod/soup of the parts of dead animals and bird shit. Both Cairo and Eddy Rickets as well as Skippy have Medical training - Skippy trained in the Army for "toe to toe Nuclear Combat with the Ruskies." His job was to go into the char of nuked cities and do EMT shit and Triage until it was safe for the real doctors to get to the front. He still carries a pen knife in case he has to Trache someone.
We have been led to believe thru local myth that the Îlot des Mouettes surfaced in the early 1800's after a long stretch of low water. Local Pirates would cross to the new Island at night and "build a large fire creating the illusion of a ship on fire." The lakes were full of boats in those days and before long some innocent would sail too close to see if they could lend aid and inevitably ground their ship on the shallow reefs which surround the island.
Pillage, plunder and Rape would follow. Then the Pirates would shred the sails of their victims and cast them adrift. The rumors say the Pirates would bury loot on the island which was too hot to be caught with until memories had faded and they could dig it up again. Some of the Local Color who frequent the bars around the Bay will tell you that there are still a half-dozen, or more, stashes on the island, waiting for anyone who wants them bad enough to brave the Hellish ecosystem.
DISCERNING INTENTION - OK, Number 1. Monkey grabs fruit and brings it to his mouth. A map of his neural firing is below. In Number 2 the monkey grabs fruit and puts it in a container. Neural map below. Then in #3 the monkey watches a comely, young and lithe Italian grab the fruit and bring it to her shapely mouth. His Mirror Neurons duplicate the pattern in #1. Then, at last, the Monkey watches the Eyetie grab the fruit and put it in the container, thus duplicating in his Mirror Neurons the neural map in #2 when he was the monkey stashing things on the island. The wily Italians lay it out for us - as if we were Autistic and couldn't grasp any of this - "In all cases, the responses were associated with the grasping act, indicating that the neuron's initial activation encoded an understanding of final intention." Christ on a Honeymoon! Monkeys understand our intentions!
The Ice-Age Hunter/Gatherer, Paleoman was an emmigrant; he was always on the move. He went with the herds and they went with the seasons. So he could understand the Moon and the Story it told about Pregnancy, Dismemberment, the Underworld and the Rising. But those were the female mysteries. The Women seemed to move in perfect circles like the Moon and have many of the same Periods. You can see that story in the sky wherever you are and the story is the same and the circles are the same. But as long as you're moving you will never notice the other circle. The Great Round. The story of the Sun and its role in Pregnancy, Dismemberment, the Underworld and the Rising. Until you stay in one place and learn to read the shadows which move in a code from day to day and the way they seem so perfectly tied to the seasons. If you are moving around then the Stories that Shadows tell get abstracted when they move too far away from the Topos where originally they were cast. So it's Neoman in the Neolithic who thru Farming and Husbandry and Sedentary Dwelling will learn to put a gnomon in the earth and then keep track of its shadow's wanderings. Anytime you cast a shadow you become a clock and a calendar for the story of the Sun. Put 2 or more sticks in the ground and place them at Topos in the Story which seem to have Salience and you have the means of creating a cosmology which Empties out the Story of the Sun and its Relations with the Earth into a Vessel like a Religion which can Mirror all those moments in the Big Round and then as long as the story fits there is Unity Above and Below ... as long as the story fits.
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