Brian’s Reflection: Monday, Jan 25, 2010

Ye Pow'rs wha mak mankind your care,
And dish them out their bill o 'fare,
Auld Scotland wants nae skinking ware
That jaups in luggies;
But, if ye wish her gratefu' prayer,
Gie her a Haggis!

Robbie Burns, Scot, born on this
date, in Alloway, Scotland, 1759

[ This is the last verse of Burn’s “Address to the Haggis”;
you can read the whole poem at
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/address-to-a-haggis/ ]


Well: here’s a test for you if you’re interested! Google Robbie Burn’s words in his poem “Address to the Haggis” and see if you can figure out the Scots bits! If not let me know, and I will email my oldest friend and ask him to supply an “explanation” !

Today is Robbie Burns Day! I LOVE Scotland. I love my Scottish heritage. And I – and now Dennis – love Scotland. I’ve been there many times – and love it, walking the Highlands (though alas I have to admit that my paternal grandparents were Lowland Scots – but then Bums was too!( The generation before my grandparents were Irish. (I have, though, discovered that there is an Orrock tartan – and if I can lose enough weight at this advanced age, I will get a kilt in it! I “took” Dennis to Scotland on my 60th Birthday – what a wonderful time we had.

Stories. My dear friend Martin knows the “Address” by heart. Gathered round the Haggis on a Burn’s Night, I heard him recite it with great passion – a wonderful moment in Life.

When I was a boy in Verdun – which was filled with Scots immigrants – my Mum would take me every Saturday morning to Main’s, a Scottish bakery. We would buy all sorts of Scottish goodies. Wonderful. But, though my father’s family were from Dundee, we never had haggis at home. There was another Scottish bakery – Muir’s – where my oldest friends mother shopped. Muir’s. They are no longer in Verdun – but they moved to Maxwell, Ontario. When I am there, we go to Muir’s (run by the daughter of the man who owned Muir’s in Verdun) and we load up on Scots meat pies (made with ground lamb), Empire Biscuits (renamed after the War, previously called German Biscuits), Eccles Cakes, Fern Tarts, and Oat Cakes. Heaven!

How I remember one lovely Burn’s Night, when Martin recited, with great passion, the Address to the Haggis – and stabbed it with his dirk. What a feast!

One day, staying on Loch Awe, at a B&B, the proprietor asked me what I wanted for breakfast. I said “Haggis”! – ignorant of the custom. She said that it was “odd” for anyone to want it for breakfast – but had some and would produce it. I had it, with Blood Pudding (yum) and eggs. Wonderful.

Do I have a “spiritual” point to make? Yes. All Humanity has these customs, cultural and ethnic and religious. I can’t help but think that we would all benefit, in many many ways, from knowing and appreciating and respecting each others’ valued traditions – and the meaning behind them all. It is my conviction that they all speak to the same thing – to the myths/traditions that “explain” us.

In the end, they point to the same longing to express our origins and our self-esteem. When honoured, they deepen our appreciation of each other, and our shared anchoring in the Mystery of God and Being Human.

Brian+