Signs. The subject for this weeks WordPress photo challenge. All these photos were taken over the course of my week-long reconnoitre trip up to the Holy island of Lindisfarne during Michaelmas last week. (see also Pilgrim on Horseback for the back story). Click on any of the photos if you wish to read the messages more clearly!
Normally, I would jump at the chance to use a title like this to go down the esoteric route and interpret it as ‘signs as symbols’. Something I am always seeking to find in the landscape as personal messages for me. These, however, are signs that are literally pointing the way.
this is one I hope to become very familiar with
Some are warning signs, some have been defaced: a sheep turned into some of rhinoceros. Information boards, a scratched dedication to a loved one on a bench, and a way marker looking like a crucifix.
Then, on a wild and desolate moor in the North Yorkshire Dales, I come across the Red Flag which stopped me in my tracks.
On the Holy island of Lindisfarne, the signage becomes grand and imposing to shepherd the thousands of visitors around the island as well as marking the way for pilgrims wanting to follow in the Saintly footsteps of Cuthbert. A couple of the signs, however, are cracked and old-fashioned and seem oddly out-of-place against the ‘corporate’ signage of a place that has become a major tourist attraction. (Naively, something I was not expecting and found rather disturbing). For me, these signs seem more home-spun and real and speak of the people behind them. (Like the dedication on the bench, above)
And looking at them all again, collectively, there is an element of deep symbology for me in them, each one unique in its own way telling their own story. On my epic journey, I shall be looking for these signs to guide me along the right path, both physically and spiritually. Not least as a little bit of entertainment to also delight and amuse.
To see how other people have interpreted signs, here.
