Oliver Wood Photography

Up in the Top Fields

Calm and Quiet

Heading back down to the village

The weather is changing — for the better.

Green Shed By The Reservoir

The outer limits of Macclesfield in Cheshire — days spent in contemplative study.

Long Journey in a Slow Machine

An HDR processed image of Macclesfield Forest.

Empty Road
Bakerstonedale Moor Cheshire, again.

Twilight Beeches
Bakerstonedale looking toward Pott Shrigley — one of my new favourite photo locations.

Parrots Field – Prestbury, Cheshire

The autumn colour is starting to appear in the village, sycamores first with the best reserved till last as the beeches turn amber / yellow. I have spent most of the day pottering about on my bike with camera, a certain fixation with the wooden bridge over the Silk Road and a plan to ride the tow path to Congleton beckons. The Bosley area is highly photogenic.

Fallen sycamore leaf

Rainow – Lowdown

Last Saturday I rode (cycled) up to Rainow in Cheshire, it’s not too far from me but it is hard going on the way out, climbing up hill most of the way! Rainow is quite a special place (for me) because it marks the boundary with Cheshire and the Peak District National Park — Rainow is like my gateway to the peaks and it is here where Cheshire flat lands give way to more hilly rugged landscapes.

I tried to get some decent landscape shots but there was so much haze that many look too flat with no sense of depth, obviously those images just don’t do this magnificent landscape any justice so I resorted to my familiar technique of observing smaller details — mostly. Many more opportunities abound!

The Bends Are Sharp — on Macclesfield Road

Rainow

Times are hard once again and my underlying contempt for all of the nonsense of modern British society is running high today. I’m longing for a fulfilling occupation that is as far removed from the nouvelle bourgeois mode as possible. No more offices, meaningless post industrial money mills, or degradation of the soul. I want a real, connected, down to earth, out door or environmental occupation. A timeless real-man’s occupation in beautiful surroundings, autonomy and responsibility, enlightenment, and a feeling of peacefulness with no fear of life or death. I want to become part of nature, to feel insignificant but also part of an elemental force, and no I’m not having acid flash-backs but instead really just want to be true to myself.

I feel a little stressed about the current redundancy but it is nothing I can’t cope with, I am a natural born survivor but I am also happy to be free again with a sense of new opportunities. I used to watch the guy that trundles around my village in a little van doing tidying jobs here and there and often thought he had a better job than I did. Down shifting is the buzz phrase amongst the new generation of over worked high flighers, there is a desire to join the burgeoning Green revolution and to rediscover inner meaning in life, to have more free time and less destructive pressure. Of course the term Down Shift is relative; for me it would mean reverse gear but I think you understand my point.

I feel that I need to utilize the gene that drove my dad into the RM commando’s instead of fannying about in silly offices in the name of effete abstract meaninglessness. I have a Scots Irish ancestry this means that I need to be active and have an aversion to ties! It also means that I have a capacity for thrift and I need to be willfully autonomous otherwise that temper flares up.

I feel excited about the future in a “global” sense, the idea or prospect of Green politics galvanizing the collective consciousness into some form of anti capitalist pro cooperative activity almost as a kind of situationist revolt. Green ideology will become the prime discourse of reform within the next ten to twenty years and a turning back or turning away from excessive consumption will become the new way. It is already evident amongst some of the younger generations that the notion of less materialism is good and identification with material wealth and over use of resources is “un cool”. The idea of “bling” is already derided as a mark of “chav” identity. The response to the recent Live8 concept is very encouraging because it demonstrates the willingness of hitherto moribund and complacent younger generations to get involved in ideological debate, protest, and issues concerned with economic inequality, and environmentalism. Of course, us older folks that still remember the spirit of 68 or 78 and never managed to jettison left wing sensibilities after graduation have always been there. It’s all a good thing, mark my words. I know so many people of my own generation that now have an interest in some notion of a simpler, more natural, and courteous existence and a nostalgia for a past that we can only just remember.

Last weekend I had a rather enjoyable trip over to Timperley to see my folks, perfect cycling conditions. It is quite remarkable how traveling on two wheels under ones own effort changes a perspective on life. The sense of freedom and physical potency that comes from being able to do things most people would consider either impossible or fatal is quite rewarding. But you also get a very different perspective on the environment when traveling this way and I enjoy the altered sense of distance and feeling of adventure and challenge within the context of relatively local journeys. I think now is the time to make plans to get other skills accredited. Nobody within a hundred miles seems to need the services of a professional Sound Engineer. But I could also easily qualify as an Electrical Contractor and don’t really understand why I have never seriously considered this before.

Mileage: 4,760.9