I DO wish the cathedral would give their passion for 'conceptual large scale installations' a rest. Might we have a month or so, just to look at its glories unadorned? Sadly, to me, these imported creations often look a mite tacky and the concepts they promote are obscure - but then I suppose I am old and stuffy. This Christmas, in the dark and wet, I watched my grandchildren, eight and eleven, working themselves into frenzied delight, charging up and down through the 'installation' then on the west lawn path. The mysterious changing lights and sounds thrilled them. Splash the puddles, bat the light bulbs, charge up down, circle young couples trying to take selfies in the romantic gloom - my two children were 'high', total fans of that installation!

In with the new out with the old. Now we have the next installations. 'Have these ladders something to do with Saint Valentine's Day.' a visitor asked me. What odd concepts were going through her mind I wondered. We were looking at rope ladders with rungs of red plastic (which illuminate in the dark I think) - what link could they have with the saint? Or any other saint? Or any other thing?

I remained silent and gave her, I hope, a knowing, sympathetic, conspiratorial grin. For the life of me, on that first encounter, I had vaguely associated the ladders with all the mess of scaffolding in the cathedral - Health and Safety barriers - warning lights - builders ropes.

I must study those ladders 'conceptually' and next time I will be ready for another mystified visitor.

Tom Ridout

Salisbury