Peregrina Gadelica

Nostalgia

2012-02-12T07:14:00.000-08:00

It's a gift, I think, to have memories of very early childhood. Not everyone seems to have them; my mother claims that my siblings and I do because we talk about them so much. My very earliest memories are of dreams, when I was too young to comprehend the difference between them and my real, wide-awake life.

I think it's a related thing to go through life with a strong sense of nostalgia. I read somewhere recently that everyone is nostalgic about their school days. I disagree with this; there is little from my school days I look back on with fondness. Christmas is another story. Christmas is saturated with nostalgia for me, right down to the memory of the smell of the artificial tree needles when they melted on the gaudy coloured lights.

I'm sure that Christmas nostalgia is common enough. I'm not as sure that's the case with being nostalgic about the years shortly before you were born. Although I appeared two weeks before the decade ended, the country music of the Seventies sends waves of nostalgia washing over me.

I'm thinking of a particular song -- I first remember hearing my fellow Nova Scotian Anne Murray's 'Danny's Song' as a teenager on an car ride on a golden sunlit autumn day and falling in love with the song and the day.

So what is it will all this nostalgia today? (And how many times have I used the word 'nostalgia' in this post?)

As a wise monk recently explained to me, the point is that 'the most powerful nostalgia is for our true homeland -- heaven. It's worth moving heaven and earth for that homeland!'

So that's it. It's the explanation for that strange, sweet ache I get when I see the moon rising over the wintry mountains in my beloved Hebridean island and when I listen to John Denver singing 'Country Roads.' It's the longing for heaven that's part of every cell of all of us; the experience of St Augustine's insight that 'our hearts are restless until our hearts rest in you.' It's the pearl of great price; it's the treasure in the field that I will sell everything I have to buy.

'Good life!'

2012-02-10T14:16:00.000-08:00

...was the reaction of a dear colleague when I told her about entering the monastery the other day. Which is ironic and appropriate -- it is a good life. It's the best life -- 'the better part' -- why else do it?

I've been booking tickets this evening for the trip down to the monastery this summer. The airline booking form required me to select the reason for the journey. 'They don't give joining the nuns as an option,' I texted to the friend who is going to accompany me. I settled on 'leisure.'

When my sister got married the year before last, she and her husband were told 'to play the honeymoon card' at hotels and restaurants. I told this to my friend when we first began to discuss our travel plans. 'Oh yes,' she agreed. 'We'll definitely have to play the becoming a nun card.' Although I'm not sure what people would offer you when you play the becoming a nun card. Quizzical looks? Incredulous laughter? A complimentary glass of Blue Nun? Hmm...

Happy Feast of Saint Scholastica!

We got nun

2012-01-24T13:49:00.000-08:00

Although a Protestant, the father of an old friend had a Catholic education. "As the nuns used to say in school," he told her. "If you don't got any manners, get the hell home."

I told that story to my own father. "The nuns at my school had a saying, too," he told me. "We don't got nun."

Which is something my own family, deo volente, will not be able to say in years to come. They will have got one nun -- a Benedictine in a monastery on the other side of the water.

This news is something that I'm gradually beginning to share, as plans have come together in the last little while. What do people say when you tell then you're becoming a nun? I've begun a list.

Very kind, very devout landlady (with a sigh): "It could be worse. You're young yet, anyway."

Scottish gal pal, fellow spinster and travelling companion (when I reported landlady's reaction): "Worse? How could it be worse? You could get knocked down by a car, I suppose."

Little sister in the big city: "Awesome. Are you allowed out to go for Chinese food?"

Friend and work colleague with a penchant for dressing up as a nun: "I hope I haven't offended you by dressing up a nun. I promise I won't do it for your leaving do."

I assured her I didn't want a leaving do, but if I did, an appearance in her nun costume would be a nice touch.

Not long to go...

2012-01-07T06:19:00.000-08:00

...before it's time to return to the Hebrides. It seemed that I was back in the Old Country this morning when I was awoken by a pheasant calling. Shades of Pluscarden Abbey. They are impressive birds. When I was very small, my favourite breakfast was Quaker Instant Oatmeal -- the apple and cinnamon variety. I can't remember if it was birds or wild animals in general that featured on the packages, but my favourites were the pheasants and the owls.

My younger sister recently pointed out that our elder niece and nephew are now at the age that we can remember being. My nephew, who is three, is on the way to the house just now -- my mother was going to take him for breakfast and to see if the car-carrier ship was in.

My niece will be four in a few months. "That little one's not too stupid," is my mother's way of describing her.

"Sometimes I do things that are bad," she informed me the other day. "Like when Mommy told me to go upstairs and get her phone."

'Why didn't you go get it?" I asked her.

"Because I didn't want to."

And there's our flawed human nature summed up by a precocious preschooler.

On Christmas Day, we were gathered at her house, and she was showing my younger sister's husband, who is Jewish, the nativity scene. "This is Mary, and this is Joseph, and this is Baby Jesus -- or God," she told him.

It's not over

2012-01-02T15:16:00.001-08:00

Christmas is not over. It's not over until January 6. Or January 8, if you live in a country that has transferred Epiphany to the Sunday. Or maybe February 2, the Feast of the Presentation. It's not time to take down the tree or the decorations. The Wise Men haven't even got there yet.

A related rant -- why do they stop playing Christmas songs on the radio on December 26? Could they at least not continue until New Year's Day? I was only slightly mollified that when I was in the car at 11.30 on New Year's Eve, I heard U2's New Year's Day, followed by advertisements for two different gyms. It would have been nice to hear Abba's Happy New Year, but I'm sure that it was playing on some radio station somewhere.

And a final curmudgeonly moment -- spending Christmas in my native land, it's become very noticeable that many of my Maritime compatriots often wish each other a "Happy New Year's," and ask each other "What are you doing for New Year's?" Has this become more common or just more obvious to me?

Advent

2011-12-09T14:11:00.000-08:00

Catholics obviously don't believe in karma, but I was raised to believe in comeuppance. As in "he'll get his comeuppance; just you watch." I think I get a bit of my own every time a child I teach questions what I say. After all, I happily corrected teachers throughout my school career.

A few weeks ago, I was speaking to a class of Catholic pupils about Advent. "Does anyone know when Advent starts this year?" I asked.

"December first," one of the boys volunteered confidently.

"No," I replied. "It's a different date every year and it's not December first this year."

I noticed a few faces looking bemused. "But it is," another child insisted. "That's the first day in your Advent calendar. That's the first door you open for a chocolate."

Which led other children to chip in with their approach to chocolate Advent calendars -- saving them all up until nearer Christmas, etc.

"We're talking about church Advent, not chocolate Advent calendar Advent," I had to specify. I decided not to mention that I had purchased my chocolate Advent calendar during a trip to the mainland in October. It has Lindt chocolates in it.

September

2011-09-04T14:52:00.000-07:00

It's September -- it's beginning-again time -- it's the end of lazy summer and the start of invigorating autumn.

A perfect time for the new Mass translation -- which we had this morning for the first time.

The island landscape is changing hues -- the grasses are golden and the purple of heather and thistles is a delight to the eyes.

A gorgeous red sunset tonight -- good weather tomorrow.

Yes, I am a Luddite...

2011-08-31T14:23:00.000-07:00

...but modern travel does have its benefits. A few weeks ago, I left a monastery on an island in the south of England, travelling by taxi to the pier, where I caught the next catamaran to the mainland. I found myself at the bus station with a little time to make a few work-related phone calls: "Hi! Where are you? Are you on the island?" "No, I'm in Portsmouth in England -- but I'll be in school day after tomorrow. Here's my bus."

Then an evening in London -- including a visit to Westminster Cathedral and a walk down the Mall in golden evening sunlight. And Chinese food in Chinatown -- my favourite mainland indulgence, followed closely by Indian takeaways and visits to Marks and Spencers. I caught the sleeper train from Euston and had my first experience of a "Bargain Berth": a small compartment with two bunks, the lower one which was occupied with a fellow young female colonial. It's a big step up from a wretched overnight journey on the dirt-cheap Megabus, but I was slightly dismayed to find that when lying in bed, the rocking motion of a train can be nauseating rather than soothing. I had it on good authority that there would be a treat delivered to the door in the morning, and sure enough, a porter materialized at about half-past six with a paper bag containing a cup of hottish water, a teabag and a shortbread finger. Which was lovely -- except that I find the practice of serving water and a teabag separately a little counter-productive -- the combination of the two will produce a potable brown liquid, but it's not exactly a proper cup of tea.

And then off the train at Central Station in Glasgow before the morning commuters had arrived. I made my way to the bright, refurbished Glasgow Cathedral for morning Mass and then it was breakfast and shopping in the city centre. Tea and cakes with friends were followed by a mad dash to collect my bag from the station and catch the airport shuttle. A short, breathtaking flight over Argyll, the Ross of Mull and Iona and I was back at my tiny local airport on an island in the north of Scotland, a little more than twenty-four hours after my journey began. And good-bye to the summer holidays -- back to work!

Islay of the green grass...

2011-07-23T08:07:00.000-07:00

...as the Gaelic song goes, was where I visited earlier this month. And it was -- Islay has rolling green hills, like Ireland, and rows of tidy white houses in small seaside villages, and an abundance of ruined medieval chapels. Ironically, there's no longer any Catholic churches on the island. My non-Catholic travelling companion asked me about this on the third day of our sojourn on the island. "I should have known," she admitted it. "You would have dragged me in there by now."

It is said that Saint Columba first landed on Islay when he left Ireland. But it wasn't suitable for his self-imposed exile as he could still see his beloved homeland. We saw Ireland from the Mull of Oa when the sea mist lifted briefly. There is something about standing on a sea cliff with views of distant islands -- or islands that are not as distant as one may think.

We went to Jura for an afternoon -- wild and mostly uninhabited, with one road and an abundance of stags, several of which watched us complacently as we crossed a field where they were grazing to visit yet another medieval church site. There were standing stones marking the traditional crossing point in the narrow isthmus at the middle of the island, where Saint Columba may have crossed during his journeys. It was not until we were on our way back that it cleared enough for us to see Beinn an Oir, the taller of the Paps of Jura. "There's gold in that mountain," we had been told.

On Islay, we drove out a narrow road, past the Ardbeg distillery, past inlets where seals basked on sun-warmed rocks, until we reached the place where the eighth-century Kildalton Cross stands, near the walls of a chapel dedicated to Saint John, surrounded by trees. There was a powerful sense of holiness in area. It seems that there was likely a monastery there at one time. Will the day come that these holy places in the islands are more than evocative ruins frequented by tourists? Will the monks ever return? As the prophecy of Saint Columba goes:

An Ì mo chridhe, Ì mo gràidh,

An àite guth manaich bidh geum ba

Ach mun tig an saoghal gu crìch

Bithidh Ì mar a bha.

Iona of my heart, Iona of my love,
Instead of monks voices shall be
the lowing of cattle;

But ere the world shall come
to an end,
Iona shall be as it was.

He must increase...

2011-06-24T15:12:00.000-07:00

...I must decrease. And the year turns on the two ends of an axis -- the birth of Saint John the Baptist when the days begin to grow shorter and the birth of Our Lord when the daylight begins to increase. Today wasn't the first time I had been aware of this fact, but it struck me anew when I read a passage about today's feast in my copy of the Magnificat. Mass was due to begin in a few minutes and I thought that it was a shame that in the here and now, not much emphasis is placed on the Solemnity of the Birth of Saint John the Baptist.

There's an irony, or at least a connection, in this somewhere. Supposedly many of the Gaelic ways of doing things came from our pagan sun-worshipping past. The right way to do things is deiseal, or sun-wise, from east to west via the south. On Easter Day, it's the tradition to watch the sun rise and see it dance in celebration of the Resurrection. Maybe some would rather stay away from these elemental facets of our faith, but wouldn't it make sense that God would create a world in which the story of our redemption was etched in the the cycles of the cosmos? And even before the Good News was brought to the Gaels, would the significance of the patterns of the natural world not be an obvious way in which they became attuned to the greatness of God?

The lines of today's first reading from Isaiah always give me a shiver of recognition:

Islands, listen to me; pay attention, remotest peoples.

God has been speaking to us and is speaking to us and his Word echoes through every facet of the universe.

Island Midsummer

2011-06-19T12:26:00.000-07:00

Last night, about half-past nine, I decided to go for a walk. The sun was low in the sky and the light was of a quality that made everything stand out clearly -- the blackbirds perched on the craggy knolls; the redshanks whistling and winging away; the yellow wild iris -- sealastair -- that blooms in abundance at this time of year on study stalks in clumps of glossy, dark green leaves. There were the rosy globes of red clover and the red-purple varieties of orchid, as well as the spreading tendrils of silverweed with its yellow blossoms like buttercups. And the buttercups -- the unmowed grass in front of the house is thick with them.

This evening the weather isn't as promising -- the clouds hang low over the top of the mountain and the light is dull. But there will be other evenings for walks this week as the days extend to their very longest and night only exists for the few hours that the sun dips behind the northern horizon and a red glow marks its progress. It's midsummer in the Hebrides.

Pentecost

2011-06-12T13:38:00.000-07:00

It's bittersweet that in my version of Daily Prayer, today's Evening Prayer concludes with the sentence 'So Eastertide ends.'

With the sun shining brightly this afternoon, I walked up a nearby hill. It's funny how hills don't look steep when you're walking up them, but they feel steep. Also funny how socks always fall down in welly boots (or rainboots, as I'm used to calling them.) A fact that has driven me crazy on occasion throughout my life. Then again, when I was very small, I either refused to wear socks or wore them inside-out so I wouldn't feel the seams on my toes. My lack of socks led to an unfortunate incident with a caterpillar that had built a cocoon in one of my plimsolls -- that's another story however. Today, I was slightly mortified by the idea that I would run into someone who would discover that I was holding my socks up with the rubber bands that come on asparagus. They worked, though.

And the views were amazing -- a panorama of moor and lochs and machair and 'far distant isles' and larks singing and crows crowing and buzzards circling. Standing at the crest of the hill, taking this in, on an exceptionally calm afternoon, a wind suddenly swept across the landscape, causing the upland grasses to bend and whisper. A beautiful Pentecost Sunday -- Veni Creator Spiritus!

The Lady of the House

2011-05-09T14:57:00.000-07:00

I have to confess that this weekend, for the first time, I bought copies of both Ok! and Hello magazines. They were the Royal Wedding commemorative editions, after all.

The press reports that the Duchess of Cambridge is settling down to life as the wife of an RAF officer in Anglesey. Now someone who is going to spend the rest of her life attending countless public engagements and who will likely never be able appear in public without being attended by bodyguards and pursued by photographers is hardly a typical housewife, but there is something cheering about the idea of the world's most famous bride taking on the role of homemaker. Will the Duchess' choice cause modern, secular Britain to re-evaluate, and consequently, re-value the housewife?

Island Sunday

2011-05-08T09:01:00.001-07:00

I called my mother earlier to wish her a Happy Canadian Mothers' Day. Funny that we celebrated UK Mothering Sunday over a month ago with a roast beef dinner at a cafe in Golders Green.

We were talking a bit about elections -- it turns out that I didn't get a vote in either the one here or the one on the other side of the water. It looks like there's a referendum in the air here in Scotland. If I do get a vote in that one, I may face a dilemma -- a vote for the UK to remain the United Kingdom, or a vote for an independent Scotland with more control over language and cultural policies and possibly an easier time for emigrant Gaels to to get back into their ancestral homeland?

There are other pressing matters in the meantime. A tray of millionaires' shortbread is cooling in the fridge and has to be cut before the chocolate hardens. And the weather has cleared, although a brisk wind is blowing. A walk after supper or before?

Royal Wedding: the craic

2011-04-29T06:48:00.000-07:00

There is not a cloud in Outer Hebridean sky on this festive Easter Friday. The Royal Wedding was beautiful. The bride's dress was lovely. And a veil! I hope she gets a nice big piece of cake at the reception, though. The hats, the crowds, the uniforms, the bells...

...but why were there trees in Westminster Abbey?

Those Anglicans are good at pomp and ceremony. People hunger for beauty and ritual and tradition. It's in us to love these big occasions.

And the Bishop of London quoted from St Catherine of Siena at the beginning of an articulate sermon in which the importance of marriage and family life was highlighted. To paraphrase a clerical friend, the whole thing was one in the eye for secularists.

A few Canadian flags to be seen amongst the wellwishers -- probably outnumbering the saltires. The people of my native land do love our royals.

Royal Wedding

2011-04-28T23:54:00.000-07:00

And the handsome prince married the cheery English girl and to celebrate, people across the land were given a day off work -- even those in far distant isles, where a Gaelic girl from the Colonies, a year or two older than the bride-to-be, noted that as well as being Easter Friday, today was the feast day of the saint from whom both their names had come. And happily she ate her breakfast in front of the television, smiled indulgently at the mildly eccentric English people who had spent the night camping out on the streets of London, and looked forward to viewing the wedding, accompanied by two lovely cats, a cup of tea and Empire biscuits from the local bakery. First she would go to Mass, though, said by a priestly friend. ("We'll have prayers for the Royal Family. You can be our Commonwealth representative.") And as Westminster Abbey rose majestically into view on the television screen, she thought, with a measure of bittersweet satisfaction, that the future King would marry in a what was a Benedictine Abbey. The Benedictines are always in the mix somewhere, after all.

Red sky at night...

2011-04-18T12:40:00.000-07:00

For whatever reason, the ending of the proverb I always knew was 'sailors' delight.' It seems that the common ending in the UK is 'shepherds' delight.' Both versions are fitting here in the Hebrides. This evening and last night my living room was briefly suffused with a rosy glow before the sun disappeared below the western horizon. The evenings are stretching out longer and longer. Tonight I couldn't resist the pull of the good weather and went out for a walk. Calves, lambs, swans and starlings; crofters taking the chance to finish a day's ploughing on the machair and a stingingly fresh wind out of the south -- spring has come to the island.

It's Holy Week. Lent is almost over and the week stretches out ahead like the rosy light over the flatness of the machair. In a few days I'll travel to Pluscarden Abbey for the Easter Triduum. In a meantime, evenings like this are a blessing.

Island Saturday

2011-04-16T11:52:00.000-07:00

I spent most of the day today doing housework. Not giving the house an especially good cleaning -- just the laundry and cleaning that builds up over the course of a week. My usual Saturday routine. Not exactly glamourous, but with its particular little perks, such as the discovery that there is a method to my island friends' habit of hanging clothes out whenever there's a chance of some 'drying' to be had, despite the hazard of sudden squalls that at best soak the clothes in a few seconds and at worst tear them right off the line. It was a few weeks ago, on a mild, sunny Saturday, that I hung clothes outside for the first time this spring. That night, with my bed freshly made, I was puzzled over the lovely fragrance in the room. Then it occurred to me -- the sheets! The magic of fresh Hebridean breezes. I am now a complete convert and I type this lounging on the chesterfield, the bedclothes finishing drying on the heaters and the lovely smell perfuming my living room.

Maybe I've been in Scotland too long. Elizabeth Taylor was just on the television, as Cleopatra. "Don't you love me? Don't you want Egypt?" she breathed. I shook my head in confusion. I was sure she had said, "Don't you want an eejit?"

The thought came to me a few times over the last few days that April 16 was significant, but I couldn't put my finger on why. It dawned on me today -- it's Pope Benedict's birthday! Happy Birthday, Holy Father! Mealaibh ur naidheachd!

There'll Always Be an England...

2011-04-14T13:23:00.000-07:00

A mere colonial such as myself is perhaps not as jaded as some of my Scottish-born friends about our neighbour to the south. 'There are some nice parts,' I've been told, grudgingly. I mentioned to a friend I would be visiting Bath during my recent holiday. 'It's like Edinburgh, I think,' she told me, 'but not as good. And why would you go all the way there when you have Edinburgh here?'

There are a lot of nice parts, I'd say. My recent visit was a bit of a church-bagging foray: Westminster and Bath Abbeys, York Minster and Durham Cathedral. It only dawned on me, explicitly, during this trip, that the 'bare ruin' d choirs' of rural Cistercian and Benedictine abbeys I both love and grieve, still exist, in a more complete form, in these awesome buildings in their urban settings. After spending a spellbound afternoon in York Minster, my mother paused before signing the guest book. 'What will I write?' she mused.

'Can we have it back now, please?' I suggested.

Updated Website for St Cecilia's Abbey

2011-04-11T14:48:00.000-07:00

These Benedictine ladies, who live an enclosed monastic life on the Isle of Wight, are nuntastic. And their updated website is super. And the chanting! And the Latin! Have a look -- and a listen!

Perigree Moon

2011-03-20T08:53:00.000-07:00

From time to time it's nice to realise that you have achieved some of your dreams. I don't know how many university students would rate 'living beyond the reach of light pollution' very high on their list of ambitions, but it certainly featured on mine. I even wrote a poem for a course about trying to escape the glare of streetlights in order to view the full moon. That thought occurred to me last night when I stepped outside to view the fullest full moon in almost 20 years, brightly illuminating the treeless island landscape and casting distinct shadows. Out of curiosity, I took my missal outside and saw that I was right -- the light was bright enough to read by. And the moon's only competition were the outside lights of some of the neighbours almost a mile away. I realised this with some satisfaction and a sense of wonder as I stood in front of my little white house with the rumble of waves in the distance and the eerie calls of the curracag -- lapwings -- as they swooped and dived over the moonlit grassland. With tragedy and turmoil in other parts of the world, a moment of beauty like this seemed even more precious.

Lenting

2011-03-15T14:15:00.000-07:00

There is something about the liturgical year, God's year -- the timing is always right. After the feasting of Christmas, there comes a point where it dawns on you that rich food and comfort won't ever really satisfy. The days begin to lengthen and with the brightness comes a yearning for something more, something else. And then Lent begins and it's hard to give up the sweets and take the time for more prayer, but there's a rightness about it, a recognition of the truth that only by losing our lives will we gain them.

Gales in the Gàidhealtachd

2011-02-03T14:04:00.000-08:00

It occurred to me this evening, with the wind causing even the stout walls of my little house to shake, that it's little wonder, as there's no windbreak between the front windows and Newfoundland.

I was also a bit embarrassed to realize that I didn't recognize thunder and lightning last evening. "Didn't you hear it?" a friend asked me an hour or so after the storm had passed.

"Yes, I did," I admitted. "I thought to myself, 'that wind sounds rumbly.' And when the power went out, I did think it was strange that I could still see what I was doing." I just can't get used to the idea of thunder and lightning in the winter.

Pope says don't call your baby Shanice

2011-01-18T12:05:00.000-08:00

Well, maybe not quite. But good to hear!

When the subject of incongruous or far-fetched children's names comes up, everyone has a story. I think my own favourite happened while standing in the check-in queue at Glasgow Airport several years ago. A young woman, who may have been dressed in a shell-suit, trying to prevent her little daughter from running around, yelling in a distinct Glasgow accent: "Shania, you get back here right now!"

Lovely Scotland; Gorgeous Gàidhealtachd

2011-01-17T14:28:00.001-08:00

Just a list of things I love about my ancestral homeland, and in particular the Highlands and Islands, in no particular order:

Putting the kettle on

Peat fires

Green welly boots

Stags (when they're not jumping all over the road)

Tea shops

Seals

Traditional stone-built houses

Traditional stone walls

Real cream -- in and on everything

Real cheese

Real eggs

Homemade scones and jam

Single track roads to who knows where

Ancient trees

Crannogs

A cup of tea after a walk outside on a damp day

A cup of tea anytime

Winter sunsets

Hoarfrost

Snowdrops

Indian takeaways

Feast of Saint Anthony, Abbot

2011-01-17T13:57:00.000-08:00

What a man. He heard the Gospel, "Go, sell all that you have and give to the poor," and he went and did just that. And then he took himself off to the desert to live a life solely for God. And monks and nuns have continued to follow his example for the last 1700 years.

Abba Anthony said: “A time is coming when people will go mad and when they see someone who is not mad, they will attack him, saying, “You are mad, you are not like us."

From: http://www.stpaulsirvine.org/html/saintanthony.htm

Tinsel

2010-12-28T14:42:00.000-08:00

A cozy evening with the wind howling outside and The Good Life Christmas special on TV. Lovely. It reminds me that as I was growing up, Christmas at home always had a slightly 1970s feel, right down to the original boxes my mother had kept for her precious teardrop Christmas tree ornaments. And there were the slightly homespun decorations, including a glittery blue, white-bearded Wise Man my brother had made from a cork in Beavers. He found it an embarrassing reminder of his lack of artistic skills, which meant that every year it had to be carefully secreted somewhere near the tree trunk where he wouldn't notice its presence.

What ever happened to tinsel? It was gradually phased out during my childhood, certainly not because of any desire to follow minimalist Christmas trends (I remember being disgusted that anyone would put tasteful, clear lights on a Christmas tree rather than oversized, gaudily-coloured bulbs) but because the cat had a taste for it and the subsequent tendency to throw up tangled silver strands on the living-room floor. Memories...

Little House on the Island

2010-12-16T11:30:00.000-08:00

With the snow whirling around my little Hebridean house and the wind rattling the windows, I am having a bit of a Laura Ingalls moment. Just like on the prairie, there are no trees here to serve as a windbreak and the sound of icy pellets of snow scouring the north side of the house are enough to put a chill in your bones, despite the three-foot-thick walls.

There have been two unwelcome visitors this past week: an unpleasant flu bug and an even more unpleasant rodent scurrying around in my loft at night. It seems that the latter has disappeared for the meantime -- permanently, I hope! -- but the bug is still running its course, leaving me fuzzy-headed and lethargic. The other day, the thought of the time I spent unexpectedly in hospital two years ago came to mind. That was another unwelcome experience. Having recently returned to Scotland, it seemed that my plans for life in the old country were up in the air and contact with friends and family was difficult. One bright spot was the care and compassion of the nurses on the ward. I remember that the common question asked to patients was "How's your pain?" At the time, what struck me is that they seemed somewhat cavalier about dishing out drugs at the least complaint, but when I think back, it's the honesty of the question that stays with me:"How's your pain?" It cuts right to the truth of things, much more than the customary, "How are you?" "Fine, thanks -- yourself?" Recently I came across a line to the effect that we all live with our own pain. The older I get, the more I see the truth of it -- for some people, it's barely below the surface, where with others, it's only when you get to know them well that the crosses they carry are revealed to some extent. Maybe if we were more willing to listen, more willing to bear others' sufferings with them, and more honest about our own pain we would be the better for it.

Island Winter

2010-12-09T13:23:00.000-08:00

It's sad to see the snow go so quickly here in the Hebrides. The tops of the mountains visible from my classroom window are still white, though. It's an amazing view -- although it's likely the pupils I see last period of the day are quite fed up with my rapturous interruptions of their work on irregular Gaelic verbs. 'Just look at that sunset! You wouldn't see a view like that from a school anywhere else in the world!'

'Maybe in Sweden, or Norway,' a boy answered thoughtfully.

But unlike in Sweden or Norway, it's unusual to have snow or freezing weather that lies for any amount of time here and it's a bit of a shame that there aren't more ways to take advantage of it. 'Do you go sledding?' I was asking another group today. I was met by blank looks. 'Sledging?' one girl ventured. 'I think some people were yesterday.' She looked dubious.

Another lost opportunity are the flooded fields which were frozen solid for a several days. A perfect opportunity for skating without the danger of deep water. The only problem being that people here don't own their own skates. There was quite a sensation, though, a month or so back, when the portable ice skating rink came to the island -- to a village hall, where across the road, the portable cinema had set up in the hotel car park. Although ubiquitous leaflets advertised 'ice skating,' I arrived in the company of an intrepid band of schoolteachers to discover that the rink was made of interlocking plastic panels, and was about the size of a large living-room. Shrugging off the feeling that I have come to exist in an episode of Father Ted , I took the plunge and donned on a pair of oversized, rented skates. It wasn't bad -- not as slide-y as skating on ice, but enjoyable nevertheless.

The recent cold weather has also coincided with what is becoming a yearly visit to a snowbound Pluscarden Abbey, during the 'long Christmas shopping weekend' island schools have at the end of November. This time the car didn't get stuck until I was leaving, accompanied by two Canadian college students and an Englishwoman. 'I seem to remember you,' one of the monks who came to give the car a push remarked wryly. Last year he had to tow the car with his tractor twice. My last glimpse of Pluscarden was from my rearview mirror: glittering snow and two bemittened Benedictines accompanied by a pair of male guests waving us off after they had pushed the car up the small incline on the bridge at the monastery entrance.

Another one they made for me...

2010-09-22T14:00:00.000-07:00

Last week, I was chatting to my sister in Toronto over Google. She asked me what I was up to and I typed back that I was watching a Gaelic TV show about women working in the Vatican. Her response was, "Did they make that one for you?"

"I may be the only one watching," I had to admit. It was one of those documentaries made in a European country with the voiceovers dubbed into Gaelic, and all the subtitles inexplicably in English. Tonight, chatting with my sister again, I told her I was watching another one they made for me -- a program from Sweden about a young girl becoming a Carmelite nun: Marta, a' Bhean-Chrabhaidh. I only saw the end this evening, but like a lot of Gaelic programs, it's due to be repeated several times in the next week or so. Keep an eye out on the Iplayer!

Sunday in the park with Benedict

2010-09-19T05:27:00.000-07:00

Just finished watching coverage of the Pope's Mass in Birmingham. Cardinal Newman is now blessed. I'm remembering a discussion I had at university with with one of my English lecturers. I think I was complaining that his choice of texts in the late Victorian literature course had not been much to my taste. There seemed to have been a lot of dead bodies and that poor Tess of the d'Urbervilles who made me want to scream with her lack of get-up-and-go. Looking back now, reading Hardy was a lot like Eastenders -- if something bad could possibly happen, it would. If somebody was happy, look out for the ominous-sounding electric drumbeats -- misery would ensue in the next installment.

"What would you prefer to study?" the lecturer asked me. Which put me on the spot because most of my favourite Victorian works were earlier in the era. I mentally thumbed through The Norton Anthology of English Literature. "Umm -- Newman," I told him. I don't think I had read anything by the man, but I knew he was a Catholic priest, and I had once been told in a History lecture that his "Idea of a University" had been very influential in the formation of our own, historically, and still to an extent, Catholic institution. I'll always be grateful to that History lecturer -- those of her students who were daily Mass-goers would know that she was as well and her perhaps slightly covert emphasis on the role the Catholic Church had played in the development of Western society and thought was the first time I, and likely most other students, had ever heard tell of such a notion. She was also the person at the university who suggested that I may be interested in an exchange year in Scotland. And so my fate was sealed. Anyway, I think I also mentioned Gerard Manley Hopkins to the English lecturer. Both choices didn't seem to surprise the man.

One of the television commentators announced that many of the pilgrims at Cofton Park had begun their journey at two in the morning or earlier, while others had spent the whole soggy night in the park. The observation brought me back to World Youth Day in Toronto in 2002, which I attended with a university group. There was a vigil on the Saturday night and then, as is the World Youth Day custom, everybody slept under the stars in order to be on site for the next morning's cumulative Sunday Mass. The vigil ended, and a few hundred thousand of us settled down for the night, only to be jolted from our slumber by a concert taking place on stage. I think the idea was that it was unlikely that anyone would sleep much, so it would be just as well to keep us entertained. I remember crawling groggily out of my sleeping bag when the strains of "Good Mother" convinced me that Jann Arden had made an appearance. She hadn't. Dawn came and with it a severe thunderstorm. I woke up in a puddle. I maintain to this day that it was the power of the Holy Spirit who spared me from breaking down, as my aversion to getting wet is somewhat akin to the Wicked Witch of the West. The sun broke through gloriously durning Mass, the summer heat returned, and you could practically see the steam rising from the crowds. Then again, as the commentator today pointed out, what's a pilgrimage without a little hardship?

Thank goodness for the TV coverage and the little gold books, but following the visit of the Holy Father in high-definition has only confirmed my desire to see this successor of Saint Peter in person. Maybe World Youth Day in Madrid, while I still manage to squeeze under the wire and be deemed a "young person"? Spain must be drier than Toronto, and it would be impossible for it to be hotter. It would be amazing to attend the Eucharistic Congress in Dublin in two years' time as well. Or maybe a pilgrimage to Rome to see the Pope at home?

Pope Benedict in England

2010-09-18T05:23:00.000-07:00

Normally I wouldn't wish to be anywhere else on a sunny September Saturday than where I am now, on my beloved Hebridean Island. But today I would wish to be in London -- in Westminster Cathedral for Mass with the Pope, or among the crowds in Hyde Park this evening. Thank goodness you can follow most of the events on TV, and as it dawned on me a little late yesterday while watching Evening Prayer from Westminster Abbey, you can follow along in the little gold book!

It was thrilling to see a contingent of priests from Pluscarden concelebrating with the Pope at Mass in Bellahouston, and then to hear Archbishop Rowan Willams highlighting the importance of the Rule of Saint Benedict in his message during Evening Prayer. Not just its historical importance to Western civilization, but the role of Benedictine balance in daily life: ora et labora; taking time for prayer and silence. The Pope himself picked up a similar thread again in his message to youth after Mass this morning:

I ask you to look into your hearts each day to find the source of all true love. Jesus is always there, quietly waiting for us to be still with him and to hear his voice. Deep within your heart, he is calling you to spend time with him in prayer. But this kind of prayer, real prayer, requires discipline; it requires making time for moments of silence every day. Often it means waiting for the Lord to speak. Even amid the “busy-ness” and the stress of our daily lives, we need to make space for silence, because it is in silence that we find God, and in silence that we discover our true self. And in discovering our true self, we discover the particular vocation which God has given us for the building up of his Church and the redemption of our world.

The full text of this message and of all the Pope's homilies and speeches can be found here.

Hooray for Pope Benedict! I just love him.

Pope Benedict is here! Fàilte oirbh!

2010-09-16T15:07:00.000-07:00

Work commitments on my beloved Hebridean island meant that I wasn't able to be at Bellahouston for the big event today, but watching it on TV at the home of island friends was amazing as well -- familiar faces among the priests and laity involved, Gaelic hymns, evening sunlight streaming over the tens of thousands present and kindly, holy, thoughtful Pope Benedict bringing a message of evangelization to the people of Scotland. Just incredible. And to hear the soft-spoken Holy Father end his homily in Gaelic!

Sìth agus beannachd Dhè dhuibh uile; Dia bhith timcheall oirbh; agus gum beannaicheadh Dia Alba.

God's peace and blessing to you all; God surround you; and may God bless the people of Scotland!

Farewell to Nova Scotia...

2010-08-25T17:44:00.000-07:00

The person who has relatives with boats is a very fortunate individual, I've concluded. With a cousin's and my own time at home coming to a close (the latter which has since been extended, thanks to the slowpokey British High Commission) various members of the Gadelica family assembled at a local marina Sunday evening for a feed of lobsters on the water. My uncle's big sailboat and my cousin's wee sailboat puttered out to anchor a short distance out, in the lee of a wooded island, and the two boats were fastened together, creating space for all of us to sit and drink wine and rum and tea and eat fishcakes and lobster and salads and strawberry-rhubarb and blueberry pie with ice cream. The evening passed with the usual foolishness and carrying on, and as the sun set behind the island where herons were roosting, I knew that as much as my heart’s in the Highlands, it is not easy at all to go far away from family and a home that is in one of the the most blessed corners of the world.

The Big Smoke

2010-08-16T18:56:00.000-07:00

Back today from the euphoric blur that was my sister's wedding and the week leading up to it. The happy couple is off to spend a few days exploring the back roads and green mountains of Vermont. "Were going to try to get locked in the Ben and Jerry's factory overnight," my sister informed me. "So we can swim in the giant vats of ice cream."

A school friend of mine who now lives in Northern Canada pointed out recently that East Coast natives such as us have the annoying habit of looking down our noses at other parts of the country, if we ever deign to actually visit them. That's exactly my attitude after spending a week in Toronto. There were friends and family and wonderful food and a beautiful wedding ceremony and several legendary parties, but there was also dirt and smog and traffic and humidity and smog and humidity and crowds and smog and dirt. That's not to say that the smog and dirt and humidity weren't punctuated by several excellent buffet meals of various ethnic origins. By no means am I saying that Toronto doesn't have its good points. But then again, the counterpoint of the ethnic deliciousness was days passed repeatedly experiencing the refrigerator/ sauna effect when entering and leaving vigorously air-conditioned buildings, as well as coming home every night with sandaled feet black with urban dirt. Which is off-putting, but easier to remedy than the aspect of several friends and relatives who somehow managed to get one side of their faces thoroughly sunburnt when attending a Blue Jays' game on a particularly sizzling afternoon. "I have some foundation to fix that," my older sister informed my brother.

I was reminded of an island friend's account of attending a family wedding in Dublin, which was, at the time of her visit, suffocatingly hot. What she would have given for a Hebridean breeze! "When I got back to the island, I wanted to kiss the ground, like the Pope," she told me. My thoughts were along similar lines as the small commuter flight bumped and shuddered its way to land safely at the Halifax airport, and I surveyed the rolling hills, meandering rivers, expansive forests, and brightly-painted farmhouses and barns of rural Nova Scotia. Home sweet home! Funny how what had seemed like oppressively hot weather compared to cool Scottish summer drizzle was now pleasant and refreshing. Air sweet air!

Transfiguration

2010-08-06T11:28:00.000-07:00

A reading on the Feast of the Transfiguration I was looking at a little while ago mentioned the transcendent aspect of this feast; the grace of a glimpse beyond the visible world to the divine, transfigured reality. My mind went back to a presentation by a poet I attended a few months ago. The poet highlighted the role of the artist to communicate the transcendent, and the idea resonated with a similar thought I had been dwelling on for a while. Moments where the transcendent is touched are described in different ways by various authors: C.S. Lewis is "surprised by Joy" while L.M Montgomery's fictional Emily experiences "the flash." Recently I was introduced to R.S. Thomas' "The Bright Field" and it seems more than appropriate on today's feast:

The Bright Field

I have seen the sun break through
to illuminate a small field
for a while, and gone my way
and forgotten it. But that was the pearl
of great price, the one field that had
treasure in it. I realize now
that I must give all that I have
to possess it. Life is not hurrying

on to a receeding future, nor hankering after
an imagined past. It is the turning
aside like Moses to the miracle
of the lit bush, to a brightness
that seemed as transitory as your youth
once, but is the eternity that awaits you.

Flying home

2010-08-03T17:32:00.000-07:00

(from last Sunday, enroute from Scotland to Nova Scotia)

Airports are the modern-day equivalent to the Tower of Babel. Sitting in Heathrow Airport’s departures lounge, I’m surrounded by people from the four red corners of the world -- as the Gaelic saying goes -- speaking languages I don’t recognize and dressed in fashions that I can’t fathom. And there are also the cameos of human warmth that come into focus when in a crowd of strangers: the teenaage son fast asleep on his middle-aged dad’s shoulder; the singing security agent, replacing customary airport dourness with a manner more in keeping with an East end fruit and veg hawker: “Do re mi fa so la ti – take your notebooks out for me.” And in a stage whisper: “I’m the one who tries on the ladies’ shoes.”

Standing in a queue and musing over the fact that it’s the moment that you arrive for international flights that you begin to be surrounded by people speaking in a way that approximates your native accent as well as being startled at how foreign and gaudy Canadian voices sounded to me, I spot a familiar face: a childhood friend and political crony of my father. Only a moment to say hello without losing my place, and in the middle of the one of the most anonymous, bewildering places I know, I become my father’s daughter again.

Simple Living

2010-07-18T11:49:00.000-07:00

About a month ago, an old friend came to visit me. Although she now lives a frontier lifestyle in Northern Canada, we went to school together and were close friends in our teenage years. Having not exactly embraced the party lifestyle, we spent many an evening in her parents' basement, listening to the traditional music groups who were popular at the time in Nova Scotia, attempting to sing along with the Gaelic songs and doing our own version of step-dancing. We'd talk about learning our ancestral language, moving to Scotland, and raising cute little Scottish children with cute Scottish accents. It's probably a bit strange that I did follow through with the plans. "You're living the dream," my friend said when she came to visit.

My friend spent ten days in Scotland and it only rained for about an hour, which I think borders on the miraculous. She returned to Canada and I returned to the little college in the Highlands to teach summer courses. She left behind two books from a trilogy about an Amish family, having recently developed a taste for novels about the Amish. She thought I would like them, and also admitted to me that her husband teases her that she will only read a book if there's a horse and buggy on the cover. As someone who believes that no author writing for children or adults can top Laura Ingalls Wilder, I sympathized.

When I picked up the first book, the author's style put me off a bit. But persevering beyond the first few pages, I was hooked. Considering my fascination with simple living, reading about the Amish is addictive.

I devoured the two books in less than a week and bemoaned the fact that she hadn't left me the third. I was also left with the hangover of longing to live my own simple, back-to-the-land kind of life sooner than later, and to think a little more seriously about how it may actually happen. I hope that someday I live that dream, too!

Colonial Blues

2010-07-10T02:44:00.000-07:00

About a week or so ago, I realised how out of touch with the news at home I was when I came across UK media coverage of the Queen's visit to Halifax. "Nobody told me!" was my first thought. There she was, surveying the naval fleet and getting greeted by thousands of people. It bewilders me, though... she's OUR Queen, I had always been taught, and she's on our money. Her picture hung in our school and we asked God to save her at the beginning of every Brownie meeting. I've visited her representative's Georgian mansion our province's capital. So why is it so hard for me, a Canadian, to get permission to stay in the United Kingdom?

Last night on the island...

2010-07-03T14:39:00.000-07:00

and it's hard to believe it's July. In the last few months away from the island, I had forgotten about the familiar sound of the wind blowing against the house. It reminds me of a friend telling me of a girl from another treeless island who had come to my Highland college in its rural, wooded setting, and was spooked by the sound of the wind in the trees.

I've been here a week but it seems as if I've never left. There have been friends to catch up with, familiar faces of neighbours and walks over the flower-carpeted machair. And the wildlife -- owls and deer and seabirds and larks and one solitary seal whose sleek black head appeared among the waves when I went down to the shore to see an incredible island sunset the other night.

Tomorrow it's away for a while, with the hope that I'll be permitted to return to stay soon. Thinking of a night like this in my own home, with a fire and cats and some writing to do, and a garden and animals outside and the roar of the ocean in the distance. That day can't come soon enough!

Remember that time...

2010-06-18T06:55:00.000-07:00

when I used to update this thing once in a while? Back in the days before I had to write exams. Which are but a bittersweet memory now, happily. "I get free tea now. I'm not a student, I'm staff," I told a friend smugly the other day.

This is the time of the long twilights and short nights in Scotland, when it never feels late until you realize that it's actually very late and that you should have been in bed long ago. But then you're not too tired the next morning, and the same thing happens the next day. The effect seems magnified on my Hebridean island, where I'm spending a few days. It reminds me of the end of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, where it's bright all the time and they don't need to sleep or eat a lot anymore. It seems that CS Lewis based the story on the medieval Irish immrama, which in turn were based on real voyages made by early Irish monks to islands in the North Atlantic like the Hebrides.

On the boat!

2010-05-12T04:57:00.000-07:00

The miracles of modern technology -- wireless internet on the ferry between Belfast and Stranraer. Ailsa Craig is looming in the distance. The food is better on the homey Hebridean Calmac ferries. (You wouldn't find a nail salon on the MV Clansman.)

Northern Ireland has melted away in the fog with a last vision of green fields and high cliffs. It was a whirlwind visit to the island, and included a chance to spend time with a friend from my high school teaching days, now with a gem of a husband and two cute babies. And a bus trip across a large portion of Ulster yesterday. There is something very appealing about the green landscape, cris-crossed by hedges and dotted with sheep and cattle and an abundance of yellow gorse bushes. It brings to mind the famous Old Irish poem about a blackbird:

Int én bec

ro léic feit

do rind guip

glanbuidi

fo-ceird faíd

os Loch Laíg

lon do craíb

charnbuidi

'The little bird which has whistled from the end of a bright-yellow bill: it utters a note above Belfast Lough – a blackbird from a yellow-heaped branch.' (translation by Gerard Murphy)

Taking the wrong bus out of Belfast City Centre led to me arriving back at my friend's house later than planned, and I was greeted with the news that there was a new prime minister. A lot can happen during a day's bus journey.

Là Buidhe Bealltainn

2010-05-01T15:21:00.000-07:00

If I had a shieling today would be the day to go. It's Là Buidhe Bealltainn, yellow May Day, the first day of mìos buchainn buidhe Mhoire nam buadh -- the yellow swelling month of Mary of the graces. Some interesting information from Alexander Carmichael on Gaelic May Day rituals: here and here. I think this was also the day that Nova Scotian Gaels would bring the year's seed to church for blessing before sowing. No shieling to visit or crops to plant or fires to jump through this year, unfortunately. But a little yellow May Day blessing in the form of a striking pair of goldfinches that visited the tree in front of my window, just coming into leaf. And yesterday brought the sound of the first cuckoo. "Luath no mall dhan tig am Màigh, thig a' chuthag" -- as early or late as May comes, the cuckoo comes. So right on schedule, I guess.

The painting above is Tiepolo's Madonna of the Goldfinch. I had no idea that the goldfinch was a symbol of the Crucifixion until just now, doing a Google search for a picture of one. So there you go.

The evenings are getting much lighter and longer now, but it's now quite late and dark. And so to bed!

Feast of Saint Catherine of Siena

2010-04-29T11:22:00.001-07:00

At all times and in all places, Catherine sought God. She found him and was united to him in love, alleluia.

(Today's Magnificat Antiphon)

Unexpected in April

2010-04-20T08:41:00.000-07:00

I am sitting at my window at the college watching the snow fall. The mountains are cloaked in white again. Spring in Scotland!

All nature's lyrical...

2010-04-16T13:00:00.000-07:00

With its yearly miracle...

Spring, spring, spring.

This was the song running my mind with this morning's lovely sunny weather. I'm not sure if it's common to have a constant soundtrack running through one's head. Mine consists mainly of show tunes and Gaelic songs. This morning's selection was from Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, which I videotaped and watched many times when I was at school. It never struck me as strange until I watched it again a few years ago that seven brothers (or possibly only six of them) actually kidnapped the seven brides (or at least six of them). The girls were cross about this for a while but in the end it all worked out and everyone got married. Happy ending, etc. The title is a bit of a giveaway.

Yesterday my thoughts travelled along a similar speculative vein. I was working on a presentation about my namesakes -- or the other way around, more properly -- the Peregrini Scoti -- Irish monks who travelled the known (and unknown) world in the early Middle Ages. The Scottish Isles and mainland were still home territory to them, but the ones who came to Continental Europe considered themselves on terra ignota. Pondering how to define this, the first thing that came to mind was "We're not in Kansas anymore, Toto." But I wasn't sure if my classmates or tutor would understand the reference. It's not clear to me if children in the UK are, or were, brought up on The Wizard of Oz as I was. Or if it's as common as I think to use musicals as reference points as often as I, my younger sister, and certain friends do:

"I know exactly what you mean. It's just like Yentl, isn't it?"

Well, maybe not the best example. Neither I nor any women I know have disguised themselves as men to enter a Yeshiva. But you get the idea. The first Christmas that my sister and her Jewish fiancé were together, she gave him a copy of Fiddler on the Roof. He had never seen it. She can recite it.

A generation gap became evident today as well. I admitted to an American student, who has recently reached the age of majority, that I had a few presentations to prepare and for the first time in my life, I was going to use Powerpoint. "Ok, Mom," he laughed.

It reminded me of how I left school teaching for a few years and when I came back all the whiteboards, still quite innovative compared to the chalkboards I had in school -- not that long ago! -- had been replaced by smart boards, which I still haven't learned to use. My name is Peregrina Gadelica and I am a Luddite.

Highland Spring

2010-04-16T02:31:00.000-07:00

I'm writing this at my desk overlooking the cloister-like courtyard at my college. Some students have just been released from a class and are milling around -- the girls in sunglasses and capris (or "pedal-pushers" as my mother calls them) -- pale Gaelic skin already scorched bright pink from a week of warm sunny weather.

When spring comes in the Highlands it really is spring -- there's a sudden surfeit of warmth and sunlight and there's green grass and primroses and trees bursting into leaf where only a few days before there was the appearance of winter. And the inhabitants respond accordingly -- gone are the scarves and woolen coats and boots of a few weeks ago, replaced by beach attire and a bad case of sunburn.

There's the fake-tanners, too -- the female Scots who maintain a sun-kissed appearance all year round and darken to a more well-done shade in the summer. Some balk at wearing a skirt otherwise -- who wants to see peely-wally legs? It's so funny that in a country where the sun shines intermittently at best, women feel they look their most becoming when they have a lightly-toasted appearance.

There's also the resulting diminishing work ethic. The first winter I spent in Scotland seemed particularly soggy and grey. Returning to the college after a holiday, the difference was remarkable -- spring had arrived! The big picture window of our ground-floor flat became a second door and we were in and out, lounging on blankets spread on the grass behind the building. Some work was done of course, but noses were not exactly at the grindstone. My own Gaelic ancestry was evident as my skin took on a blotchy, red appearance.

I'm older and wiser now than I was in those days, of course -- so it's back to work for me!

The end of the Easter Triduum

2010-04-04T11:27:00.000-07:00

Those were the words I read at the end of Evening Prayer in my breviary tonight, a bit regretfully. But with the end of the Triduum comes the beginning of the joyful Easter season. And the Triduum has been wonderful. It was a privilege to share it with the monks and retreatants of Pluscarden Abbey. For Benedictines the liturgy is "opus Dei," the work of God. Which means the Triduum is celebrated beautifully and magnificiently. And that I'm very tired after a late Easter Vigil and early Lauds and a drive back to my college in the West. Tired but happy. Sunshine and rain and melting snow and daffodils and birdsong and chant and incense and stained glass and Latin. And an empty tomb because Christ is risen! Happy Easter! Alleluia!

Papal visit

2010-03-21T14:55:00.000-07:00

I had a text message from a friend the other evening. It read, simply: "I know where you'll be on Sept 16." She knows me well. I do hope I'll be able to join the hundreds of thousands who will turn up to welcome Pope Benedict when he visits Scotland and presides at an open-air Mass in Bellahouston Park in Glasgow. I've also heard that there will be a limit to the number of people who will be allowed to enter the park. Of course, when my mother went to see Pope John Paul II when he visited Nova Scotia in 1984, the crowds were not as big as anticipated. Mom thinks the talk of overcrowding scared people away. We'll see, anyway.

I was reminded of the fact that when Pope John Paul II visited Ireland in 1979, over a million people attended the Papal Mass in Phoenix Park, Dublin. That means that one out of every five people in Ireland were at that Mass. Just amazing.

A sudden stomach bug meant a slightly quieter weekend than usual, and I passed a bit of time watching programs from TG4, the Irish-language television channel, on their Internet player. An exciting discovery, and a relaxing way to get a little more exposure to the language.

A showery Sunday, with the daffodils starting to appear on this first day of Spring. And a busy week ahead. March is going by quickly!

Lá Fhéile Pádraig

2010-03-17T13:23:00.000-07:00

I thought my St Patrick's Day celebrations were over quite early today -- after opening a card from my mother and a trip to town for an 8am Mass, that seemed about it. There was my Irish class a little later on in the morning, where we discussed what people do on St Patrick's Day, which was a bit ironic, since we weren't doing anything special at the college. So it was a pleasant surprise to be greeted at lunchtime with "Beannachdaí Lá Fhéile Pádraig duit!" -- this was an Irish friend, decked out in green, complete with a corsage of shamrocks courtesy of her grandmother in County Mayo. Mid-afternoon saw a few of us chatting over a pot of tea and a few festive chocolate bars, courtesy of the same Irish friend. Her stories of celebrating the day with Mass and parades and goodies and parties were quite a contrast to the more secular and less child-friendly celebrations I'm more familiar with.

Our little tea party was lovely, and despite the work to be done, the day did seem more like a holiday. Usually I appreciate Scottish understatement and the tendency not to make a big deal about things, but I also love the way that we Catholics take the time to celebrate and make feast days special. It may only have been a chocolate bar and some shamrocks, but it gave the day colour. And my favourite colour has always been green!

Benedictine balance

2010-03-13T12:15:00.000-08:00

Hard to believe that it was during Lent seven years ago that I first had the privilege of visiting Pluscarden Abbey with a university chaplaincy group. That such a place actually existed in twenty-first century Scotland was a source of amazement to me, and I knew it wouldn't be my last visit.

We didn't have a lot of contact with the monks during the weekend at the monastery, but I remember that we commented to each other how the saintly guestmaster's eyes were so clear and blue that they just seemed to glow. "When you think of it," another girl in the group commented, "They're living an ideal life here. Prayer, healthy food, companionship, work. They've got everything they need."

Looking back, I think she hit upon an important point. Monks and nuns living under the Rule of St Benedict do live a balanced life. Mass is the centre of their day and the Divine Office punctuates it. There's time for personal prayer and spiritual reading as well. There is work to be done, and it includes both physical labour and more intellectual tasks. There are meals in common, where the food is wholesome and often grown at the monastery. There's a daily recreation period to enjoy the company of the other community members. And all the time there's the round of the liturgical year. Silence and praise; solitude and community; work and rest; fast and feast. Benedictine balance -- it's something we can all benefit from in our lives.

Half-way there

2010-03-12T10:58:00.000-08:00

Lent is flying by so far and it's only during the last day or two that it seems that things have slowed down a bit. So here it is, Friday evening, with some Irish to learn and the Gaelic radio playing on the computer. Lovely. And of course, a cup or tea or two, which I'll drink despite remembering my Island landlady's comment during a previous Lent: "Giving up tea -- that would be the real penance!"

Flying is also an apt word to describe a visit with a friend and former colleague who was at the college for meetings earlier in the week. His schedule was so full that we had to catch up early in the morning over a breakfast of tea and coffee out of the machine. It's always a pleasure and a bit strange to see people from home here in Scotland -- as I commented to my sister, it proves that my existence on this side of the water isn't an extended dream, a la Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. Of course, her friends from home appeared there in slightly different guises, didn't they?

Despite being quite chilly today, there's a change in the air that means spring is here. The snow on the mountains is melting and I spotted a tiny black calf with its mother in a field nearby yesterday and can't wait until the first lambs appear. It was this time last year that I was staying in a place where the baby lambs were right outside my window. I was entranced -- until I realized that it's a not uncommon occurrence for small lambs to become separated from their mothers. They were never in real danger, as the crofter kept quite a close eye on his flock, but their pitiful little baas pierced my heart. I remember telling my mother over the phone, "I don't know if I can stand the drama!"

North Yorkshire

2010-03-02T14:18:00.000-08:00

Back from a whirlwind trip to the eco-nuns, reminiscent of the time that I accompanied my father to Quebec in order to deposit my sister at a summer French course. We drove up on Saturday, arrived at midnight, checked into a questionable hotel, got up the next morning, went to Mass, dropped my sister off and headed back to Nova Scotia. A twelve-hour drive, either way. The car was never the same again. Dad wanted to plant a commemorative tree.

The trip to Yorkshire wasn't quite as hectic, but the two days spent at the monastery were bookended with long, eventful drives, which included impressive snowdrifts, herds of deer, a road closure, a plethora of road works, a few wrong turns, and magnificently beautiful views driving through moonlit, snow-blanketed Glencoe at two in the morning with the car's headlights off.

Stanbrook and its inhabitants were lovely and North Yorkshire a pleasant surprise. Heading out on the Saturday afternoon to walk the three miles to Ampleforth, I was amazed that my image of that corner of England, gleaned mainly from James Herriot and Heartbeat was right there. Attractive rows of limestone cottages; hedgerows and fields and sheep and pheasants; picturesque village pubs with satisfying names (Wombwell Arms; The White Horse) and a ruined Cistercian abbey to top it all off. Ampleforth was another delight -- a mini monastic and academic city surrounded by fields and woods; an impressive church with an atmosphere of prayer. I walked back to the eponymous village via a back lane where some boys were playing, one brandishing an impressive water gun. 'Don't worry,' he told me, in an unmistakable Yorkshire accent. 'We only ambush college kids.'

On a penitential note...

2010-02-23T11:00:00.000-08:00

Another place on my 'to visit' list is Lough Derg, in Ireland. The three-day pilgrimage with its vigil and fasting would be arduous, but it's tempting. (If you can call penance tempting.) They've just announced the dates for the three-day pilgrimages for this year: June 1 to August 15. So interesting -- the island has been a Christian holy site since the time of the earliest Irish monks and remains a place of pilgrimage.

Eco-nuns

2010-02-23T10:39:00.000-08:00

Thanks to one or two Providential coincidences, I'm going to be spending this weekend at Stanbrook Abbey. The community has a long history but the nuns have only recently moved into a new monastery in North Yorkshire. Only a few miles away is Ampleforth Abbey, which means double the Benedictine blessedness. Very exciting. I've been merrily informing people that I'm off this weekend to see the eco-nuns. The new monastery is very 'green,' complete with solar panels and a rainwater harvesting system. Again, very exciting. Hoping for good weather and that I don't end up wandering around in the dark Friday evening looking for the place. Thank goodness for Google Maps!

I was just trawling through Google Images looking for a picture to add here, and came across one from an online newspaper article of Abbess of Stanbrook, I believe, arriving at the new monastery with luggage in tow. The caption: 'A nun arrives at her new nunnery near Helmsley...' Classic.

Saint Valentine and Ireland

2010-02-14T14:57:00.000-08:00

I've had Ireland on the brain for the last little while. Think I'll have to spend some time there soon. Interesting to note that Saint Valentine's relics are enshrined in the church of the Carmelite Friars of Dublin. There you go!

Feast of Saint Scholastica

2010-02-10T15:40:00.001-08:00

Happy feast of Saint Scholastica to any Benedictines who may be reading this! PAX!

Desert Fathers

2010-02-08T15:00:00.000-08:00

I've been doing some reading on the Desert Fathers for a college course. Just fascinating! It seems that this earliest form of Christian monastic life was what spread, via the Continent, to Ireland in the fifth century and gave us Gaelic monastic heroes like Colum Cille -- Saint Columba. Also interesting that the movement bypassed St Benedict and therefore Benedictine monasticism only reached Gaeldom hundreds of years later with the Norman invasion of Ireland and Saint Margaret of Scotland. I feel a trip to Ireland coming on -- a tour of monastic sites would be heavenly. But of course, for most of us sinners, the hope of Heaven is preceded by the pains of Purgatory, so a trip to Lough Derg would also be in order. The penitential flavour of Gaelic Catholicism (including the uncushioned kneelers in Hebridean churches) also becomes more easily understandable with the consideration that most of the early saints who either established or strengthened the Faith in Gaelic areas were heirs of the ascetic desert tradition. So much reading to do on this!

As you do...

2010-02-02T15:24:00.000-08:00

I travelled over the mountains last week for a Gaelic choir practice. Another choir member questioned me about how I was getting on at the college. "Fine," I told her. "Very busy, though."

"Yes," she replied, "It's best to keep busy when you're all alone, isn't it?"

I could never be accused of not following such sage advice over the last few days. Friday involved giving a friend a lift to the monastery, only a short time after having come back from my own retreat. We arrived late, thanks to a few wrong turns on my part that resulted in a roundabout route on moonlit back roads. We entered the abbey in a rush, afraid that my passenger would be missing supper, or "collation" in monastic-speak. One of the monks was ringing the bell. He regarded us calmly. "You're back," he said. The retreatant was soon in the capable hands of the guestmaster and I had a few minutes' chat with the oblate master before I was back in the car, speeding over narrow roads in increasingly heavy snow showers. Back to the home of the friend I was staying with, a quick change into my £15 Tesco's party dress and down to the local secondary school for the senior social, which should have taken place the week before Christmas, when Highland schools were closed due to snow. Monks and unruly teenagers all in one frosty Friday night. Back to my hostess' flat for tea and fancy Marks and Spencers biscuits and "getting the craic," with which we came to the conclusion that it was possibly best to accept our fate as spinsters and plan a trip to Padre Pio at San Giovanni Rotondo.

The next morning, up and out the door before sunrise to travel back over to the west, as I was due to teach a weekend course at the college. No sign of snowfall overnight, but the mountains have been hanging on to their snow showers during this last cold spell and for the most of the drive my knuckles were as white as the unplowed road, which was accented by frolicking deer. My late arrival didn't put off a group of lovely students who travelled from as far afield as London and Spain. Classes, Vigil Mass and a quick visit to the nearby pub. I left before the karaoke started.

Sunday, Monday and today have passed in a blur and tomorrow I'm off to my Hebridean island for a visit and some supply teaching. It's quarter to midnight and there are clothes unfolded, prayers unsaid, and a poem unwritten for tomorrow's writers' group. It's all go!

Là Fhèill Brìghde

2010-02-01T15:08:00.000-08:00

Happy first day of Spring! This weekend brought another snowfall to the Highlands and the mountains are like a black-and-white photograph, but according to the old Gaels, today, St. Brigid's Day, Là Fhèill Brìghde, is the "birthday of spring." You can read more about the Gaelic traditions and legends surrounding Là Fhèill Brìghde here. I had planned to pick some rushes to make a Saint Brigid's Cross today, but the snow and the business of the day got the better of me.

One of my favourite stories of Naomh Brìghde is that she journeyed from her native Ireland in a coracle and landed on the island of South Uist in the Western Isles of Scotland. Not able to return home without assistance, she asked for help from the black and white shorebirds which inhabited the island's broad white beach. Obligingly, they lifted her coracle into the air and flew her home to Ireland. In return for the favour, Brìghde told the birds that they would no longer need to make nests in which to lay their eggs, but that they would lay them in the sea-tangle on the upper part of the beach. The birds, called oystercatchers in English, are called Brìdein in Uist, in memory of their service to the saint who is so dear to the Gaels.

In This House of Brede

2010-01-27T13:37:00.000-08:00

There are a few books, or series of books that I read over and over. Since I was in elementary school, I've read Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House series and most of LM Montgomery's books numerous times, and over the years which have included a degree in English literature, really haven't found much that rivals my affection for these two authors' works. It wasn't until six or seven years ago, browsing in a used bookshop in the Highland town I called home at the time that I came across Rumer Godden's In This House of Brede, and another book was added to my "read and re-read"-ing list. It's the story of a woman entering a fictitious Benedictine monastery and the book's descriptions of monastery life and of the various nuns' ups and downs are captivating. Of course, I'm biased -- Rumer Godden was a Benedictine oblate, after all! -- but I'd say that even those who are not as monastically-minded would appreciate the book.

There was also a movie made in the 1970s, a few years after In This House of Brede was published. It differs quite a bit from the novel, as most film versions do, and really doesn't compare, as most film versions don't. But it has a bit of its own magic. A black taxi scooting around dreich 1970s London; the atmospheric, windswept abbey (I understand they used a convent in Ireland which is now a centre for asylum-seekers); the moody theme music; an elderly nun with an uncanny resemblance to E.T.; the heavenly Gregorian chant with the nuns' mouths not quite moving in sync. Made for TV 1970s films at their best. Read the book first, but have a look at the film as well.

To the salt pits again

2010-01-26T11:59:00.000-08:00

Back at the little college in the Highlands for another term. It amazes me, every year in Scotland, that almost as soon as the year turns there are signs of spring. The melting snow at the monastery revealed the snowdrops underneath and it's noticeable that the days are getting longer. It's not completely dark until after five in the evening, and the sunsets have been beautiful. At dusk, red Mars and bright Jupiter hang low in the sky.

Every year, too, I forget how quickly Lent follows Christmas -- Lent, of course, leading to Easter. On snowy February Ash Wednesdays in Nova Scotia, I've thought to myself, "This can't be Lent. It's winter! Spring is ages away." But of course, it's not. I was reminded of this during my visit to the monastery. There, the Blessed Sacrament is kept in the Lady Chapel, which is adjacent to one of the public side chapels in the church. There's an opening between the two chapels called the "squint." One evening, the public chapel was dark when I came in and knelt to spend a few moments with the Blessed Sacrament. The whole monastery has a lovely, holy smell of incense and beeswax, but when I knelt to pray, I smelled Easter. Or rather, I smelled lilies in a vase set on the squint, which I hadn't noticed in the dark. Christmas had just ended and there was snow outside and here was a reminder of Easter. It was an odd juxtaposition, but made perfect sense at the time.

At the monastery

2010-01-16T07:06:00.000-08:00

I'm spending a few days at Pluscarden Abbey before returning to university work. It's hard to believe the amount of snow here, although it has melted quite a bit in the last few days. My car got stuck when I arrived and a kind monk had to pull me out with the tractor. He explained to me that it was only one of several vehicles he had towed out of the snow in the last little while. So I didn't feel quite as bad when I got stuck again going up the drive!

There's no internet access for guests at the monastery, which makes sense, so I'm sending this from a pub in nearby Elgin, home of an impressive cathedral, sadly in ruins, and delicious fish and chips. I have to head back to the monastery shortly, so as Benedictines say, Pax!

Back to the Old Country...

2010-01-11T18:47:00.001-08:00

and it's quite exciting to discover that the airport has free wireless! I'm glad I took my laptop in my carry-on bag, a green Harris Tweed tote bag, made my my mother. Eat your hearts out, fellow Gaels.

Airports are fascinating places. Especially if you're into people-watching. Where else are people from all over the world coming and going all the time? I'm reminded that on my way home for Christmas, people were asked to take off their boots to go through security. One very stylish young woman took off a pair of expensive-looking high-heeled leather boots to reveal very ordinary, thick socks with holes in them. It struck me as both funny and comforting. And a little smug, standing there in my hole-less socks.

We're boarding soon. Farewell to Nova Scotia for a few months. Back to the Old Country!

Living off the Land

2010-01-08T07:29:00.000-08:00

As usual, a trip home involves some shopping and eating Chinese food. Shopping because clothes are generally more affordable and plainer in Nova Scotia than in the UK. Eating Chinese food because it's my favourite and it is generally easier to find Chinese restaurants in a Canadian city than on a Scottish island. My younger sister, a city girl through and through, often has a go at me about both activities.

"How are you going to go out for Chinese food when you live off the land? Are you going to grow your own rice?"

Good question. "Well, I can buy some things. Rice isn't expensive. And I could make chicken balls at home."

"You bought jeans? I thought you were going to make your own clothes or purchase them from second-hand stores."

True enough. I did say that. "Well, I will eventually. I am learning to knit. Soon I'll be able to knit my own jeans."

Or not. The bottom line is that I'm a long way from going back to the land. The day will come, though. I got quite excited when I read the other day that a television company in the UK was looking for people to live off the land for a year for some sort of TV show. Unfortunately, they specified couples. Oh well. Not sure if I'd be up to being a reality TV participant anyway.

Old Christmas

2010-01-06T11:02:00.000-08:00

January 6 is a nostalgic day for me. It's the traditional date of Epiphany, although in my lifetime in Canada, the feast has been celebrated on the second Sunday after Christmas. Growing up, my father always called it "Old Christmas." It was a matter of pride in our family that the Christmas tree and decorations were left up until this date, because Christmas lasted twelve days and why would you take your tree down before Christmas was over? We were always the last ones on the street to put our lights up and the last to take them down. It was a Christmas tradition to half-jokingly denounce our "pagan" society. Even now, out in the car with my mother shortly after the New Year, the sorry sight of a denuded Christmas tree waiting for pickup at the end of someone's driveway elicits a shout of "Heathens!" from me.

My father would make jokes about how we should take a page from the Ukrainians' book and transfer our family celebration of Christmas to January 6. That way we could take advantage of the Boxing Day sales. This didn't fly with the four kids, of course. But for several years, leading up to Christmas, my younger sister and I would discuss opening a gift a day for the twelve days of Christmas, in order to draw the celebration out. Of course, our resolutions were duly forgotten in the frenzy of present-opening on Christmas Day.

It is a little sad that we don't make a bigger deal out of the twelve days of Christmas. Years ago, Nova Scotian Gaels marked "Là nan Trì Rìghrean" -- "The Day of the Three Kings" with a big dinner. Spanish friends at university told me about the tradition they had grown up with: of the Three Kings visiting their town to pass out presents to the children on the feast of the Epiphany.

Hooray for traditional feasts! Hooray for the Epiphany! Three cheers for the Three Kings!

Snow Day

2010-01-02T15:21:00.000-08:00

A cozy day indoors today after a trip out into wintry weather this morning for Mass and a parish breakfast. It's traditional in Nova Scotia to have a snowstorm around the New Year. This is my second snowstorm since coming home for Christmas; we drove through the first to attend the wedding earlier in the week. At least I'll have something to brag about when I return to Scotland. “Nova Scotia? You must have terrible winters there,” is the usual comment. “Oh, yes – we get lots of snow,” is my usual reply. It would be a little embarrassing to admit that we had a “green Christmas” this year and that the weather over the last week or so, other than for a few bitterly cold days, was warmer and less snowy than in the Highlands. Maybe it's being a December baby that made me a snow lover. I've been regretting that I'm missing out on the snow the Highlands have been getting. Of course, I wasn't such a fan when I had to drive through the Western Highlands in a snowstorm two weeks ago. Snow tires are almost unheard of in Scotland while they're a winter necessity in Nova Scotia. Creeping along a mountain road in a world of whirling whiteness, it was easy to spot the deer on the moors along the way. I had the frightening thought that if it entered their antlered heads to come over across the road it would be them or the ditch for me, neither a comfortable option. A prayer was hastily uttered. Happily, they stayed well away from the road.

It's one of those nights that you wish you had an open fire, or at least a Rayburn or Aga. Someday... Meanwhile, I'll practice my knitting.

Time flies...

2009-12-31T16:05:00.000-08:00

A terribly original thought, I know. Ten years since my first New Year "at home from Scotland." A decade. Hard to believe. The Christmas holidays have been going by in a whirl, including a trip to a wedding. Since I was small, my family has been close friends with another family with four children. The wedding was of the youngest girl. On the drive up, the running joke between my sister and I was, "She's getting MARRIED! But she's TWELVE!" Actually, she's twenty-six, but for many years I've suffered from the delusion that time stopped in 1996. Which is only reinforced by the number of repeats of Road to Avonlea and Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman I've seen in the last few days.

On the evening of Boxing Day, The Sound of Music made its annual appearance on TV. Watching it prompted me to unearth my copy of The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, written by Maria Von Trapp herself, years before the movie came out. The book tells the story of the family's life in Austria and emigration to America, which of course, didn't happen exactly as as presented in the film. Of course, everybody who has seen the movie remembers that Maria was going to become a nun, (a Benedictine of Nonnberg Abbey in Salzburg -- yay Benedictines!) but then she came to stay with the Von Trapps, married the Captain, etc, etc. The book paints a much fuller picture of the family's Catholic faith and is a really enjoyable and edifying read. Here's Maria Von Trapp, in summary, on immigration: "We had all sorts of problems with our visas but we sought first the Kingdom of God and so it all worked out and we ended up living on a farm in Vermont and running summer singing schools." Just what I needed to hear.

Scottish Christmas Party

2009-12-18T12:34:00.000-08:00

A quiet day at the college today, with flurries, and snow on the mountains, and birds flitting among the remainder of the blackberry bushes that grow along the path. There's a cold stillness in the air. I saw a deer on a walk today -- I'm not sure who was more surprised.

Last night was the college Christmas "do." Christmas parties in Scotland remind me of childrens' birthday parties, with funny hats and streamers and noisemakers. I'm not knocking the Christmas crackers, however. We didn't grow up with them but they've made an appearance at family Christmas festivities for the last few years and I think they're great -- the corny jokes and the inexplicable toys and paper hats. I love the Christmas episode of The Good Life where they make their own and pull them and yell "BANG!"

Our festivities included a dance as well as a dinner. Cèilidh dancing is lots of fun and I often lament the fact that we weren't taught any kind of dancing at school. I'm sure that it would have been a somewhat nightmarish experience at the time, but it would be a boon to know the dances as well as my Scottish counterparts. "There are only eight of them," it was explained to me last night. The college favourite seems to be "Strip the Willow" which is done with such gusto that it almost always ends up with injuries, and the occasional trip to hospital. I think I prefer my dances a bit more civilized than that. I'm amazed to see (usually older) couples take to the floor and do the dances with ease and gracefulness. People surprise you and the best dancers are often not the ones you would think. The school on my Hebridean island where I sometimes work was holding its own dance contest today -- "Strictly Come Cèilidh." I'm looking forward to finding out the results!

Winter days...

2009-12-16T15:17:00.000-08:00

are getting increasingly shorter and the mid-afternoon view from my window yesterday was of bare trees silhouetted against a red sky. There's a chill in the air and the forecast this weekend is for snow. The term is winding down and after tomorrow night's soiree, the college community will be scattered to the four airts until sometime in January. Looking forward to a weekend with friends. Plans include a search for the perfect teapot, brisk wintry walks, landed-gentry-spotting over lunch and a choir carol sing complete with mince pies. Hope to squeeze a bit of present shopping in there, too. Then home to Nova Scotia for Christmas!

Cougar birthday

2009-12-13T08:46:00.000-08:00

I'm a cailleach at heart and my chronological age is catching up. By that I mean I'm thirty today, a birthday which my sisters and I call "the cougar birthday." I don't know if the word has really caught on in the UK, but in North America, a cougar, besides being a big scary cat that lives in the woods, is a woman of a certain age who goes after younger men. The "cougar birthday" business all started when my older sister and her friends turned thirty. A tiger-striped top circulated that was worn by each birthday girl in turn on her big night out. It was all in good fun and they weren't out chasing younger men (although my sister's husband is a year younger than her). The phrase stuck, nevertheless. My birthday hasn't included a night out or a cougar shirt, but a Sunday with friends -- my last full day on my island until January. I took a walk a little earlier down the road to a house that may be a possibility to rent when I return to live on the island. It's a rare calm day here and every loch was a perfect mirror. There were two buzzards at the house. Maybe that's significant.

Meanwhile, a lady at church this morning heard it was my birthday and later on her grandson arrived with a card.

I also was speaking with a friend's brother who had recently celebrated a birthday. "It's good getting older," he said, "You don't care as much. You don't care what other people think. You just do what you want."

Good point.

Island Saturday

2009-12-12T05:24:00.000-08:00

I'm sitting here with a cup of tea and a sweet or two and the view from the window is of loch and moor and mountain, punctuated by the odd telephone pole and grazing cow. Loveliness. The day after tomorrow it will be back to the college, so I'll enjoy my sunny Saturday, or rather, the hour or so of sunlight that's left, and take a spin around the island.

Back to the island...

2009-12-05T13:35:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow it's back to the island, weather permitting. When I first told people that I was going to live on my Hebridean island, the response often was, "Have you been there in the winter?"

I originally wasn't sure what people were getting at with that question. What could be the problem with winters that were so much milder than the snowy ones I grew up with? Then I went to the island and found out: wind. On a good day, it's a constant brisk breeze and on a rough day, it can knock you over. The older homes have walls three feet thick and a winter gale can still give them a good rattle. As a local lady told me, "You have to be physically tough to live here." Often the winter wind propels rain and sleet horizontally across the treeless landscape. Soon after I arrived, another person remarked to me, "We don't use umbrellas here."

You also have to accept that winter weather brings its share of ferry and flight cancellations, which means you can't necessarily get on and off the island when you would like to. Maybe there's a lesson in that, though. Nowadays, we want to do things when and how we want. We think we're in charge. Of course, we're not.

Some people find island life just a step too far -- just a bit too isolated or remote. Or more than a bit. When I came home last Christmas, full of stories of my adventures on the island, my older sister commented, "The more I hear about this place, the less I like it." This summer, I was chatting with a lady in a shop on another Hebridean island. I told her where I was living. "Oh, I could never live there," she told me. "It's just too remote." I thought this was funny, but her point was that her island had a town. "I couldn't live here if it wasn't for that," she explained. "It makes all the difference." It reminded me of a conversation I had with a young woman from my island who works at the college. "I love the island but I wouldn't want to go back there to live," she said. "You can't jump in the car and go to the Tesco's at midnight." I didn't point out to her that it was a two-hour drive to the nearest Tesco's. Her point was more theoretical, I think. You could if you really wanted to.

So I have to disagree with my city-dwelling sister. The isolation brings its inconveniences, but it's worth it. Island nights are dark. When you go out, you have to bring a torch. There is no light pollution. You can hold your hand in front of your face and not see it. There's only one main road, which means the absence of the hum of traffic. When you go for a walk on the twenty-mile long beach, you may see another person, but you just as likely won't. Island life isn't for everyone, but I've discovered that I love it.

Feast of Saint Francis Xavier

2009-12-03T13:38:00.000-08:00

Today is the Feast of Saint Francis Xavier, patron saint of my alma mater, and an important day for all alumni. We all think of the day when we first received our X-rings, which we wear with pride. X-rings are one of the main reasons that some people claim that the university is a bit of a cult -- including my brother, the only one of us four sibling who chose to pursue higher education elsewhere. Sour grapes, I'd say. I'm reminded of my first week at university. A friend and I headed off to the campus shop to kit ourselves out in head-to-toe StFX clothes. Which is another reason why some claim that it's all a cult. At any given time, half of the student body are wearing clothes with the name of the university emblazoned on them. Some continue this practice even after they've left. We come by it honestly, though. A good part of the student population, including myself, are Cape Breton-born, and I maintain that Cape Breton Island is one of the few places in the world where the locals buy their own tacky tourist souvenirs and display them proudly in their homes. We like people to know who we are.

Despite the importance of StFX Day, I don't recall spending a lot of time at university reflecting on Saint Francis Xavier himself. I don't know if many of us did. More attention was paid to the influential local priests connected with the college and who were memorialized in the names of various buildings on campus: Coady, Tompkins, Thompson, Chisholm, Gillis, MacPherson, Nicholson... There was a prominent statue of Saint Francis Xavier in the university chapel, which had been done over in the seventies. He looked like a robot. A more traditional painting of the saint hung in the library, surrounded by the the locals he strove to convert to the Christian faith. Reading about Saint Francis Xavier now, I'm amazed by the extent of his missionary work. A friend posted her own Feast of Saint Francis Xavier wishes on Facebook today, pointing out that it was he who had converted her ancestors in Goa, India to Catholicism. She also mentioned that it's an Indian tradition to eat sweets today. Twist my rubber arm.

The first time I visited St Aloysius' Church in Glasgow, I nearly fell over. The exterior of the church doesn't give much away, but inside, it's is dazzling -- all marble and mosaics. Even after having attended Masses there many times, there are still details I haven't noticed. One day, seated in a pew, I raised my eyes to the dome above me. It was ringed with stained-glass images of Jesuit saints. And there was Saint Francis Xavier, directly above, gazing down at me. At once, I felt at home.

All over the road...

2009-12-02T12:58:00.000-08:00

That's where my thoughts are tonight. Running through the to-do list I'm always carrying around in my head; a dark cloud of due-dates hanging over me -- do they call them due-dates here? I can't remember. One of the things that happens when you operate in Gaelic on a daily basis is that you forget what things are called in UK English.

I'm going back to my Hebridean island in a few days, with a considerable amount of work to come in-between now and then.

The days are getting shorter and shorter. I love this time of year in the Highlands, especially when the sun shines for the few hours it's above the horizon and it's either morning or evening all day.

Is it because they have to fit all their activity into the abbreviated days that the birds are so visible right now. Jaunty little robins and bold thrushes that hop right across your path.

There's snow on the mountains now.

Here's something: one of the great things about Gaelic culture is that it's such a small world and therefore our proportionally-sized constellation of stars is much more accessible. Every week, four of us learn Gaelic songs with a famous Gaelic singer. Today I gave the famous Gaelic singer, who is a lovely person as well, a lift to the tiny shop down the road. She picked me up a box of chocolates as a thank-you: coffee creams.

St Andrew's Day

2009-11-30T10:37:00.000-08:00

Just off to St Andrew's Day Mass -- today is a Solemnity in Scotland, as is fitting for the country's patron saint. Thinking about Saint Andrew, my eyes fell on my university ring sitting on the desk. I went to St. Francis Xavier University, and on the feast of St. Francis Xavier all the upcoming graduates have the opportunity to receive a ring that features a bold black "X," for "Xavier." But I remember the year before I received mine, a friend got her ring and told me that at the reception after the ceremony, a venerable priest who was a former president took her hand and traced the "X" three times. "St. Francis Xavier," he told her. "Cross of St. Andrew. Cross of Christ."

I've always liked to think of my ring as being triply symbolic in that way. It's fitting, in that the university was founded as a diocesan seminary and the majority of the original students and staff were Scottish Gaels. A large number of alumni have a similar ancestry. The venerable past president is a Gaelic speaker. Admittedly we Gaels tend to identify with saints other than Saint Andrew: there's Saint Peter and Saint Patrick, Saint Michael the Archangel, Saint Brigid and of course, Calum Cille -- Saint Columba. But Saint Andrew, always slightly in the shadow of his brother Saint Peter is an easy saint to love as well; after all, he's the one who brought Peter to Jesus, as that line in the Gospel tells us.

Island Life

2009-11-24T10:53:00.000-08:00

Came across this article that appeared in the Catholic Herald a few months ago. It's about Canon Angus MacQueen, a remarkable priest who lives in Barra. I had the privilege of meeting Canon MacQueen this summer and he is just an amazing person. His lively personality comes out in the article and his comments about island life are reflective of the way people in the Hebrides look at the world.

Also found a great quote which I think also sums up the Hebrides quite well, although perhaps inadvertently:

'Consisting of Lewisian gneiss, the islands are the oldest known fragment of Europe.'

I have to say that I quite like that particular fragment of Europe.

The edge of the world

2009-11-23T10:48:00.000-08:00

Years ago, the first time that I visited my beloved Hebridean island, I thought that I had landed on the edge of the world. To make a phone call to my mother, I walked to the red phone box a mile down the road from the house where I was staying. Turning around to look back down the road, I examined the treeless landscape, overshadowed by a round-shouldered mountain and dotted with modern bungalows and the ruined walls of much older houses, interspersed with small lochs and lichen-covered boulders. "It's like Little House on the Prairie," I wailed to my mother. I had never visited a place without trees. Looking back, a better comparison may have been with the far-off islands visited in CS Lewis' Voyage of the Dawn Treader, another book I read first when I was a child and still love. Yet after spending a few days on the island, there was a pull to go back, and after another stay on the island a few years later, my fate was sealed: I knew this was where I wanted to live.

A lecturer in a college class today was talking about the notion that people have of the Highlands and Islands of Scotland being an isolated part of the world, far from the centre of things. That wasn't the way things were years ago, when people travelled by sea. And of course, it all depends where the centre of your world lies.

I was thinking of this while reading about St. Columbanus, whose feast day it is today. Not to be confused with St Columba, another great Gaelic saint, he was born the year St Benedict went to his heavenly reward and was another monastic trailblazer. He left Ireland and established monasteries in modern-day France, Austria and Italy. Strange to think of things happening that way -- Gaels bringing religious innovation to continental Europe. But there you go. We weren't always on the edge of the world.

Back to the salt pits...

2009-11-22T11:02:00.000-08:00

...after a too-short and very busy visit to my Hebridean island followed by an overnight trip to town. And hoping that it won't be too long until I'm back on the island again. In the meantime, despite the drawbacks of being a cailleach at college, I am greatly enjoying my studies. Which is quite ironic, considering that at the end of my undergraduate degree, when my fellow honours students were going on to grad school, my line was, "I'm sick of papers. I don't want to be an academic. I just want to be a normal person!"

St Cecilia's Day

2009-11-22T10:31:00.000-08:00

A rainy evening in the Highlands on what would be St Cecilia's Day if it wasn't the Feast of Christ the King. I'm sure there was a poem in the anthology I used in university about St Cecilia's Eve that I thought was lovely, but I can't find anything like it on the Internet, so I'm wondering if the poem had nothing to do with St Cecilia's Eve and I made it up. It wasn't one of similarly-named poem by Dryden or Keats, I've determined.

In honour of St Cecilia's Day, here are the nuns of St Cecilia's Abbey on the Isle of Wight singing Compline, the night prayer of the Church. Thanks, Hermit without a Permit!

Country roads...

2009-11-18T07:08:00.000-08:00

A quick post before I depart for my Hebridean island. For some reason, I always get the urge to play John Denver's Country Roads, Take Me Home on my ipod when travelling to the Western Isles, which really makes little sense since I'm going by ferry. There you go. A friend once told me how a house that she shared with two roommates got broken into. The burglar stole their entire composite CD collection, but left the three identical John Denver albums on the shelf.

I can already taste the greasy ferry food. Hopefully I'll have time to make a stop at the bakery on the way to the ferry and pick up some treats for my hosts. It's in the only real town within a two-hour drive from the college. When I hadn't found a dress during my shopping excursion last week, the friend I was staying with started to get concerned. She asked me if there were any clothes shops in the nearest town. There are, but mostly of the type that sells hillwalking gear. I had a vivid mental image of myself showing up at the choir dinner dance in a bright orange cagoule.

Even after years in the UK, I think that cagoule is a wonderfully exotic word for a windbreaker.

Which would come in quite handy on my island visit. But, fashionista that I am, I'm not bringing one. I may regret that decision.

So that's it! Off to the island!

A rose by any other name...

2009-11-16T15:49:00.000-08:00

A college instructor today brought up the Wikipedia lists of most popular baby names by country. Popular names for boys in Canada include Ethan, Jayden and Logan. Lists for popular girls' names in particular Canadian provinces include Madison and Brooklyn. Questionable, is all I can say. I really don't understand why people in rural Nova Scotia would name their children after a street in New York, but there you go. It's beyond me. I just become more and more grateful that my siblings and myself were given traditional family names. My brother has the same name as my grandfather and his son has the same name as my father. I have my mother's first name. My older sister has the feminine version of my father's name. Her daughter has another version of my father's name. My younger sister broke the trend and was named after a family friend. She has two cats called Stanfield and Esther, neither of which is a family name.

My parents came by this traditional naming tendency honestly. It's a Gaelic thing to pass down the same family names. And there are not a lot of names to start with. On my Hebridean island, I'm sure that most women are called Mary and the others are Catrìona. There's a little more variation among men's names, with Angus, Neil and Iain all very common. You can get two siblings with the same first name in one family. Which makes perfect sense if you consider that they're named after two different people with the same name. If both grandfathers are called Angus, then you have two brothers called Angus.

The lack of variation of names doesn't cause confusion. You're never just known by your first name in a Gaelic community. You're someone's son or daughter, who was the son or daughter of someone else. Or your family has a nickname, since there are fewer last names than first names. All these naming systems crossed over the Atlantic to Nova Scotia. The town where I went to university has an abundance of Chisholms, meaning that nicknames are very useful there. I'll never forget a conversation I overheard in an elevator between two staff members who were locals, as opposed to the "come-from-away" professors.

"Hot Dog Chisholm. You know who he is, don't you?"

"Of course I do. His kids are Ketchup, Mustard and Relish."

Countdown...

2009-11-15T12:22:00.000-08:00

It looks like I'll be back in civilization this coming weekend. Maybe I'll manage to find a Lindt Advent calendar this time around -- another exciting UK discovery. Growing up in Nova Scotia, we only had those generic Advent calendars containing chocolates that didn't really taste like chocolate. Not that they didn't taste good -- especially when it was your turn to open the tiny door of the day and were allowed to eat your chocolate at seven in the morning.

Before the trip to town on the weekend, I'm off to my beloved Hebridean island for a few days, weather permitting. Another discovery I made during several months of island living was how heavily dependent travel plans are on the wind. If there's a gale, you don't get on or off the island. And considering the frequency of gales in the winter, you have to be pretty flexible with your travel plans. I'm just hoping that the weather will co-operate and I'll get my island fix. A peat fire, a cup of tea and a cat curled up beside me on the couch and the company of good friends who are like my Scottish family -- I can't wait. I'm taking confidence from my friend's reassurance that her brother-in-law the fisherman says the worst of the weather will be on Thursday and Friday. Fishermen know these things. "And if we get storm-stayed, we get storm-stayed," she concluded.

"I don't care if I get storm-stayed for months," I confided.

"Yes, you'll just have to tell the college you can't come back till the weather improves," she concluded.

Hopefully the day will come, UK immigration regulations permitting, that I will be going to the island to stay. In the meantime, there's a paper to write and a lengthening to-do list. As one of my favourite island sayings goes, "So that's it!"

Civilization

2009-11-14T13:02:00.000-08:00

Just back from spending a few days in civilization. Although I would never want to trade living in the back of beyond for town life, it is enjoyable to visit the land of traffic lights and terraced housing once in a while. The purpose of my trip was ostensibly to attend a Gaelic choir practice, but also included a few treats like buying stationery, going out for Chinese food, and staying up till all hours getting the craic with my hostess, a friend from my high school teaching days.

A last shopping excursion this morning before heading back West took me to one of those huge Tescos, similar to the giant Superstores which are now cropping up in eastern Canada. My purchases included milk, orange juice, a stapler, toothpaste, and a party dress. I have a theory that, twenty years from now, there will be only one store in every town, and it will be a giant Tesco that sells everything. A scary thought.

The party dress was for the annual Gaelic choir dinner dance later this month. If there's something wrong with young women in the waning months of their twenties getting excited about attending a cèilidh dance at a slighty-worn-around-the-edges hotel in a small town in the Highlands, well then -- too bad. And scoring a dress for £16 at the Tesco only adds to the pleasure. Now if only finding someone to go with was as straightforward!

Too early!

2009-11-11T15:19:00.000-08:00

It's strange that Remembrance Day seems to be a more significant day in Canada than it is in the UK. I know that here, most of the commemorations happen on the Sunday before the 11th, but it's still strange that the day itself isn't a holiday here. Eleven o' clock passed this morning without my even noticing it because I was in a university class.

Also interesting to find out from some Parisian tourists that in France, November 11 is marked as the anniversary of the end of the First World War while on May 8, V-E Day is also commemorated.

I was talking to my mother tonight. She was at home in Nova Scotia watching the news and told me that the presenters had already stopped wearing their poppies. And a Christmas wreath had appeared on the set.

Growing up, my siblings and I were taught that Christmas started sometime on the evening of December 24. Over and over, through November and December, our parents would declare, "Too early!" When the first decorations appeared in the stores; when the first Christmas lights went up on the street; when neighbours put up their trees up on the first of December... it was the same refrain from my parents: "Too early!" My father also had a favourite line that he used on us every time Christmas was mentioned: "Don't think about it or it won't come."

Our parents' admonitions are a family tradition. I realized at an early age that even if I thought about Christmas, it would still come. But I understood what my parents meant and despite my excitement about the day drawing closer, I knew they were right about the "too early" part.

So when my mother mentioned that Christmas decorations were appearing not just on TV but in the stores at home, my response was predictable: "Too early!"

Up with good girls!

2009-11-10T11:10:00.001-08:00

A friend of mine told me that when she selects an outfit to wear, she asks herself the question, "Would Carla Bruni approve?" She then had to explain to me that Carla Bruni is the glamourous wife of French president Nicholas Sarkozy. Fair enough. Not quite as fashion-forward as the friend in question, I would say that my style icon would be more along the lines of Minnie Driver's character Benny in the film Circle of Friends. Cozy sweaters worn over button-up shirts? Wool skirts? Pea coats? University scarves? Yes, please.

I'm not big movie watcher, partially due to attention span issues, but I know what I like. Just about every one of my favourite films fits at least two or three of the following criteria:

a. Is based on a book

b. Is set in the past

c. Is set in the British Isles

d. Is a musical

Circle of Friends is set in Ireland in the 1950s and is based on a popular novel of the same name. Check three criteria. The movie made me want to get in my time machine and go back to the Ireland of fifty years ago. The novel was also a good read. But I have a major bone to pick with the film. It's the same problem I have with the movie Grease. It's that the moral of the story is that good girls don't get the guy.

In Circle of Friends, we have Minnie Driver's character Benny. She's from the country and self-conscious about her looks. She goes to university and falls for the lovely Chris O' Donnell. Or rather, a character called Jack, played by Chris O' Donnell with a questionable Irish accent. All sorts of soap-operatic goings-on ensue, quite a bit of it not exactly morally edifying, including Chris O' Donnell's character becoming involved with this other social-climbing friend, Nan. Anyway, at the end of it all, Minnie and Chris' characters are reunited and in the final scene we hear Minnie Driver's character in a voiceover: "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned." And we all know what that sin is.

Then there's Grease. Classic, catchy songs. Some content that isn't exactly suitable for its legions of twelve-year-old fans. Dishy bad boy John Travolta and perky, ponytailed Olivia Newton-John have had a summer romance. They end up attending the same school. Olivia Newton-John's wholesomeness doesn't exactly fit in with John Travolta's greaser crowd. There's a car race in this big concrete canal thing. Then everyone goes to a funfair. Olivia Newton-John's character appears, but she's exchanged her poodle skirt and bobby-socks for a skintight black bodysuit. Everyone's happy and Oliva Newton-John and John Travolta leave in a flying car. Riveting stuff, I know. But again, the message is that virtue comes second to getting the guy.

Just wait till I get a book published. Up with good girls!

Gaelic/Benedictine Values Part 1: Hospitality

2009-11-09T14:28:00.000-08:00

"How many cups of tea do you drink a day?" someone asked me, incredulously, at the college refectory tonight.

I had to think about that one. "Seven or eight," I concluded. I explained that I had been raised to think that it was quite normal to have a cup of tea after every meal, sometimes with meals, always with sweets, and any other time that seemed appropriate. As in as soon as you come home from work or school or shopping, or when you're sitting with a book or a newspaper or watching TV. I also rationalized that I wasn't as much of a tea jenny as the old people in the country who kept the teapot simmering on the back of the stove all day and drank cup after cup of the tarlike substance.

It's taken for granted that when you come to visit a person of Gaelic extraction on either side of the water, it won't be long before you're offered a cup of tea. And it's a given that that cup of tea will be accompanied by a sweet. In Cape Breton Island and eastern mainland Nova Scotia, it's still the custom at rural and small-town community gatherings -- dances, meetings, etc-- to have a "lunch," which consists of tea (always made quite strong, the way we Cape Bretoners like it) and sandwiches and sweets. You don't hold an event and not give people a lunch. And when people come to your home, you drop what you're doing, offer them the best seat in your kitchen, put on the kettle, and sit down for a good chat. And when the tea's ready, there's a little bite to go with it. To treat a guest any other way would be unthinkable. It would be unhospitable.

As I learn more about the Benedictine way of life, I'm discovering that there are a lot of parallels between the Benedictine and Gaelic traditions. A major one is the value placed on hospitality. The Rule of St Benedict states: "All guests who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ." (RB 53) Anyone who has the privilege of visiting a Benedictine monastery finds a warm welcome and a listening ear. And more than likely, a cup of tea as well.

Highland Saturday

2009-11-07T07:40:00.000-08:00

I woke up this morning to snow on the mountains and a day like a tinted photograph. So I went out for a walk in the grounds of the nearby castle -- another thing to add to my list of things I love about living in Scotland. Never mind that the castle is a ruin and wasn't exactly ancient to start with; the gardens surrounding the remaining Gothic facade have been kept up and there's a plethora of paths in the woods that surround it. Then a few hours this afternoon were spent poring over the classification of traditional folktales with a big mug of tea by my side. (It seems that the Gaelic versions of Snow White and Cinderella aren't quite as wholesome and child-friendly as the Walt Disney adaptations.)

I was reminded of C.S. Lewis' description of his ideal daily routine in Surprised by Joy. It sounds just great, I think:

We now settled into a routine which has ever since served in my mind as an archetype, so that what I still mean when I speak of a "normal" day (and lament that normal days are so rare) is a day of the Bookham pattern. For if I could please myself I would always live as I lived there. I would choose always to breakfast at exactly eight and to be at my desk by nine, there to read or write till one. If a cup of good tea or coffee could be brought me about eleven, so much the better. A step or so out of doors for a pint of beer would not do quite so well; for a man does not want to drink alone and if you meet a friend in the taproom the break is likely to be extended beyond its ten minutes. At one precisely lunch should be on the table; and by two at the latest I would be on the road. Not, except at rare intervals, with a friend. Walking and talking are two very great pleasures, but it is a mistake to combine them. Our own noise blots out the sounds and silences of the outdoor world; and talking leads almost inevitably to smoking, and then farewell to nature as far as one of our senses is concerned. The only friend to walk with is one (such as I found, during the holidays, in Arthur) who so exactly shares your taste for each mood of the countryside that a glance, a halt, or at most a nudge, is enough to assure us that the pleasure is shared. The return from the walk, and the arrival of tea, should be exactly coincident, and not later than a quarter past four. Tea should be taken in solitude, as I took it as Bookham on those (happily numerous) occasions when Mrs. Kirkpatrick was out; the Knock himself disdained this meal. For eating and reading are two pleasures that combine admirably. Of course not all books are suitable for mealtime reading. It would be a kind of blasphemy to read poetry at table. What one wants is a gossipy, formless book which can be opened anywhere. The ones I learned so to use at Bookham were Boswell, and a translation of Herodotus, and Lang's History of English Literature. Tristram Shandy, Elia and the Anatomy of Melancholy are all good for the same purpose. At five a man should be at work again, and at it till seven. Then, at the evening meal and after, comes the time for talk, or, failing that, for lighter reading; and unless you are making a night of it with your cronies (and at Bookham I had none) there is no reason why you should ever be in bed later than eleven. But when is a man to write his letters? You forget that I am describing the happy life I led with Kirk or the ideal life I would live now if I could. And it is essential of the happy life that a man would have almost no mail and never dread the postman's knock.

I'm off to the Saturday vigil Mass in a little while. Attended by about twenty-five people, it's held in the tiny Catholic church in a village about fifteen miles away. Then out to a nearby pub with some of the other students for supper and music. That's a Highland Saturday for you.

Monastic and Fantastic Part 2

2009-11-06T15:04:00.000-08:00

Here'a another fantastic Benedictine abbey: St. Cecilia's, in Ryde, on the Isle of Wight. Like the monks at Pluscarden, the nuns chant the Divine Office in Latin. A monk at Pluscarden told me that the chant at St. Cecilia's puts their efforts to shame. I wouldn't say that, but the nuns' singing is heavenly. Priests from nearby Quarr Abbey say Mass here. I'd highly recommend a retreat here. It's a very traditional community. The nuns are lovely, as is the Isle of Wight. Before visiting, all I knew about the place was that maybe Paul McCartney could rent a cottage there (if it's not too dear.) I don't think there could be a more quintessentially English seaside locale: winding country lanes and hedgerows galore; quirky Victorian architecture; ice cream on the pier.

Here's St. Cecilia's website, which is surprisingly high-tech. The virtual tour is a great feature.

An interesting side-note: the abbey overlooks the Solent, the shallow strait which separates the Isle of Wight from the south coast of England. When crossing on the ferry, my attention was drawn to huge barges in the strait. Over the course of my visit, one of them never seemed to move. This seemed strange, and I figured that perhaps it wasn't a barge, but some sort of stationary structure like an oil platform. It was only when I came across this article a few days ago that I realized I had been looking at a man-made island, built in the 19th century.

Monastic and Fantastic Part 1

2009-11-05T15:32:00.000-08:00

I'm a lot of things these days: professional student; premature cailleach; prospective immigrant. I am also a novice Benedictine oblate here:

This is Pluscarden Abbey, near Elgin in Morayshire, Scotland. The monks are fantastic. The liturgy is beautiful. The Divine Office is chanted in Latin seven times a day, in addition to Mass. The monastery was founded in the 1200s and fell into ruin in Reformation times. Then a group of Benedictine monks came to rebuild the abbey about 60 years ago. It's the only medieval monastery in Britain that is still inhabited by monks. It is just awesome. If you're in the area, drop by for a visit. Or better still, go on a retreat. You can find out more on their website.

Sometimes people are a bit mystified by the whole monastic thing. When I've told people that I'm going on a retreat at Pluscarden, I don't know how many times I've been asked, "But what do you do there?" I'm sure if those people could be there for Compline and hear the monks sing the Salve Regina in total darkness, save for the light of a few candles, and then walk back to the guesthouse by moonlight with the only sound the calling of owls, they wouldn't have to ask anymore.

I'm noticing that student life is like monastic life. You have your "cell" where you sleep and study (and pray if you're so inclined), and your day revolves around trips to the refectory and lectures and the library. Of course this isn't a coincidence. Even if you're not that up on the history of the development of the university, it hits you in the face when you visit a place like Oxford. The college I'm presently attending, which is just a baby compared to more venerable Scottish institutions like Aberdeen or St. Andrew's, and which has no church affiliation, still built its student accommodation to a cloister-type plan. There are some differences, though. In monasteries, the novices don't come back from the pub in the wee hours belting out "Sweet Caroline." As far as I know, that is.

Around the Highlands Part 2

2009-11-05T10:49:00.000-08:00

I was in an otter hide today. With beautiful weather and the hours of daylight rapidly shortening, I exercised my student's prerogative and took the afternoon off to go on a little splaoid. Taking an only slightly hair-raising single-track road over the mountains, I ended up in a tiny village that is home to Scotland's last remaining hand-operated turntable ferry (which only runs in the summer) and an otter hide. As in a hut that allows you to hide from the otters in order to observe them. I did have the good fortune of spotting an otter frolicking in the whirlpools as the tide came in, but ironically, this was not while in the hide. I also posted a letter. It's a continual source of amazement to me that you can be in the most isolated spot in the United Kingdom and you'll still come across a post box with daily pick-up service. And sure enough, the post van passed me on my white-knuckled return journey on the single-track road.

The non-geriatric students at the college had a pyromaniacal glint in their eyes this afternoon and I can hear them frolicking in the car park right now. Bonfire Night is one of those things we didn't have growing up. Sort of like the Tooth Fairy. Don't think I missed too much either way.

The cailleach at university

2009-11-04T11:30:00.000-08:00

I'm a geriatric. This is the conclusion that I've reached after a few weeks on a university course, several years after leaving university the first time.

Not that I'm complaining. I've been an old lady most of my life. It just seems that my inner cailleach is coming more and more to the fore here. One sure sign of cailleachishness is when someone asks you if you're going to the pub tonight and your thought process is, "Hmm -- laundry. Hmm -- class work. Hmm -- cup of tea and getting some writing done. Hmm -- no."

There's also a sense of regression, however. As in "The lecturer has just asked a question. The answer is obvious. Why is no one answering? I can't stand it when this happens. I don't want to be the only one answering. This has happened before. Countless times. I thought I had left this behind years ago. I guess I'll just answer and put everybody out of their misery. Argggh!"

Another "argggh" moment when I walked into a lecture late again this morning. No wading across the loch in the car park to rescue my vehicle to use as an excuse this time. Rather, it had something to do with a time difference. Not the clocks falling back a week ago, but the difference between Greenwich Mean Time and Gaelic time.

Most Gaels run on Gaelic time. This means that they are always five minutes to a half-hour behind the actual time. In Gaelic culture, this is usually accommodated for by everything starting five minutes to a half-hour later than scheduled. This can be a cause of endless frustration for the few Gaels such as myself who tend to go by the actual time on the clock. However, after years of living in the Gaelic time zone, you start to adapt, whether you want to or not.

So I timed my arrival at this morning's lecture a few minutes early, according to Gaelic time. Which is a few minutes late in actual time. The problem was I had forgotten that this particular lecturer does go by actual time. I can't explain exactly why, except that he is a precise grammarian with an eye for detail, and English by birth. (It can be quite disconcerting to listen to someone speak Gaelic with a flawless Lewis accent and then throw in an English word with precise Oxbridge diction.) Better to err on the side of actual time from now on.

Highland winter

2009-11-03T11:11:00.000-08:00

Coming back from the All Souls' Day Mass last night, the parking lot at the college was unusually full. Consequently, I parked my car in the corner of the lot, with low stone walls on two sides of the vehicle.

This morning, after a night of heavy rain showers, running late and rushing to the car, I discovered that I would have to wade through several inches of water to reach the door on the driver's side. With my class starting any moment, I hesitated, eyeing the water and my flimsy shoes. The welly boots in a box in my closet were momentarily forgotten and I could see no other course of action. Rolling up the bottoms of my trousers, I removed my shoes and socks and splashed my way to the car door. The car started without a whimper, and it wasn't until I backed out that I could see the water on the other side of the car was much deeper. A close call and a welcome to winter in the Highlands.

A year ago, I spent some time staying with a family in the Western Isles. The lady of the house was at away at work during the day and I wasn't. She asked if I wouldn't mind hanging out the washing if the weather was good enough. It seemed like a simple task at the time. The sun was shining so I went outside and hung the clothes on the line. A half hour later, a dark cloud had blown in from the Atlantic and hailstones and large raindrops were being driven by the wind. Hurrying outside, I removed the washing from the line and collected the items that had been blown to the ground. Inside I went with the basket of clothes. Ten minutes later, the sun was shining again. Out I went again, and hung the washing, using twice the number of clothespins. Back inside I settled down to some work, until I was aware of the sound of rain being blown against the window. So out again to collect the washing, some of which had blown off the line again, despite my best efforts with the clothespins. I repeated this process another time or two before I admitted defeat. The washing had been clean and damp when it came out of the machine; now it was dripping and dirty and I was cold and wet. Not a very productive process.

When she came home, I questioned the lady of the house as to what I was doing wrong. She pointed out that there was a difference between and dry spell and a dry spell. It's hard to explain in English, but in Gaelic, you only hang clothes out to dry when there's a turadh. That's proper drying weather, which is different from an absence of rain.

"But how long should I leave the clothes out for?" I insisted.

"Until they're dry," I was told.

Clannishness

2009-10-31T06:34:00.000-07:00

The university I attended for my undergraduate degree was in my father's home town. This was an advantage in many ways. Although the majority of the professors were from away, most of the people who worked in the university's offices were local. This was a benefit to me and my two sisters who attended the same university. Sometimes other students would complain about having been given the run-around by someone in a university office. That never happened to us. We were used to the smile and the comment, "I know who you are." Some people say the Gaels are clannish. I have no idea what they're talking about.

I taught a Catechism class during my final year in university, and would sometimes have to drop by the parish offices to pick up materials. My younger sister accompanied me on one visit. The director of religious education had gone to school with my youngest aunt, to whom my sister bears a strong resemblance. When we came into the office, the director was almost speechless. "You could be your aunt!" she exclaimed. "You're even dressed the same." My aunt had been in high school in the mid-70s, and my sister, with her long, straightened blonde hair, flared jeans, and turtleneck sweater under a down vest, was a mirror of 70s fashion.

We were on our way to visit our grandmother. This was the best thing about attending university in our ancestral home. Her house was a short walk away and she was always ready with a plate of brownies. She would sit down with us and smoke and tell stories about the family and the old days. On that day, we had a story for her. We told her about my aunt's friend's astonishment at the family resemblance between said aunt and my sister, right down to their outfits. My grandmother looked at my sister closely. "That's right," she declared. "Your aunt did wear some awful get-ups."

Not that my grandmother was completely innocent on this account herself. I never heard this from her, but another aunt told me that on Hallowe'en, when she was growing up, my grandmother would disguise herself in my grandfather's clothes and go around the neighbours' houses for a laugh. I'm not sure how much the neighbours were laughing the year they went to their back doors to find my grandmother in an old coat, a stocking pulled over her head and my grandfather's rifle pointed at them. She thought it was a great joke. I'm laughing, thinking about it right now. Oh, I miss my grandmother.

The Gaelic Year

2009-10-31T04:58:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I came across a Gaelic almanac from 1872. It contains a Gaelic calendar with major feast-days highlighted, as well as a thought for each day, including such salutary reminders as can be found on January 1: "Tha gach bliadhn' ùr a' toirt am bàs nas dlùth." -- "Each New Year brings death closer." January 30 also doesn't pull any punches: "Don taigh-òsta an-diugh, 's don phrìosan a-màireach." -- "To the pub today and to the prison tomorrow."

Having a look through the almanac reminded me that the Gaelic seasons don't quite match up with the modern calendar. For instance, tomorrow, November 1, is the beginning of winter, which will last until the beginning of February. It makes sense. Here in the Highlands, it's remarkable how quickly the nights have drawn in. Of course, the end of our modern Daylight Savings Time makes a difference, too. But looking out my window and the bare, dripping branches of the trees against a leaden sky, it does seem that nature is just about to go to bed for a long sleep.

At this time of year, the point will be made that many of the traditions surrounding Hallowe'en come from the beliefs and practices of the Gaels in pre-Christian times. I think it's interesting to look at these connections, but more important to remember that "Hallowe'en" is really "All Hallows' Eve" and that tomorrow is the Feast of All Saints, followed by All Souls' Day. Maybe the advice of the Gaelic almanac isn't as callous as it seems. Surely we should pray for our loved ones who have passed from this life to the next before us, and remember that our time in this world will come to an end, too. And we also remember that the saints in heaven are there interceding for us, as well as being models of how to live the Christian life.

Mary's months

2009-10-27T03:06:00.000-07:00

October and May are Mary's months, of course, and in my beloved Hebridean island of South Uist, these are the months for "the statue." People in South Uist have a real devotion to Mary and the Rosary, which is prayed before Mass in most parishes. In May and October, a statue of Mary makes the rounds of the townships. On a given night, the families of a particular township gather in one of the houses. The statue of Mary has a place of honour, on a table covered with a clean white cloth, and blessed candles are lit on either side. Everybody kneels down and the Rosary is prayed in Gaelic. Afterwards, there's a chance to stay for a cèilidh -- a visit -- and the lady of the house has a pot of tea and beautiful home baking at the ready. The statue is wrapped up and placed carefully back in its case and taken to the next house for the following night. After all the families in the township have had the chance to take the statue, it moves to the next township.

It's a beautiful tradition and I don't know if quite the same thing is done anywhere else. South Uist also has a number of roadside Marian shrines and an impressive granite statue of Mary holding the infant Jesus overlooks South Uist from Ruabhal, a hill in the north of the island. The statue is known as "Bantighearna nan Eilean" -- Our Lady of the Isles -- and in South Uist, at least, Mary couldn't be given a more fitting title.

Lost in Translation

2009-10-26T16:30:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I had the chance to chat with two other North American Gaelic speakers living in Scotland. The conversation turned to the fact that it's not speaking both Gaelic and English that can be confusing, but the difference between the English we speak in Scotland and at home. It's especially hard to switch back and forth. I was staying with friends shortly after returning from Canada a few weeks ago.

"Where are your paper towels?" I asked my hostess.

She gave me a blank look.

"Your paper towels," I repeated.

"Do you mean kitchen roll?" she asked.

"Yes. Sorry--I've been home for a month and I've forgotten my Scottish words," I admitted. Which was true--attending a party a few days later I asked the small son of my hosts about his collection of toy trucks. Another blank look. Then it dawned on me that I was speaking Canadian again.

Of course there's a lot of ways to speak Canadian as well. When I was in university, friends from Ontario and "out West" thought it was hilarious to ask Nova Scotians such as myself to say things like "carrrrr."

It took a while to learn the Scottish names for things in the first place. When I was in college years ago and very new to the country, I was on an expedition to buy coathangers at the local Woolworth's. (It may have been on this same trip that I discovered a wonderful thing called "Pick 'n' Mix.") Now I had been raised to enquire politely as to the whereabouts of the bathroom, whether or not the room in question actually had bathing facilities. Knowing that this was probably not the done thing in the UK, I approached a saleslady. "Excuse me--can you tell me where your washroom is?" I asked, hesitantly.

"Do you want to have a wash or do you want to use the loo?" the lady shot back.

Since then, I've tried the patience of salesladies across Scotland by asking for things like Q-Tips, aka cotton buds, and bobby pins, otherwise known as kirby grips.

It's really much easier to speak Gaelic. There's a lot less confusion involved.

Glen Affric and Strathglass

2009-10-25T15:06:00.000-07:00

With a conference to attend in Inverness on Saturday, I decided to make a weekend of it. One of the advantages of student life is the flexibility of your working hours. So I left the college on Friday morning after my only class of the day and headed east. This is the last weekend of the Octber school holidays in the Highlands, so I was at the home of my hostess, a fellow teacher, at lunchtime, and she had lentil soup, cheese and pickle toasties and hot tea on the table in no time. Having finished our delicious autumnal lunch, we had a second cup of tea and then set off to explore Glen Affric.

Glen Affric is a lonely, lovely place. I had been there in the summer years before and remembered being impressed by its beauty and not so impressed by the tick I picked up after wandering around in the undergrowth. It was a perfect day to visit again: the birches were golden and the glen's ancient Caledonian pines were giant gnarled bonsais against the leaden sky. My friend and I discussed the pros and cons of owning a vast Highland estate and contemplated marrying money.

In nearby Strathglass, we stopped to see the historic Marydale Catholic Church and were disappointed to find it locked. Some people are surprised that there are regions in the Highlands that have been strongly Catholic all along. The opposite was true for me--I'm a product of the Catholic community that the people who left these areas established on the other side of the water. Many of the Strathglass Chisholms, for instance, went to Antigonish County, Nova Scotia, where Chisholm is a very common last name. It's rare today in Scotland. Growing up, I thought that "Scottish" and "Catholic" went together, and was surprised to find that we're in the minority here!

Outside the church was an old stone baptismal font, bearing intriguing inscriptions that I'm very curious to find out more about. I'm looking forward to going back sometime soon and getting a look inside. The former glebe house is home to a nun who is a hermit, who I'd also love to meet.

On the way back, we stopped to investigate another intriguing Catholic site: the Holy Well of St. Ignatius in Strathglass. Again, I can't wait to do some research and find out more about the well and its inscriptions.

Regency Rage

2009-10-22T14:32:00.000-07:00

I've been following the new BBC miniseries version of Jane Austen's Emma and I'm hooked. The acting and costumes are great and you can't improve on a classic story.

You can watch it on BBC iplayer here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00n7pk1/Emma_Episode_1/

What a difference from modern life. Upper-class society was so constrained, and therefore every look and gesture became significant. Not that I think all that constraint was always a good thing. I remember reading Pride and Prejudice with a book group a few years ago and my main complaint was that the women sat around idle so much of the time.

It makes me wonder if I was actually born 200 years too late. No, I'd say 150 would be about right. Not having an ounce of blue blood in my veins, I wouldn't have been one of the ones sitting around idle anyway. This would probably have been more like it:

Around the Highlands

2009-10-22T10:34:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I was on a little splaoid, ostensibly in search of stationery. There are very few disadvantages to living in the Highlands, and it's not very often that I miss big shops, but I do have a weakness of stationery: narrow-ruled refill pads of thick, high-quality paper; cartridge pens; any kind of folder: the more elaborate, the better. It's taken me a while to learn the British names for these items. I'm sure if I went into a shop and asked for scribblers, looseleaf and binders, no one would have a clue what I was talking about.

There was little stationery to be had in the nearest village, although I did go into a charity shop and found a teapot and some lovely teacups, circa 1975. I asked the lady at the shop about teaspoons as well, and she very kindly gave me some of the shop staff's own!

I remembered being in a chemist's shop in another village in the area years ago and being impressed by their selection of stationery, and also a bit boggled to see they carried lavender cigarettes. So I decided to make an afternoon of it and headed down the road.

I did have some luck in the shop I had remembered, and with it not being too late in the afternoon, I took a twisty-turny road to yet another village a few miles away, renowned for its picturesque harbour and palm trees. I took the wrong road when entering the village and was greeted by the sight of a Highland cow, galloping towards me. (Note to self: do cows gallop? Or do they just run?) Regardless, I executed a smooth seventeen-point turn and sped away in the opposite direction. I have a slight phobia of cows outside of fences. Especially ones with long horns. I went on quite a few walks on my beloved Hebridean island in the presence of unfenced cows and expressed my uneasiness to a sympathetic friend. She suggested I carry a stick. The problem was finding a stick on a treeless island. The next time we went to the one small wood on the island, she found me a stick. It wasn't very big. (Note to self: must conquer this fear of bovines before attempting to live off the land.)

Anyway, when I reached my destination, I wasn't disappointed--it was a beautiful spot with a pleasantly remote, end-of-the-world atmosphere, despite the families of English tourists making their way along the main street in their matching designer welly boots and accompanied by matching designer golden labradors. I spied a few promising-looking hostelries and concluded that a return trip would include a pub supper.

I'm discovering that autumn in this part of the Highlands is beautiful--the leaves may not be as bright or as plentiful as in a Nova Scotian fall, but the light and the colours on the mountains are amazing. There are still a few blackberries around and the rowan berries and hawthorn berries are redder than red. Today I heard some rustling in the bushes along a path at the college and upon a closer look discovered four female pheasants. I hope they've escaped a shoot somewhere. And on the way home from Mass tonight, I stopped along a dark stretch of road. Turning off the car lights and stepping outside, I was rewarded with the sight of the Milky Way, stretching across the night sky, without a streetlight anywhere to obscure it. There's a wonderful Gaelic legend about how the Milky Way came to be. I'll have to remember to post it another time.