How Scottish...

My writing prompt from weeks ago was to think about the word “ancestors” and what it means/evokes. Honestly, I was too busy to really think on it. But tonight I got the news that a friend, a once close friend, from university has died. The moment I read the news, I had an instant image in my mind of him in a formal kilt, white button down shirt and tie with a glass of whiskey in hand. I think there might have been a sword as well. In fact, I am certain there was a sword. This gentleman was, at least in university, a bit attached to his Scottishness. He had this mild accent that crept into his speech which naturally increased with passion and/or liquor. He knew a lot about his heritage, as many Americans do, but sort of took his knowledge and admiration to a different level. He completely defied that “first generation loses all signs of the motherland” thing.

If you’re a fan of Doctor Who or, most recently, Arrow, then you know who Jack Barrowman is and that his outtakes are hysterical. No, I have not changed the subject. John was born and partly raised a Glaswegian but then moved to Chicago. Both accents come naturally to him and he occasionally forgets which one he should be using. So his outtakes on are often very funny. It wasn’t until I saw these, years after university, that I started to understand why my college friend would come in and out of the accent. And why it wasn’t, probably, an act. In particular, I felt in college that my friend was just being a bit pretentious. Which he was. If you can’t be pretentious at university, especially at the University of Virginia, when the hell can you be? But he was also genuinely forgetful about his not actually being “really” Scottish and what he sounded like to others. That’s how much he wanted to be a true Scot.  

By a similar token, I once thought I was a bit more Irish-American than American-with-a-lot-Irish-heritage. Then I lived in Ireland via study abroad. My third day in Dublin I said to a kind shopkeeper, “Have a nice day.” And she laughed loudly and remarked, “So you Americans do really say that.” I told her we did and that I meant it. I tried to watch an Irish soap opera and found I couldn’t understand half the dialogue. Then, I went to a Irish music jam session and though I desperately wanted to join in, I couldn’t figure out how. My life in Ireland for four months illustrated to me very clearly that I was nothing but a silly American with delusions of celticness.

I think a lot of Americans feel this “tie” to another homeland. We may know our family history back many hundreds of years even. But it does not negate the infusion of purely American culture that we are all boiled in from birth. Now, I can hear you shaking your head that there is no “purely” American culture because we are such a mishmash. Well, I tell you what. You get yourself an ocean away, either one will do, and walk out into any city. Stop the first person you see and say, “Nice to meet you.” You will feel more American, more bare, and more other than you’ve ever experienced (unless you’re a poor minority, sorry, you can get that in any “fine” department store.)

Which brings me directly to ancestors. My friend’s were Scottish and he was so tied to that idea, to an ideal of Scottishness, that it affected his entire being. I certainly hope someone gets a piper in to his funeral. He deserves a piper. A good one. And a tall glass, no ice, of excellent whiskey.