Difficult to understand ?

Arches are very unpredictable. They make people do strange things. This man needed to do a hand stand after he helped complete this double arch structure we built in Victoria BC 4 years ago. It was a pretty cool thing under the circumstances; actually it was more of a hand spring. Or was it a double vault? I dont remember. Luckily he didnt fall backwards and die. Who's vault would it have been then? But in any case, the dry stone arches stopped him from falling. In a sense, he was not only standing on his hands, he was leaning on his and our — in this case the students at the Glendale College DSWAC workshop— handywork.

I am a firm supporter of arch structures: the more people can learn about the dynamics and principles of how stones stay together the better. Stone and stonework shouldn't be a mysterious thing. There are no arch villians. And there are no villian arches. Except if they are fake ones, or made of plastic.

From whence cometh these ripples?

It's a rainy day here in Ontario today. Not a day for 'dry' stone walling. So many of us find other things to do when it's really wet outside, like writing and blogging. It is good to be dry. It's part of the job description. I think that before it was decided by the powers that be that we should be called 'dry stone wallers', they should have included other favourable aspects and requirements we would all like to see included in the job. How about 'content' dry stone wallers? How about patient, forgiving, generous, and warm dry stone wallers. Or how about funny, healthy, prosperous, good-looking, dry stone wallers?

In fact most wallers are warm people who usually have a dry sense of humour (even when they do have to work in the rain ) with a great capacity to see good in the things around them. They are not wet blankets, nor do they go around raining on other people's parade, especially if it is an annual parade where people have been cooperating and building together for years.

Instead of looking to find 'offense' under every stone, it would be kinder to just look to make a 'fence' whenever we can with the stones that we discover along the way. Even in the rain there is comfort in knowing we are making something structural and beautiful. It is far better to build with wet stones, even the odd surfaced ripply ones, than throw them at people.