By: Jennifer Richardson Holt
I think I might be a bit different. Anyone reading this who knows me well probably finds that statement an obvious and terribly delayed announcement. I decided to make this statement because of what happened in my brain as I was trying to think of a topic for today. I had told myself that I should write on something I am passionate about and truly interested in as that should make for better content. Then as I reviewed my interest list, I realized just how diverse everything was, and I even surprised myself. I knew I had a variety of interests but my heavens, just a quick review of topic possibilities spans such a wide spectrum I began to wonder about me. I thought about all these ideas that came to mind and oddly enough I stumbled upon a bit of an intriguing connecting thread through all of them. Who knew?
I started with a video about the language of Scotland. And you may find that an odd statement like I did because I assumed they spoke English and just had that glorious bold accent. And yes, they do but also in the more rural and isolated areas many of them speak Doric which is like English but then again not. This was a new development for me, and I was intrigued. I knew sometimes to hear a Scottish person speaking was a challenge to understand but I had no idea that there was a whole other language filled with Viking influence and varying wildly from village to village. I could somewhat understand the examples I heard but then again there were parts that I hadn’t the slightest clue. I had studied a bit of the Scottish terminology, so I knew a few of the unique terms but a whole new language was an amazing and fascinating development for me. I’ve always loved accents and languages so me enjoying this little informational treasure didn’t surprise me.
What did surprise me was when I heard some locals from a tiny fishing village in northern Scottland in a pub chatting and some terms spoken were far more familiar than anticipated. I knew a few Scottish turns of phrase but when I heard these people using terminology that I knew from America, and not just anywhere in America but I had heard this in areas that I knew and go to and in voices that I have heard all my life. Some of the things that these people across the pond were saying I have heard come from the lips of my own family. Now this Scottish language took at turn to history and not just any history, which I do have a general affection for, but my own history and my own roots. That is the type of thing I don’t just have a general affection for, but I could absolutely lose myself to learning about the trails of DNA and mystery that make up my ancestry.
Hearing a people from far away use words that those closest to me have used, it was a tangible experience in my ancestral journey. People from those hills (or beinn as they might call it) left that land and traveled the ocean. They settled in Appalachia because it reminded them of home and those peoples lived and prospered and became another people and those people became the people of my mother. Even the Viking influence is right there with the touch of Norse in both mine and my mother’s genetics not even counting the Scottish. It was amazing to see the personal connections unfold. I have always felt a connection with these peoples and had always heard that these were the people that settled in the areas in America that would tie them to me. But this was such a manifested kinship. It took the relation beyond some historical facts I had seen written on paper and it was realized with my own ears. These people spoke like my people because these are in fact, though separated by many generations and a vast amount of distance, my people.
In watching a simple video that was going to feed into my love of accents I ended up delving into what makes me the person I am. I nurtured my love of tracing my ancestry and the history of my family. I got to learn about Scotland which was wonderful because I have always been enamored by the people of the British Isles. I suppose that affection was based not only on my love of history, which one must admit they have quite the sampling of, but in the history that is truly my own. It had been stories from centuries ago though to make that land have a really powerful feeling of familiarity. But when I heard someone who had never left their little village on the hills near the North Sea use words that my own grandmother in Appalachian foothills of Alabama used, well that made all these varied pastimes link together and intensify in ways I never saw coming. Perhaps these odd passions I have aren’t so odd after all. Random dots on a page don’t seem very significant until they are connected. The key just seems to be drawing the line.
Prose and Possibilities 