Dowsing for a
Wee Book Launch

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When the phone rang, I was literally half way through the doorway, on my way out.  A few seconds later, I would have missed the phone, jumped in the car – and wasted most of the day.  Saved by the bell!  Such strange occurrences seem to happen rather often to a Tamar Dowser. 

 

We had hoped to spend the day dowsing in the woods near Goonhavern, but torrential rain and gale force winds put paid to that.  

 

Having previously, somewhat regretfully, passed over the invitation to the launch a of new book that day - by Hamish Miller, probably Cornwall’s best known living dowser – in favour of dowsing with my friends, I now found myself unexpectedly available for this mysterious event.  I phoned for some directions to the venue from HM’s partner Ba Russell, and we set off – never having been to a book-launch before, and not really having much idea of what was involved.

 

While the directions were sound, we hadn’t bargained for the practical effects of the weather.  The intended route was blocked by debris just outside Hayle, and at the next junction, cars were reversing in an awkward, not to mention dangerous, manner into the oncoming flow of traffic.  Having travelled a fair way, we were loath just to turn back, so after a gusty and scenic detour round the back roads and byways of St Ives, we arrived – according to my own dowser’s nose for being vaguely in the right area – in vaguely the right area.  

 

However, with only a house name to go on and a variety of pretty similar-looking yellow roads to choose from, I felt justified in getting out the rods to finish the job off.  With a little help from my copper-clad friends, we got by quite nicely.  Two junctions, two questions, two answers and Bob’s-your-uncle, as someone used to say.

 

In retrospect, using the rods to get to the launch of a dowsing book does seem particularly appropriate! 

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Although I had corresponded with Hamish a few times, we had never met.  Any concerns I might have had that a bearded Scottish blacksmith might exhibit a braveheart bravado were dispelled even before he spoke.  Miller is a quietly positive and patently sensitive dowser and craftsman, with a wealth of experience and a haversack of interesting and revealing anecdotes.  He took the trouble to listen to our stories, as well as telling us some of his own, and even remembered the gist of letters I had sent to him – with just a little prompting! 

 

His personal contacts with like-minded local people in Africa, Australia and elsewhere were a particularly reassuring counter-balance to the stereotypical tabloid images of the maelstrom, which our media would have us believe lurks just beyond every garden gate.    

   

For the record, the book-launch wasn’t the clique of chattering intellectuals one fears one might find in the home-counties, but a coming together of positive fellow-travellers, with a common interest in dowsing and reading, the uplifting and the esoteric.

 

The Definitive Wee Book on Dowsing is a nicely crafted little volume, beautifully illustrated by Kate Hands, aimed primarily at the novice diviner, but with plenty of interest for those who have more experience with dowsing tools.

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Hopefully, the Tamar Dowsers can ply their craft at Goonhavern on a more portentous day.  The launch of this excellent new dowsing book from our patch was very much a one-off.

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Nigel Twinn

Otober 2002