They're not just a practical beacon of safety, lighthouses can also provide spiritual solace and calm amidst the storms of life... For Sunday Miscellany on RTÉ Radio 1, listen to Lighthouses by Barbara Scully above.
The sonorous tone of the fog horn in Dun Laoghaire harbour resonated through my childhood. Whether it was a wild winter night or one that was eerily calm and wrapped in a thick blanket of fog, I would fall asleep to the rhythmic sound sending out a warning to mariners. It travelled inland over the sleeping houses, where it reached my ears and always comforted and soothed me. In my mind I could see the beams from the two lighthouses illuminating the waters of the bay, in conversation with their sisters on The Baily and the Kish bank. A ballet of light and sound on a potentially dangerous night.
Lighthouses are majestic towers of protection. They warn of danger but they also guide us home; bulwarks against the rages of mother nature. Harbingers of hope and of care, they are the guardians of some of the most beautiful, rugged, and isolated parts of the world...
Listen to more from Sunday Miscellany here.
