For Real Toads: Open Link, January 30

genetic memory:

is it real?

I went to Scotland

with Mom

and Dad

and the rest of the mob.

no one

felt it

except me, and I did

as soon

as the

we got off the plane.

I’m here,

I said,

I’m in Scotland,

I’m home

and I can feel it

in my bones.

*

I had nothing for Open Link Monday this week. I’ve been researching a subject dear to my heart—a kitchen renovation—and have therefore been distracted, but I read some submissions by other members of the writers’ group Imaginary Garden with Real Toads, so I could at least comment.

Mary (In the Corner of My Eye) wrote of one’s “primal landscape” which some of us, those of us who were fortunate enough to stay in one place for a large part of childhood, are said to possess.

Mary’s memories awakened my own, and, in so doing, reminded me of the way I felt the first and only time I visited Scotland.

I went with my parents, my siblings, and my siblings’ spouses. Mom was born a MacKenzie. Her ancestors were from the western Highlands. Grandma Davies was a Fraser from Aberdeen. Neither Mom nor Dad felt what I felt, although Dad had been very fond of Scotland when he visited relatives during his time there in World War II.
*

I know the sensation was real. It was the same feeling I’d always felt when I heard bagpipes, the feeling I thought everyone had about the pipes until I learned otherwise: a strong tug at the heartstrings; in the bloodstream, and in the very marrow of my bones.

Carl Jung, whose opinion I respect in certain other areas, called it racial memory, part of a collective unconsciousness.

I don’t intend to research it. I simply know it’s true. I’m not sure yet if the kitchen reno is true or not, so I’m going to keep working at that.

For Real Toads: the Isle of Skye

Yesterday, Kerry presented a pictorial prompt for the writers' group Imaginary Garden with Real Toads. She offered as inspiration a photo, a painting, and also prose by the artist Ken Simm, featuring Whooper Swans on the beautiful Isle of Skye in Scotland.
It is my great hope to visit Skye one day, but, in the meantime, I do have photos of Canada Geese taken here in southern Alberta by my own intrepid photographer, my husband, Richard Schear.

To accompany these Canada Geese on their journey, I have chosen to work (approximately) within the format of the Skye Boat Song, which is (as are many poems and songs in Scotland) about Bonnie Prince Charlie.

Alberta Bird Song

*

Speed, bonny bird, like a boat on the wave,

Onward! the lead goose cries,

Fly, bonnie bird, O Canada’s pride

On through the nighttime skies.

Dark the clouds roll, loud thunder roars,

Lightning bolts streak the night

Baffled, we wonder how the geese know

Which direction is right.

Thursday Theme Song: when he was...

"Association Football" is referred to as "soccer" here in North America, and "the beautiful game" elsewhere. (We don't know why.)

My Davies grandfather, who played it when he was a young man in Glasgow, Scotland, called it fitba' and used to amaze us when we were little, because he could hit the ball over the telephone and electrical wires—using his head! My brother and I were ever so impressed.

Many years later, my youngest brother played futbol in Mexico. His teammates had a nickname for him...it meant "speedy little lizard" but I can never remember the Spanish word.

Earlier this year, I watched his daughter, my 9-year-old niece, play soccer. Grandpa would have loved to see his sport continue through two more generations. You can bet those young Canadian girls weren't hitting the ball with their heads, however, with their "soccer moms" watching.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JjxpGpKNR4

*

When he was a little bitty bairn,

Grandpa's dad would take him to soccer

On them old football fields back home

*

It was up in Burns's old Scotland

More than a mile from merry old England

On them old football fields back home

*

Oh when them soccer balls get rotten

You can’t hit them with your noggin

On them old football fields back home

*

Photo and flags courtesy of Mr. Google

Posted for Hootin' Anni's musical meme

Thursday Theme Song

Thanks, Anni!

To see what songs inspired other music-bloggers, please click  HERE!

Coffee Klatch Friday: candy bucket list

Vicki, who hosts Coffee Klatch Friday at her blog The Tapestry of Life, has asked us this week what is on our "bucket list" (things we want to do before we die or "kick the bucket") and following hard on the heels of Hallowe'en, asks us what candy we like best! Yes, I left the comma out of the title on purpose—more fun that way. (Ten candies I would like to try before I die.)

Well, I'll start with candy first. Always a good place to start, especially if it involves chocolate. I love chocolate, dark, milk, light, white, hot, cold—chocolate! But my favorite individual kind of candy would have to be Peanut Butter Cups, for my own peculiar reason. I like the taste of peanut butter but I don't like the texture or even the smell of unadulterated peanut butter. Coated in chocolate and dressed in cute little ruffled paper pantaloons, it is magnifique!

Bucket List

Well, now, let me see...we've done a lot of traveling this century, and I did quite a bit of it on my own in the last century, but there are always places...

1. I was going to list Scotland first, but I'd better start with England because my best friend and her British-born husband have just moved from the west coast of Canada to the middle of England where they now live in a narrowboat on a canal.
2. Scotland, because I've spent a week in Edinburgh, but haven't been to the Highlands or the Islands. Looming large on my bucket list is the tiny island of Eriskay, followed closely by the larger island of Skye, both in the Hebrides.
3. Sydney, Australia. I spent a few days there in 1982 after touring Queensland with my little brother and a friend. Now I'd like to go back to visit new friends, if I can find a ship to take me there. I'm willing to fly home (which will be awful enough, and will likely involve several weeks of bed-rest) but I refuse to arrive there with jet-lag.
4. Africa. Ditto. Travel by ship. Or by leaps and bounds by plane, overnighting every time a change of plane is required.
5. Singapore, if my friend Robin and his wife are still there. If not by ship, at least the same overnighting requirements as in #4.
6. Antarctica, or close to it. Somewhere with penguins, such as the Falklands. I loved the Galapagos penguins and now I want more. Animated movies are entirely too cute, and visiting the penguins behind the scenes at Sea World Orlando was wonderful, but I want to see the real thing, in the wild, once more, or more than once more.

7. Trains. I love trains. The Orient Express would be fabulous. There are some elegant trains in Africa, too. (See #4.) The Rocky Mountaineer in BC and Alberta would be lovely, also. Really, however, what I like best about trains is sleeping. I sleep like a baby in a lower berth on a train.
8. I was in New Orleans in 1980. I think I'd like to return. After both of my parents had died, my siblings and I said we had no regrets about the life Mom and Dad had lived, and it's true, although I would have liked to take them to New Orleans.
9. Ireland, and Wales. I spent an afternoon in Wales when traveling with my parents, brothers, and sisters-in-law in England after our week in Edinburgh. I'd like to see more of Wales, and I'd love to visit Ireland, where I also have a friend I'd like to visit.
10. I'd like to meet Tony Bennett. He's the only one left from the 50s. And, if not Tony Bennett, I'd like to meet John Fogerty. Creedence Clearwater Revival played all my favorite dancing songs in the 70s, and I love Fogerty's voice.

So, there we have ten, or maybe ten and a half. I'm looking forward to seeing what others at Coffee Klatch have on their bucket lists. See you there!

PS — I know the list is long, but my friend Sherry just reminded me of Haida Gwaii, formerly the Queen Charlotte Islands, in British Columbia. A must-see!