Canterbury Trials: Thing 12

I like slide shows. When I was little, I remember how excited I would get when my dad would start getting out the old slide projector and mom would start making popcorn. We didn't have a screen, so mom would drape an old white sheet over her big fold-up fabric cutting board. Off would go the lights, and we would travel back to our many trips to Canada, the western states, or just time itself. Most of the slides were in a cartridge that would drop one in, pull it out with the push of the attached remote (how's that for technology), shift forward, and drop another--ker-chuuuung-chik! ker-chuuuung-chik! I loved that sound, the same way I still love the sound of an old 35 millimeter camera's shutter opening and closing--solid and final--moment captured, for better or for worse.

How many times did I think I had taken the perfect shot, only to wait the 24 hours for developing (used to be a week or more-gasp-how did we live?) and discover the subject had flinched, so it's blurred, or the person had blinked, so the face was contorted. And film was expensive; so was the developing.

In high school I bought a black and white developing kit--projector, trays, red light, the works. Took rolls of film (black and white wasn't as expensive) and spent hours in my home-made darkroom (one of the bathrooms we didn't use in the giant 4 bedroom 4 bath house my mom and I shared after the rest of the family had moved on). I worked with tinting and exposure, cropping and focus-blurs--I loved it.

So while cruising around on Flickr, I decided to focus on Canterbury Cathedral. When my husband and I went to England a few years back, we didn't make it to Canterbury. We made it to Westminster Abbey and York Minster--both beautiful beyond belief--but Canterbury Cathedral, to me, seems to have a different air. Maybe it's Thomas Beckett and the whole "will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?" story, maybe it's Chaucer's Tales, but this Cathedral has been in my imagination ever since I can remember.

I found many views of the Cathedral on Flickr, but these were the ones that stood out to me the most, especially the undercroft. When we were in York Minster, I remember sitting in the undercroft, listening to the guided tour explanation. At one point the voice stopped, and this beautiful music started up--the Minster's pipe organ. I felt so at peace at that moment. . .

For class however, we don't focus on the York Mystery Plays, but we do travel with Chaucer, so these picture may actually come in handy some day.

1. Nick Garrod's Canterbury Cathedral

2. Major Clanger's My Mum Inside Canterbury Cathedral

3. Hyougushi's Canterbury Cathedral

4. Chingers7's Canterbury Cathedral

5. Steffen M. Boelaars's Canterbury Cathedral Cloisters

6. Steve Cadman's Cloisters, Canterbury Cathedral

7. Hyougushi's Canterbury Cathedral

8. Steve Cadman's Canterbury Cathedral

9. Wendy Clarkqt's Canterbury Cathedral

10. Nick Garrod's Cathedral Blues

11. Archangeli's Backpacking TarePanda at Canterbury Cathedral