Two days after the 50th anniversary of the Moon Landing, today we went to Tawney; it’s about a year from our first trip there. We didn't realize when we began this brainstorm in July of 2018 that our processes would still be unfurling and expanding, but here we are: today our intention was to re-capture (with our new 360 degrees GoPro) light bands in the Tunnel Room as they swivel in organic shifts: narrow and speed-up, open-widen-and slow down, braiding themselves in response to the singing bowls, and to experiment with 3D scanning. The cave was dry and the water was low, which made the shallow mote easy to access with less slipping around and sinking in mud than usual. We spent a lot of time on the little river's edge though, and still exited with boots sloshing full of water, in mud casts and masks; everyone except for Wallace who climbed out crystal clean. Wallace joined us today!
It was a delight to be underground together again, after an early summer pause, and after much piecing together and falling apart of ideas, old and new. We returned with some nice footage of the light bands and singing bowls-- but only made it to the Bridge of Terabithia (the little river's first access point) when the GoPro disk space cramped our style a bit. We collected some crisp 360 captures of the bands, especially those closest to the water, but missed opportunities to preserve the almost psychedelic fields of light singing and rippling across the cave's walls and ceiling. We learn more every time though, and ignoring our imperfectly met, or unmet, objective to capture and distill the performances of light and sound: the experience was no less magical. Imagine being inside a subterranean cocoon, woven from the light of prisms, the quiet of planetariums, the dust particles inside dew drops, the humidity of aquariums, and the dark spaces between roots, and stones, and movementless wind... and basically you will be there with us in that space.
We had great success with the 3D scanner, as Phat led us about the dark interior, creating a point cloud of geometric samples on the surface of the cave's internal space (see some experimental reconstructions from the Moon Room and Formations Room below).
It was the kind of cave trip, that you climb out wanting to go back again. We were below ground for only a few hours, one county away from our daily lives, but it often feels like time and space broaden below ground; you come up feeling like you've been someplace very far away, for a long time, on a distant island or remote planet, welcomed back to the sun's almost digital vibrancy, bombarded with zings—and dings—and texts—from satellites and internets, as you climb over colorful millipedes—seemingly hand-painted by tiny brushes, and pass backpacks up above ground through an iron gate. There is the initial cool and balmy moss carpeted-rocks, a re-combobulating space, and then climbing out of that, the warmth of late summer, and nearby storms today.
