Scotland, the gift that will forever keep me longing (Prompt 6)

It's been almost three years now since I came back from the land of outcasts known as Scotland. For those who haven't spent a considerable amount of time in the country and gotten to know what it means to be Scottish or at least for those of us who didn't have the luxury of having a class called 'Culture and Society in Modern Scotland' to explain to us this paradigm, let me provide some background.

I could go into the whole Bonnie Prince Charlie thing and the fact the English stole the throne from the Scots, but I was never very patient with history. Don't tell my girlfriend (the history whiz kid), but history, although important, bores me.  So here's the down and dirty of Scotland that helped me find a home at the very heart of a culture or at least helped shaped my world view. The true state of the modern Scottish psyche can be encapsulated by one single paragraph in Irvine Welsh' cult classic and dialectical roller coaster novel/collection of inter-related stories about heroin addiction, Trainspotting. At one point, the main narrator Mark Renton stops in the middle of the field to express his self-loathing as a Scotsmen, his says something along the lines of not hating the English for essentially making Scotland another colony, but instead hating is own Scottish heritage for allowing themselves to be taken over so easily by a bunch of wankers. The tone of this rant echoes through out contemporary writing and if ever a culture carried around a thinly veiled chip on its shoulder, it's the Scots. My professor was a renowned poet, Don Paterson. He pointed out to us what the Scots deal with and have come to accept on a daily basis which is that their very culture is a lie. The kilt is nothing more than a bit of folklore dredged up by Sir Walter Scott and the people of Edinburgh who hosted the English King at festival. Most clans, including William Wallace, most likely still wore the tartan that is so romanticized in travel brochures, but it wasn't the kind of kilt Mel Gibson wore in Braveheart. Ironically enough, the Scots don't even really own their own folk hero, William Wallace. At his monument in Stirling, it's Gibson image immortalized in a statue rather than what historical reports of Wallace's appearance conveyed. The culture is one searching for an identity. They are no longer the pastoral visages created by Burns' poetry or Scott's novels, but instead there is a seething frustration with not knowing what it truly means to be Scottish and this intrigued me.

I know I said that history lesson would be brief, but these feelings have been building up since the 1700s. The book we referenced was a history of Scotland from 1700 to 2007 and it did a lot to explain the why rather than just what events took place, but none of this really explains why I fell in love with Scotland and will never be able to let go what I found there. Of course there was all that golf that I played. I spent more time playing the Old Course than I spent in two semesters' worth of classes, but that's not what makes me want to go back. It's the smell of the North Sea settling over the cobble stone of St. Andrews and the sponginess of the ground that never really dried out while I was there. Most importantly, it the wind that comes from nowhere and everywhere. If this sounds a bit abstract, it's because it is. I love the way the Scots cling to an identity that they don't really believe. Honestly, how many times can you hear the bagpipes and actually discern what song is being played. It's about the peat earth and the purple heather between the treacherous gorse bushes which don't look nearly as threatening when they're in bloom, but don't be fooled. I love that the Scottish people are much like this gorse bush, a tangled mass of thorns that distracts from its dangers with bright yellow flowers. I love that the national whisky, Scotch, still contains the flavors of the very earth it comes from: peat, smoke and salt for the islay malts. The culture has been pre-packaged and in the very literal sense even bottled.

The land itself can be charming, green as far as the eye can see for most of the year and relatively moderate, at least to us north-easterners who are always prepared for cold streaks of subzero temperatures. The coldest night I remember as I trudged back from the pub, warm and tingling with singed throatful of Scotch and chips with cheese (french fries in a styrofoam container with shredded cheese, which one shakes until the cheese melts and then consumes while drunk) was about 20 degrees Fahrenheit and this was at the coldest point of the night. Most days in the winter were in the mid-thirties to low forties and in the 50s during fall and spring, although the potential to feel much colder than it really was is a unique feature of Scotland where the wind is always brewing with a damp cold that cuts right to your heart.

I know none of this may sound appealing. It does seem hopelessly bleak, but it's very real. It's the best of coastal Maine and Central Pennsylvania and if I ever earn enough money, I hope to move there where the North Sea laps below the cliff that holds the castle ruins directly across from the school's English building and poetry house. I know I said learning about history is boring, but living it or at least living in and around it, especially when it's an unfamiliar history that would scoff at what Americans call longevity...that's something more. The University of St. Andrews is at least twice as old as the U.S. and although it can be touristy with the golf courses and whatever, there's something genuine hidden just beneath the surface. Although the Scots put up a front, their identity is just waiting to be plucked from the gorse bush or uncovered on the West Sands. It can be picked up and embraced at any time, but what is most intriguing is that they don't necessarily even know what 's real anymore. It's all about a feeling that has yet to be absorbed as a nation and that potential volatility is just as thrilling as the landscape and attractions.