Jeff: Giant's Causeway

I stood alone on a platform in Ireland. Constructed by geological forces that have influenced history’s greatest architects. A causeway with such grandeur that there are stories told of its origin in folk stories to child and adult alike. I am of course referring to the Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland.

 

It has been nearly two months since arriving in the UK, and the aspects of history and culture, just not as relevant in my spheres in the US, are constantly provoking my notion of “common experience.”

 

My breath was taken as I felt the smooth texture of an individual stone that sat closest to the “Giant’s boot.” It was then that the thought occurred: “there are many people who have grown up close to this natural wonder.” I didn’t have the chance to speak with any of these locals, but it did present an interesting follow up question: “are there things in my life, magnificent and awe inspiring, that I peer over because of familiarity?” I study in an institution that is mounted on a small hill that has a view of the Pacific Ocean. I am engaged in material that studies the literary work of those who have lasting shadows in the consultations of language, even centuries after their deaths. Yet I have had my share of mornings where all of these things seemed as humdrum routine.

 

I suppose locations such as the Giant’s Causeway evoke this two-fold beauty- peering at something truly majestic which then forces one to reexamine the things of the past with a new eye. If I recall correctly, it was G.K. Chesterton who wrote, “the object of travel is not to set foot on a foreign land; it is at last to set foot on one’s own land as foreign.”

 

It is strange how being a stranger in a foreign land can establish how weak one’s apprehension of the beautiful truly is.