muddy but loving it!

This image encapsulates much of my feelings toward the pathway building scheme we have embarked on. Soaked, covered in mud, but thoroughly enjoying the experience and the opportunity this period of work has provided me. Captured early on by a colleague, the image is over the very first stone path feature I'd managed to set correctly in place, after hours of toiling and lifting and heaving in the early summer mud at Craigmore, just off the Dukes Pass. The sense of satisfaction, or perseverance over the elements and the difficulties of learning new skills. We spent 8 weeks or so on that hill, our team, in all elements, and many many more path features were built. But you don't forget the first. This stone was the start of something new for me, and if I set it in the ground it should long outlast me, helping walkers up that hillside for decades to come. In the past, in previous careers, often office based, I'd never before had the very really, visible examples of my own work, my own achievements. Here was one, placed by my own hands (with help it must be said). There is something deeply satisfying in seeing a physical manifestation of your efforts. In that sense this recent months, learning and building our paths, has been one of immense personal and professional pride.