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Sunday, March 21, 2010

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Saturday, February 06, 2010

FORTHCOMING EVENTS

March 26th- Ardler, Dundee 50+group. Talk on the culture

March 28th- Canine Partners Lunch-charity event of stories, songs and laughter. This is a fantastic charity which works magic pairing disabled people with trained dogs enhancing their lives no end.

March 31st- Cumbernauld WRI

April 14th- another visit to 'Headway' with lovely Marette

April 17th- 7.00pm-Storytelling Centre in Old High St, Edinburgh.' Yellow on the Broom.' Tribute to Betsy Whyte'. My way of saying 'thanks Betsy for opening the world of writing to the Travellers so that they can their own story.'

April 28th -Lady's Probus, Kirkcaldy.

May 6th-9th- Ullapool Book Festival; looks like a great weekend.


BOBBIN MILL

throughout my books I mention 'the Bobbin Mill' at Pitlochry, Perthshire. It was my maternal Granny's wee house and the place where we'd both sit at the fire and she'd tell me tales both fact and fiction of the old Tinker ways. Indeed chunks of my ancestral history were fluently relayed as I laid my head upon her knees and she puffed upon an old clap pipe. I loved Granny's wee house and every summer couldn't wait to escape to Pitlochry, meet up with many cousins to laugh and giggle watching and drooling as she spread home made raspberry jam on her specially baked scones. Trees of all shapes and sizes were fantastic playgrounds and many's the grazed knee I'd had shinning up some birch or beech only to drop hard upon the ground. In the sixties Granny left her haven to move closer to her family who were mainly scattered around Fife; including us.
I never went back, preferred to remember it with Granny intact and her religious paraphernalia adorning walls and above bed and fireplace.

Recently some Travellers who reside in the area invited me to visit. Why? Because the old place was being demolished and they thought I may want one last look before it vanished. It was kind to be invited but I must admit as Dave and I drove up the A9 there were a few apprehensions.I had mixed emotions, no doubt there would be a great deal of dilapidation and I still preferred to keep my memories. From a distance not much had changed but approaching the wee house it was apparent that it was only a shell and was long past its best.
As I stepped inside and saw the damage of broken glass, ripped wall paper, the shredded remains of narrow curtains, a flood of sadness seemed to pour through me, I was choking on the lump growing in my throat. I think it was the little fireplace with the the faded Virgin Mary photo hanging on a rusty nail above. There were dark shadows in every corner, gaping holes in the ceiling and broken floor boards.
Dave asked if I'd like a few photos, I didn't think he'd remembered the camera but thanks to modern technology his phone had one. I went outside for a moment to gather my memories and through a chink in the clouds a slither of sunshine shone down upon the river Tummel. I could hear in the distance some blackbirds singing sweetly and clearly remembered Granny's warning, 'dinna gan too near the river noo bairn. It rained the hale nicht lang and there'll be a roar a watter ploughin' down, them wee tweetaks aye sing louder tae warn the bairns.' Granny called all birds tweetaks. I never always obeyed and many's a time I crawled back soaked to the skin and her saying, I should have listened to the birds.
When did she take possession of her home in the woods which was one of a block of four?
This newspaper cutting from DC Thomson's Dundee Courier. 1947 provided the answer..
'PERTHSHIRE HOMES FOR TINKERS' Monday was red letter day for members of the tinker fraternity at Pitlochry, when four families were each presented with the key of a two apartment house provided by Perth County Council. standing in a wood near the former Bobbin Mill, the houses are in one block built from a converted army hut, with brick partitions. Each has a living room, bedroom, scullery with cold water tap, and inside lavatory. They are said to be the first new buildings to be erected for tinkers in Scotland by any authority.
Rev. W. Alexander Ross, county council member for Pitlochry presided at the inauguration ceremony. The condition of let having been read over, each tenant signed the missive and was handed the key. Rents were fixed at £1/12s/6p per month.
The Rev. W.A. Ross congratulated the new tenants on their good fortune in having incurred a substantial dwelling house. After a lifetime of homeless wandering and living in tents they had every reason to believe that they had not been neglected or forgotten, but God had been remembering them. After the ceremony a Tinker's blessings was invoked upon the council gents taking part.

Truth be told Granny had no problem with her old ways; she'd come from generations of wandering folk who didn't suffer harassment but there came a time when laws were forced upon them, making their lifestyle almost impossible to continue. The bridle paths, riversides and old roads which once held happy childhood memories soon became dangerous places where police and cruelty men patrolled at random. Whole families saw their tent homes torched, bairns forcibly taken from parents and old folks imprisoned in poorhouses.
Only safe to be was in a house,under a roof. Of course it also meant the end of 'freedom' but that was a price that twentieth century wanderers had to pay to survive.

But for me being born in 1948 I always connect Granny with the Bobbin Mill where Lily o' the valley shared a carpet of moss with dandelions and wild daisies. It was my Disney world, the home of Green Sloory and Humpitt Roy, my playmates of the forest.
Whatever the past dire treatment of my people were, on that quiet winter's afternoon, although tinged with a deep sadness, I felt privileged to be a witness to the last day of 'Granny's wee hoose' in the wood at Pitlochry.
The dampness made me shiver and I could swear a thin arm looped into mine and a gentle voice whispered, 'mind the tweekaks noo bairn.'

Love you Granny.


Saturday, November 07, 2009

YOUTUBE

Hi everyone!

I'm now on youtube!
If you fancy a peep then check- l0chturret spelt with a zero
jess smith singing yellow on the broom
jess smith telling Jeannie's gold
jess smith telling the frozen boots
Hope there's something there for lovers of traditions


Tuesday, October 27, 2009

NO LIFE FOR RILEY

Sixth book; 'No life for Riley' is completed and ready for publication.
Its a giant leap out of my comfort zone which has been sharing tales and joys of my life on the road in bus home of many summers. Experts warn me that to present this book will cost me many faithful readers who have sent previous books into best selling list is literary suicide.
Bearing this in mind I have sent out feelers among many of my fans who, on the contrary are very interested in the culture of the tinker/traveller/gypsy.

So why the title 'No life for Riley'?
Well during my father Charles Riley's lifetime he had witnessed many horrific incidents as a Tinker lad traversing across Scotland's old bridle paths with his family. Reaching the end of his days he decided to write an autobiography. Hamish Henderson a grand folklorist who was actively searching for Tinker/Traveller stories and songs during the fifties and sixties was contacted. When Riley's manuscript was finalised he sent it to Mr Henderson. An answer came back stating, 'I look forward to reading 'The white Nigger.'
There the story reaches a cold end- family intervention halted any progress of his book. Riley died a miserable unhappy man. I promised that one day I would find those horror facts and write the book for him but changed title due to PC of modern day acceptability.
Book begins with ancient highland Caird's and Sinclair's. Many factual indicators pointing from fourth century craftsmen who moved from place to place and were never really written of until 1600s when victimising them as witches and wizards and being connected to the demonic black Art's of a changing religious upheaval, sealed their fates. From then on homes became moorland mounds and caves,moving within moonlit shadows. Going through to the Tinker and present day Traveller/Gypsy has been a fascinating journey of enlightenment. On the darker side its been quite harrowing discovering details of their survival through the highland clearances, Irish famine, dyke levellers (Johnnie's on the road again') of border counties and a planned eradication of their wandering lifestyle. Worst part was reading of segregated school experiments relating to Tinker children and orchestrated propaganda. Gypsy slavery documents with orders for white buxom wenches to be sent to the Carribean to be bred with black slaves to lighten skin colour.
Hidden in government archival reports were social eye openers and a depth of destruction seldom seen in Britain towards her own people. Sadly there are related articles to my own family lineage. Its a serious look at the complete culture and may I add long overdue. Academics throughout history have written lengthy chapters on the Tinker/Gypsy of the past but seldom did they allow thier subjects a voice. This was something Riley spoke of many times.

What I hope to come from this book is a closer understanding, especially for future generations with a need to know of all Britain's peoples and not just a selective few. 'One Nation, many cultures', should to be realised. For only as a complete family are we trully national.
William Wallace was a great man but who saddled his horse? For where would the hero have been if his horse had not been expertly prepared? It is to the little man I have concentrated my studies on.
I have a wonderful array of photographs to fill the book; some never been published before. I owe a great deal to people who sent me photos, stories and snippets to share with those of you interested in genealogy; perhaps a thread to take you on a journey and lead to that illusive relative, is waiting in Riley's book.

Will keep you informed of publishing date..............
Meanwhile here's the SCOTIA BAIRN', poem; back through public demand---

'yes it may be said you are better than I
your peers have obvioulsy bless you with a fine home, fine clothes, best schooling, good food etc.
I, on the other hand, saw life from the mouth of a Tinker's tent.
But I have felt the breath wind of John o'Groats.
I have seen the hills of Glen Coe clothed in purple heather, heard her mountain tops whisper a thousand curses on the murderers of Macdonald's bairns.
The ghosts of Culloden brushed against my cheek as I sat on a rock seat, watching heaven's lightning streak across the land to the sea beyond.
Can you say you've tasted the first ripened strawberries of Blairgowrie?
Sucked on rasps until their red juices filled your taste buds with flavour fit for the Gods?
Is there a time in your life you've washed in the early morning dew, in a field flowering with cowslip, pink clover, and wild daisies?
Did you ever swim below the belly of a giant basking shark?
Have you sung to a curious seal?
Have you heard the weasel's whistle pierce the eardrums of a hypnotised rabbit?
Seen the fear in the eye in the Monarch o' the glen as the stalker's finger pulls back upon his gun?
Did your protective parents tell you tales of the feared Fian Warriors of Glen Lyon?
Do you know how old the yew tree of Fortingall is?
Have you ever listened to a deaf child sing a beautiful Scottish ballad, music and words unwritten?
Have you tasted the morning milk from the cow before she suckled her calf, or tasted the freezing waters of a burn at its source?
Have you ever watched the dolphins follow the Lord of the Isles as she sails magestically from Oban to Mull?
Saw a fight to the death by two Traveller warlords ruled by their forefathers, adhering to the rules of their clan?
Have you seen the Banshee washing shrouds at the river's edge in the thick ghostly mist of a lonely glen?
Have you held the hand of an old woman as she breathes her last breath and stretches her body for the final time?
I am a child of the mist, what are you?
I am 'ethnic' you are accepted. I tell a tale of your ancestors, you are taught not to!
would you converse with a road tramp?
Does a Tinker's encampment fill you with excitement or do you draw back in disgust?
Do you give thanks for each breath God gives, or do you take life for granted?
We are different you and I: I am the wind in your hair, you are the voice of mistrust.
I am the blue of the Atlantic as she thrusts her watery fingers into Scotland's west coast.
You are the gate that stops me from entering the forest.
I am the grouse in the purpled heather, you the hunter who denies me my flight.
I am the salmon as she leaps to her favourite spawning stream, you the rod who would end my epic journey.
I am the seed of all who went before me. I am from the brave ones who hid, not burned the tartan. I am from those who spoke the Gaelic in secret places. I am part of the true earth, the sea the sky; I am the 'SCOTIA BAIRN'.
taken from 'Jessie's Journey' and also recorded in 'the Matted Cat' cd.


 

 

 






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