Learning to sing at 70

My former partner was a musician with seemingly perfect pitch, his whole identity caught up in being a folksinger, which left a little room for me to sing. Though he didn’t actively discourage me from participating, he didn’t seem to want anyone to mess with his gig. 

So I became the dog's body. The roadie. I was the one who did all the background stuff from advertising, and social media, to CD design to booth and merchandise design. And I was the one who researched the music, designed the jacket, bought, burned and printed all his CD media as well. I made thousands of CDs over the course of 20 years. We sold them at Highland games for petty cash, they never fully paid for themselves. 

The problem is of course, was that folks were no longer buying CDs. They wanted to download everything—which changed our relationship to being able to make any money at all off of the music. CD Baby was a good idea whose time came and went. No one wanted to buy a business card with a code for a downloadable album.

Most Highland Games don’t pay unknown artists to perform. Neil found it was difficult to break into the game because established musicians were holding down their respective coveted stages, including Alex Beaton who was instrumental at establishing folksingers at the Highland games. But Neil was lucky in that he was hired to be an emcee at a few games. Especially for the Las Vegas Highland Games. But that fee barely covered the cost of travel across the state.

But we were valiant and determined. We began small, closer to home with the Pleasanton Games, and Arbor Day in Fremont. I enjoyed those days traveling up and down the coast to Ben Lomond, Seaside, Pomona, Costa Mesa, Preston, Arizona, and Enumclaw in Washington—even across the Mojave Desert to Las Vegas. I grew to love visiting the desert in spring. I liked being a booth wench and belonging to the Scottish culture circus of a larger roadie family we were all part of. 

Lúghnasa

The Mórríghan, my namesake, dressed as a crow was calling outside my window at dawn: it's Lúghnasa! Or maybe it was Lúgh's raven. I couldn't see it, I was trying to sleep. The bird didn't really caw, it was more like a bark: get up you lazybones. I pulled the pillows over my ears. It kept barking. (I was up all night listening to Dick Francis' Even Money. It takes longer to listen to a book than to read it. And I can never put a good book down.)

Only the male crow sings. It's a rather mournful little warble. This one was barking orders outside my window like a drill sargeant. It could have been a raven, but ravens in Oakland? They are deep-voiced. Croak, the raven, evermore? Let's just say corvids were involved.

OK, OK, I'm up. Got it. It's Lúghnasa. (No, not the band). I can't climb the highest peak, nor dance, nor even circle the proverbial well—not with this torn knee. Yesterday I cleaned house for the first time since I was injured in March, and am paying dearly for it. But somehow the body keeps time with tradition, despite the century one is living in. About the only thing up for dancing today, is my imagination.

Sometimes The Mórríghan, the Great Queen, is called the phantom queen, or the war goddess. Or "Morrigu" for short. She's an ancient triune goddess land/ soverighnty. As in mother of the gods. Some say the Welsh Morgan le Fey is a cognate of the Mórríghan (or Morrigan), others say no FN way—it's a case of bad linguistics.

That little fada (accent) on the first syllable, mór changes the meaning of the word from sea—mor, muir, mer—(or horse—but I really don't see how anyone can get "horse" out of it) to—great, or big—as in The Big Kahuna.

My Welsh friend Mábli named me The Mórríghan in grad school and it stuck. I miss Mábli, living far awa' in Stornowa'. I know, Maureen is supposed to mean little Mary—but I fancifully said that's a Christian overlay for a name already in Irish mythology. And so, The Mórríghan moniker stuck.

Maíriín is Maíri with a diminutive ending, -ín, or in English: Maura + -een. Like Colleen: cail + în. You're probably thinking Maureen sounds nothing like Mórríghan. Welcome to Irish 1A. That -gh in the middle of Mórríghan is silent, more of a swallowed y sound. Like a gulp. Call this an exercise in false etymology, or maybe a bad case of vivid poetic imagination.

About the only thing that warring camps of Indo-European linguists do agree on is that rí = king/queen, or soverignty. The rest is up for grabs.

Then there's the thought that Mor-ríghan is cognate with Morgan idea, with no fada, as in the sea. This is where it gets tricky. She-of-the-sea, my old boyfriend, climber-poet Edwin Drummond (aka The Human Fly) used to call me. Great big sea. (No, not the band). Fanciful wordplay drives linguists to drink, but if you're an IE linguist, where consonants count for little, and vowels count for nothing at all, any excuse to drink is probably good. Or if you're a poet. Besides, who wants to be called Biitter Herbs anyway? Just don't call me Battleaxe.

You're probably wondering what all this has to do with Lúghnasa, or August 1. I'm wending my way there. Never could think straight, so it's widdershins for me. My thoughts travel at the speed of Celtic knots. Or maybe I'm bird-brained from being wakened at dawn.

The crow is one of the Mórríghan's animal personae, a shape-shifter. Not only was she a triple goddess—there's fierce debate as to which three goddesses—she could turn into an eel and a wolf as well as a white, red-eared heifer (OK, so that's four critters—which goes against the Celtic trinity thing).

But in Irish literature, The Mórríghan was most famous as the scaldcrow, or raven on the shoulder of CúChullain's corpse—he died, strapped to a menhir on the battlefield in the Táin Bó Cúailnge while she ate his guts. She is the Irish goddess of war and fate. The washer at the ford, she ordains who will live or die on the battlefield.

Those two had a serious love-hate thing going on. Cú should never have spurned The Mórríghan  when she offered herself up. (She had this re-virgination land thing going on too). You know what they say about a woman scorned. Kick that up a few notches when she's an cougar sovereign goddess—and mother of the gods. Besides, Lúgh was Cú's father. So, I'm sure there was another interesting triangle going on as well. Welcoming them home with open thighs, and all that. Let's just say she's complicated.

Lúgh too had a thing about those corvids—oracle ravens. You know, the ravens at the Tower of London? No wonder the Romans had to bury statues of imperial Roman eagles there. To break up the juju. Some say London is Lugh's city, Lugdunum. Did the ancient Irish distinguish between ravens and crows? They're both Otherworld carrion birds. Some IE linguists claim that the Gaulish lugos (Lúgh is a cognate) means raven. Or maybe it means *lug as in oath, pledge, or in Proto-Indo European it could mean *leuk (light). Or maybe it's wordplay with ravens. —Check out Lugh - in Mary Jones dictionary.

The Hound of Ulster's man-handle was CúChullain, but his baby name was Sétanta (sé as in Sidhe?). There was something odd about his birth(s): unseasonable snow, birds, twinned colts (making it a triad birth), maybe some kidnapping or infantacide. Let's just say he-who-was-to-become-Sétanta, then CúChullain, died more than once, and Lúgh had to stick the kid's soul back into Deichtine's womb all over again. (Deichtine was sort of like the Welsh Arianrhod (silver wheel) and her magical sons: Dylan Ail Don and Lleu Llaw Gyffes. All these multiple virgin births. I'm sure their Facebook status is set to: It's extremely complicated. Monks trying to shoehorn Irish mythology into Biblical shoes.)

So when the Mórríghan was calling me nine times outside my window at dawn, in a place where crows don't normally visit—it got my attention. Made me realize it's a feastday. A crossroad of the year. I thought about baking some sodabread to celebrate the great wheel of the year. Not that I actually did anything, other than attempt to write this blogín.

The other ancient  Irish feast days are largely forgotten—but everybody knows of Hallowe'en, or Samhain. Then there's Imbolc (first milk) and Beltane (Bel's fires). And Lúgnasadh. Or Lúghnasa—its Christian frock is the harvest, or first-new-grain-loaf festival, aka Lammas Day. Technically, Lúghnasa began yesterday, as Irish days, like Hebrew days begin at dusk.

Today is the feastday of the god Lúgh Lámhfhada. And whenever you begin invoking the old Irish gods, they all want to come to the party. And young Lúgh, a bona fide member of the Tuatha Dé Danann, was the young rising god, a real party animal. 

Lúgnasa is the half-way mark between the summer solstice and autumn equinox. The word is a combination of Lúg (the god Lúgh) and -násad (which is an assembly, or gathering). His handle, Lámhfhada means long arm. God of all arts, he was really good with his, er… spear. (See also pan-Celtic god Lugus, and Welsh counterpart Lleu Llaw Gyffes, "The Bright One with the Strong Hand.")

Lúgh (modern: Lú) founded the Óenach Tailten (the ancient Irish Olympic Games—similar to the Greek Games) as a funeral feast for his (foster) mother Tailtiu, queen of the Fir Bolg. Royal fosterage was a big deal in ancient Irish mythology—it built alliances between clans and tribes. Foster children had mixed allegiances—to their foster families, and to their blood kin. 

Cian of the Tuatha Dé Danann was Lugh's father, and Ethniu, daughter of Balor, of the Fomorians, was his mother. (Or Lugh had three fathers, or was born three times, or was a lone surviving triplet—Balor drowned the others.) Got that? There's a test at the end, should you ever get to the bottom of it. I would imagine most of you are stark raving by now—with all those pimpley hyperlinks screaming: pick me, pick me!

So, we have three conjoined Irish races: Tuatha Dé Danann (TDD), and some Fomorians from under the sea (making Lúgh a half-god), with the Fir Bolgs as his foster parents. Add fosterage with Manannán mac Lír at Emhain Abhlach (Anglesey) too. we're not to sure what mythical race he was, TDD? Manannán arms Lúgh. So, Lúgh has three fathers, and/or is triplets, or was the product of a triple birth. Good old Indo-European threes. Surely that was significant. I said, it's complicated. Gawd, I need a drink.

Lúgh's poor foster mother Tailtiu, died of exhaustion after clearing the plains of Ireland for agriculture. Not too sure what all the menfolk were doing when all this was happening. Sitting on their keisters swilling heather beer in yon bonny glen? Apparently clearing the fields was women's work—even if she was the queen. What's with that? Master and commander?

So Lúgh of the Long Arm threw his foster mother Tailtiu the mother of all Irish wakes, or funeral feasts—if you must. The first Óenach Tailten, or Áenach Tailteann, was traditionally said to be held at modern Teltown, County Meath. Telltown is a corruption of Tailtu's name. It's also the seat of the early Uí Néills, so locating it there is a dynastic thing. Turf wars and all that. They later footed the bill for the See of St. Patrick at Armagh and took on some retroactive airs.

The Óenach Tailten Games were celebrated as late as the 18th century and included feasting, fighting and fecking. Or the ritual sacrifice of a white bull, heavy athletic competitions, handfasting, dancing, pilgrimages to the top of Croagh Patrick and to holy wells (Brigid, the beer goddess and the hearth is invoked), and the ritual cutting of the first harvest grain—with August 1 as the epicenter. 

Surely you didn't think these parties lasted only a day, did you? More like a month and a day. Takes about a week or two to ease into it. Like poets arriving fashionably late. Then, it was party like a rock star for another week or so, then nurse the hangover. Willow bark tea was as good as it got for aspirin.

See, when the Games were gussied up and Christianized, the sagarts had to make the festival fall on a Sunday to make things work out right. Eddie Stack mentioned in his blog that July 26 was Féile Lúghnasa. It's a movable feast—whatever it takes to make it to fall on the last Sunday in July.

One time it was held at around 200 sites, nearly always remote, inaccessible places that were on heights, or near water. The festival was dedicated to Lúgh, the young and most brilliant god of the Tuatha de Danann. Lúgh was the god of light, god of arts and crafts, father of inventions and the likes. It was he who saved the harvest by vanquishing Bal, the sun god who was in the process of scorching all the country’s plants and crops with relentless heat.  —Eddie Stack 2010

Lúghnasa is ancestor of Aonach an Phoic Puck Fair, Domnach na bhFraochóg, or Bilberry Sunday. (AKA frachóg, whorts, or heatherberries. In our family, August is also the opening day of huckleberry season. My grannie would take us up the ridge at Tomales Bay to check on the bushes. Just to make sure.)

The Áenach Tailteann is also the ancestor Games of Scottish Highland Games—as they too were traditionally held in August. 

Lúghnasa was once called Dé Domhnach Chrom Dubh, or Crom Dubh Sunday—he was a bent/crooked dark fertility god, said to reside in a cave at the crest of Croagh Patrick. But Christianity banished him as an evil one.  Another permutation of Lúghnasa is Domhnach na Cruaiche—Reek Sunday, or Garland Sunday, is the day 30,000 Irish lemmings crawl up Croagh Patrick on bended knee. Or blindfolded, or both, while praying all the way up with myriad jaysusmaryanjosephs. Not me, my knees will never kneel again. Though I do prefer to walk barefoot.

Pilgrims climbing Croagh Patrick on "Reek Sunday," part of the festival of Lúgh since ancient times. —Wiki

Lúgh Lámhfhada was also the patron god of cobblers. Thought I'd throw that one in for free. The thought of shoes at a time like this tickles me. I can't bend down to put on my shoes. Besides, the closest I got to a holy well today was the shower. I was circling the drain. Does dyeing your hair count as pilgrimage?

So you had a few goats, some old and new, toss in a bit of the living and the dead, and the dead coming back to life again—what more could you ask for? An "A" party list.

Lá Fhéile Lúghnasa Sona Daoibh!

SF Caledonian Club Highland Games: silk painting

My silk painting booth in the barn opposite the Living History section at the 2008 Caledonian Club Highland Games in Pleasanton, CA. Games visitor Scott Peden from the Irish in California group, is the one with the beard...Scott swears he's smiling under all that foliage but it was at least 100° on Saturday.

Costa Mesa Highland Games

Maureen Hurley and Nina Walsh, Costa Mesa Highland Games

Mending the Kilt

Neil's antique 1920s kilt is literally falling apart. Before every Highland Games festival, my job is to inspect it and give it a quick stitch or two. Mending the kilt is an ongoing battle. Why not get a new one? They cost more than a plane ticket to Scotland. There are varying weights and styles of kilts, and that also affects cost.

But the most traditional of kilts is the military kilt, thanks to Queen Victoria who had a prudish fondness for men's well-turned calves. The kilt was more of a mini skirt before it was lengthened to a respectable knee length during the Victorian era. Much of Queen Victoria's influence still governs the style and length of kilts to this day.

The heavier military weight kilt material runs about $60 a yard and at least nine long uninterrupted yards are needed to make a kilt, hence the saying, "the whole nine yards" to cover a man.

A kilt is a lifetime investment. One doesn't simply put a hem or take a kilt in, it's all fitted exactly, so the kilt is literally made to the man. No hems in a kilt, just a straight selvage edge to the knee. Rumor has it that men were expected to kneel before the Queen, and the selvage edge of the kilt had to touch the floor.

Neil found his Farquharson kilt, in Inverness in 1981, for 35 quid on a wee back street tartan shop off the main drag.

Last winter we looked at used kilts for 75 quid at the jumble sales in the mean streets of the Barras (Barrowland—named after the street merchants' wheelbarrows during the 1890s) and in the Gorbals past the Gallowgate in Glasgow's rough southside, once Europe's worst slum. Some say Paddy's Market under the viaducts near the River Clyde is the oldest flea market in Europe.

Some say, the locals would just as soon slit your throat as to give you the time of day. The name alone (Paddy) should give you a clue as to who al lived in the Gorbals. But not one of those kilts would fit him for love or money.

In the Highlands, the whole family traditionally chips in on a chap's 21st birthday to buy him a kilt, and each year, he got another piece of the outfit. By the time he reached the ages of 27 to 30 he was supposed to be kitted out in full Highland dress.

Neil's family is Irish-Scots, so no Scottish tartan is associated with O'Neill. MacNeill, yes. So Neil had to kit himself out in highland dress.

Neil chose the Farquharson tartan because the kilt reminded him of his scout uniform colors. A favorite tartan of Scottish boy scout troops, Farquharson is a Jacobite sept of Clan MacKintosh and Clan Chattan that fought at Culloden Mor, also associated with the Gordons. The Gae Gordons were also our hosts at the Las Vegas Highland Games.

Everything about the kilt is imbued with mystery and meaning. The Farquharson moto is is Fide et Fortitudine (fidelity and fortitude).

The kilt, held up by two buckles and a lot of faith, is a mathematical challenge in plaid. The pleating is either done “to the sett”, repeating the tartan pattern, or regimental, “to the line or stripe." Neil's kilt is sewn to the stripe. All stripes need to match up exactly on the grain. There are 23 to 45 pleats on a kilt, depending on the sett.

Neil's kilt has 48 or 50 "hand deep" 4" pleats, depending on how you count the deeper first pleats on the front and the under apron pleats. It takes six pleats on Neil's kilt to repeat the tartan pattern which is a black watch military pattern with yellow and red stripes—for the colors of the royal rampant lion flag of Scotland?

There are two types of pleats: knife pleats and the more complex box pleats. Luckily Neil's kilt has the simple knife pleat. What you see of the tartan is like the edges of a deck of cards fanned out on the casino table by an expert blackjack dealer.

In other words, most of the kilt is hidden in the folds of the pleats. When the thread begins to rot on a kilt, you don't send it out to the draper or dressmaker, it has to be remade by a specialized kiltmaker, and the repair cost can run more than buying a new kilt at £5-600.

No matter how you cut it, miles and miles of thread and a lot of hand stitching goes into making a kilt. A simple overcast seamless stitch won't do, it has to be the invisible stitch, double-knotted every few stitches so it won't unravel under the pendulous weight of the pleats.

Now I know it's some sort of a hellacious Calvinist sin to use a sewing machine on a kilt but it's stronger than my hand stitching. You're not supposed to pierce the yarn, but sew between the yarns. And the buckle leather does need a sewing machine's special touch.

The old 1929 Singer of mine had the gumption to sew through most of the triple thickness of the tartan. But the motor strained and moaned like a constipated caber tosser.

No matter how hard I held onto the pinned kilt, the material shifted when the pressure foot gripped the wool, throwing off the stripe so it was no longer on the grain, so I still had to massage it back into place by hand. So much for modern shortcuts.

Not much holds the kilt up to begin with, so every stitch counts. Safety pins help too. We were running late for our plane when Neil announced his kilt was falling apart.

Enroute to the airport, he hastily pulled on a pair of shorts, and stripped off the kilt, while I hurriedly massaged his kilt together with a few crucial stitches and some well-placed safety pins. At the airport, he rolled it up and stuffed it into his suitcase and we were on our way to the Las Vegas Games.

My quick handiwork held up and got us through a hectic weekend of Highland Games without a single mishap.

But not through airport security on the way home. Again, we were running late. To save time, he decided not to change and to wear the kilt to the airport. We left directly from a performance and there was little time to spare before our flight took off for Oakland.

Needless to say, when we went through security, bells and whistles and alarms went off everywhere.

Neil stepped into the plexiglas booth and took off every bit of metal he could find. he took off his sporran, the kilt brooch from the apron and every safety pin he could find. Even his sock flashers. Still, the kilt triggered the electronic sensors.

It was a real showstopper. Passengers stood transfixed, waiting to see what would happen next. It began to look like the kilt would have to stay in Vegas.

By this point, Neil was so frustrated that he began to unbuckle the kilt to hand the damned thing over to the guard. The guard stopped him, saying, "Sir, please do not remove it. Do NOT remove it." Neil had on plaid knickers but the TSA airport security guard didn't even want to go there. He even threatened arrest if Neil did disrobe.

The guard frowned and waved his wand. He frowned some more. Adjusted the setting. Waved and frowned for what seemed an eternity. More TSA guards joined him, observing his technique. The final boarding call had just been announced and there wasn't another plane til the next day.

Now, Neil has tiny metal plates in his face from an old car accident. So the wand beeped crazily around his head too. The TSA guard shook his head in double consternation but eventually he let Neil go. Good think Neil didn't have on his skian dubh.

Neil had to run the entire length of the Las Vegas airport concourse with all nine yards of his kilt flapping dangerously behind like a laden scald crow on a battlefield.

I was yelling, "Run, Forrest, run!"

Passengers sniggered and parted as he chugged down the ramps. He got an ovation when he boarded the plane, all wild-eyed and out of breath. He was the only man in a kilt on that flight. Everyone else was already dressed down in their skivvies. The flight attendants loved it and gave him a drink.

Airport security was not amused by a Scotsman in national dress nor did they want to find out what is worn under the kilt. And that's another whole story.

POST MORTEM:

I found out later that another kilted Highland warrior clansman, dressed in traditional garb also attempted to fly home on an earlier flight. Understand that a traditional kilt is not the same as the rather prudish Victorian kilt we all know and love. The traditional kilt is comprised of a looooong bolt of cloth, and a belt. Nothing more.

You lay your yardage on the ground and pleat it. Then you roll yourself up into it, and cinch it around your waist with a belt, the excess end piece creates a mantle, a shirt and a pouch. And then you hope and pray that everything stays in place.

At various Highland games I've watched full grown men thrashing about on the ground like strange flailing narwhals—getting dressed is tricky at the best of times, and apparently even more so when you're hung over.

Watching the guys from Albannach get dressed the next morning after the night before—was hysterical. I also got a glimpse at a whole lot more than what I bargained for so early on a Sunday morning. Talk about flashing.

OK, back to Las Vegas Airport: the TSA agent insisted that the Living History re-enactor—who also happens to be a genuine Scottish Laird, to remove his belt. That's what the manual says to do. Right? The laird tried to explain what would happen if he did so, but the guard would have none of it.

So the laird removed the belt. As the kilt fell to the ground, he rotated in the glass booth with arms spread wide—to show the entire airport what was worn under the kilt. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

No wonder the TSA guard wouldn't let Neil remove his kilt. He'd already been flashed.

Badgering the Dog

134th annual Scottish Highland Games approacheth

As Indian Summer approaches, we'll be roaming in the gloaming in kilts and gossamer gowns at the Caledonian Club's 134th annual Scottish Highland Games in Pleasanton this Labor Day Weekend—should anyone care to join us for any or all festivities.

There will be a royal pre-Game Pub Nights on Thurs., the 2nd (and most likely on Fri., the 3rd as well, I imagine); responsible revelers are staying over & slaying pints at the Pleasanton Holiday Inn. (Less crawling involved.) Main Street Brewery, opposite Pleasanton Hotel, north side of Main St. Around 7, Isla St. Clair, Piedmont Highlanders Pipe Band, dancers, fiddlers NON. Or just follow your ears and dust off your favorite mondegreens. (Forgo the Atkins Diet for the Monty Python greens and uisca diet).

Rumor has it Neil O'Neill, Himself, the Man so Nice They Named Him Twice, will sing a few national anthems to help open the Games on Saturday morning. We need YOU, a rousing, randy chorus for the unofficial Scottish National anthem. The words are pretty simple: you just pull your lips apart and yell "Who?" during the appropriate chorus. "....and stood against him.. WHO? Proud Edward's army..." (Longshanks, that is...) Qua? you might ask? Wallace fought against him. (see pix bellow)

So dust off your candent royal Stewart togas, paint your faces woad blue, warm the cockles of your, erm, your pipes, shoot your television, quaf a few brews or uisge beatha and see some real live action at the Games.

Beware, however, if someone asks you to stand in for the polish caber catcher. To go hunting for the wee lost haggis, you'll need a flashlight, extra batteries.

Oh and by the way, for you newbies, don't let your sporran dangle its participles. The sgian dubh is to be kept at all times in your knee socks. It's not a good idea to goosestep in a kilt either, for, as you know, nothing is worn under them (other than blue ribbons). Everything is in perfectly good working order. Or, it's a Loch Ness monster and it's waiting for you (or ewe, depending upon the Scot's particular, peculiar proclivities). However, though patent leather shoes for the lassies is perfectly acceptable, mirrors are definitely out.