I’ve been a bellringer since 1989, when I learned to ring at St Mary’s church, Tenbury Wells. I kept it up when I moved to Leominster with my parents, and learned about as much as I ever have by 1995. In 1996, I went to university, and fell in with NUSCR. But here’s the thing. NUSCR’s practice night was Tuesdays, which clashed with the LGB group at the university, so I ended up alternating between the two, and never really committing to either. Ringing was fun, and always ended up in the pub; but the LGB group was pretty important in helping me come out and find gay friends.

Unfortunately, I’ve found that ringing is one of those things that you never really get better at unless you dedicate quite a lot of time to it. You have to do it two or three times a week to reinforce what you are learning and progress through the discipline. And at all sorts of times in my life, I’ve never organised myself to have the time to devote to ringing. And so it is that really, although I’ve been ringing twenty years, I haven’t made any progress in the last fifteen. One of the most advanced things I’ve ever done as a ringer was to get a quarter peal of Plain Bob Major in 2003. These days, I’d struggle to ring that, as I simply don’t get to practices on 8 bells very often.

So about 18 months, I’d sort of told myself that I’d quit ringing. I hadn’t made any real progress for years. My councillor work means I am often at evening meetings, which rule out regular practice with any one band. I don’t like getting up early at the best of times, and Sunday mornings (since the main reason for ringing is for Divine Service) are often the only time P gets for a lie-in, so it’s doubly unfair for me to get up early the one day he doesn’t have to.

And then I went shopping on a Friday night and heard the bells of Daybrook, Arnold, clattering across the car park. There weren’t many of them, and they weren’t ringing well, so I found myself thinking I’d just pop over and help out. I joined in and helped out. I probably haven’t helped the standard of ringing, but I usually add to the numbers. And doing that reminded me why it was that I liked doing this strange hobby anyway:

The people are great! I’ve had fab times with ringers wherever I’ve been – NUSCR had a wide range of fab people throughout all my university years, and although I’ve dropped in and out of their lives ever since, they’re still great. The people at the FODS, the gay bellringers association who have two tours a year – they’re great too! The people at pretty much any tower in the country when you turn up and say “I’m a ringer, can I get a ‘grab'” (ie can I ring at your tower because I haven’t run here before) will be welcoming and friendly. And the people at Daybrook are no exception. They’re great too.

The places. Being a ringer has taken me to all sorts of towns and villages I would never otherwise have visited from rural idylls to city centre churches. Ringing tours are fun. Churches are interesting places to spend a day dashing from one to the next, and although I’ve never systematically recorded the information or even completed the churches of one county, I’ve still had a lot of fun.

The access. As a ringer, you get to climb all sorts of staircases few other people have access to. You get rooftop views of cities, and privileged access to the exclusive upper reaches of cathedrals. You get to see buildings from whole new perspectives and see all sorts of fascinating things.

The exercise. I get precious little exercise at the best of times, so hoiking half a ton of metal through the sky at 60 feet a second must surely count as part of that.

oOo

Anyway, tonight, I scored a quarter peal for the first time in 6 years, ringing the tenor to a doubles method (which means: I rang the 6th bell to a pattern for 5 bells, so I wasn’t part of the method, just the person who always rang last – so I had an easier time of it than the other ringers, and even they weren’t taxed too much because it was a basic method.) We rang it as a 90th birthday compliment to a lady who lives within earshot, so hopefully she opened a window at some point and heard us at it. A passing ringer who did hear us told me on Facebook that it sounded OK, which was nice.

I’m going to try and get back into the habit of ringing quarters over the next year. Despite ringing the heaviest bell for just under an hour, I’ve not got any aches or blisters, which I’ve got before.

There’s a tradition at NUSCR that people get to ring a peal when they graduate – a peal is over 5,000 changes, and takes over two hours complete. In 2000, when I graduated the first time, we had at least three goes at getting a peal for me, but fate conspired against us and we suffered various setbacks – a rope that broke halfway through; an error in conducting, and a breakdown in ringing, so in the end, we settled for a long extent of 2,000 changes in the year 2000.

That means I’ve still never rung a peal.

So next year, I’m going to renew my efforts and score my first peal, hopefully to commemorate our wedding in October. Wish me luck. And let me know if you’d like to ring in it!