Category Archives: Uncategorized

It’s almost here — New York Tartan Week — held annually in New York City. This year the parade is on April 8, brought to you by the St. Andrew’s Society of the State of New York, the New York Caledonian Club, The American-Scottish Foundation and Clan Campbell.

A complete week of events is in store from March 31-April 9, with theater and clan gatherings and more.

This July in the Pacific Northwest, I’m looking forward to another Scottish Highland Games and Clan Gathering in Enumclaw. Dates to be announced soon.

Meanwhile, I’m having a marvelous time indulging myself, every so often, in episodes of the BBC series “Monarch of the Glen.” What a terrific cast of actors in an absolutely gorgeous setting. I’m hooked.

Chambers Bay Golf Course

We’re back home in Seattle, where the U.S. Open golf tournament is about to begin.

What a trip, beginning with chill and blustery Scotland, continuing in warmer, drizzling Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and concluding in Freinsheim Germany with a heat wave.

Reformed Evangelical Protestant Church tower in the center of Freinsheim

And with plenty of toasts at the Freinsheimer Altstadtfest. To close, below are just a few photos and memories.

Cheers!

The Altstadtfest runs for three days. We only lasted one (because our flight left early on day 2, naturally).

Croft on the Culloden battlefield

Bicycles in Amsterdam, at the Centraal train station

European magpie

Piet de Leeuw on Noorderstraat in Amsterdam, a restaurant that serves horse. (No, we didn’t try any.)

This morning Matthias and I bicycled, at my request, to an asparagus field. Perhaps a strange tourist stop, but I couldn’t picture how asparagus is grown underground here (on purpose, to keep it white instead of green). When we arrived, we stood for awhile watching the morning harvesters. Asparagus (Spargel) is picked twice a day, in the morning and the evening. If you want to go deeper, read all about “Spargelmania” here.

As we stood gazing at the field, Matthias turned to me with a quizzical expression. “What do you call those pieces of timber that hold up the roof of your house?” he asked, gesturing over his head.

“You mean, like beams?”

“Right, we call the rows here “Spargel Balken,” asparagus beams because they look like the beams in a ceiling,” he said, gesturing out at the long square rows.

The harvesters dig into the soil rows, jab out the asparagus spears, then build back up the soil so the plant will continue to sprout spears. Once the season has ended, in late June, the soil “beams” are flattened out, the asparagus allowed to go to seed.

On the way back to the house, Matthias and I passed through a parking lot full of German RVs, known as “Wohnmobiles”.  Owning a Wohnmobile appears to be a trend in Germany. The RVs come in all shapes and sizes, just like in the U.S., but their purpose is a bit different. Throughout the year, so many festivals are held in small villages throughout Germany. It’s difficult to get there and back in a day, especially if you want to enjoy the local vintages late into the evening. The solution? A Wohnmobile, of course.

Another landmark on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh is St. Giles Cathedral, considered the “mother church” of Presbyterianism. The crown spire is in the shape of the royal crown. It seems this cathedral is the only building of three churches in downtown Edinburgh that still is used as a church, which struck me as significant, given the histories I’ve been reading about the intensely zealous 17th and 18th century Scots Presbyterians. Note Dave’s orange jacket, a beacon to help me find him in a crowd, and a hint to where his heart truly lies, in his Holland homeland.

Where we have now arrived, in that fair city of Amsterdam in the Netherlands. Fair indeed, but it’s been raining ever since we arrived, as evidenced by this cloudy scene at the Maritime Museum (Scheepvaartmuseum).

In the evening at a local pub/restauraunt, Dave spoke French to the waiter, prompting him to raise one eyebrow and ask where we’re from.

“The United States,” I said, laughing. “But Dave here is of Dutch descent. Not that he can speak it.”

The waiter shrugged. “That’s the way it is today. My wife is of Polish and Italian descent, but she can’t speak a word of either language.” He turned to Dave. “So you are of Dutch descent?”

“Yes, my great-grandfather came to America, he was a religious man.”

“Ah, then he must not have been from Amsterdam, probably from a village in the countryside. It is still like that today.”

Greetings from Holland.

I remember first wondering about “the close” when listening to an audio CD of Anthony Trollope‘s The Warden, which kept mentioning the term. I couldn’t picture a close. In context, it seemed to mean something near a house, like an entry. Or maybe a small backyard? I looked it up, but “narrow alleys” didn’t conjure a proper image. City blocks in the U.S. are taken up by buildings, with foreboding alleys full of rubbish bins between them, mainly for cars and delivery trucks.

At last, wandering the Royal Mile on Edinburgh, I enjoyed my first glimpse of a close. Lots of closes, actually. They’re pedestrian alleys that squeeze through between storefronts leading to inner courtyards. Here is the entrance to Paisley Close (right by a Whisky store, naturally).

And here is the inner courtyard of Riddell’s Close, where David Hume once lived. Daniel Defoe wrote in 1726, “… that in no City in the World do so many People live in so little Room as in Edinburgh.” The closes, and streets too, were crowded and disgusting, since people had a habit of dumping their chamber pots out the windows, shouting “Gardy Loo!” (from the French, Gardez l’eau!–watch out for the water). In 1754, Edward Burt wrote “I was forced to hide my Head between the Sheets, for the Smell of Filth thrown out by the Neighbours came pouring into the room to such a Degree, I was almost poisoned by the Stench.”

Well. To freshen the air, just for fun, I’ll close with a photo of some Highland cows–they sure are cute.

I’m headed to Ohio, where I’ll be giving a variety of talks about the “story behind the story” of writing my historical novel The Last of the Blacksmiths and the little-told story of German immigrants to Ohio and Cleveland in the 1800s.

My first event is April 10 at Baldwin Wallace University in Berea for their German American Kulturabend.

Next up, Historic Zoar Village Saturday afternoon, April 11. Then Saturday evening I’ll be back in Cleveland Heights for an author reading/signing at Mac’s Backs– Books on Coventry with author Susan Petrone.

All the details about the events to come are on this web page here.

During my weeks of travel between now and the Ohioana Book Festival April 25, be sure to check back often — I’ll be sharing discoveries, genealogy tidbits, adventures and more on a daily basis.

Confessional moment: Yes! I’m working on my next novel. This one is about Scottish immigrants in the 18th century. And just like the initial phase of my research for The Last of the Blacksmiths (German immigrants in the 19th century), I’ve started by reading some classics of the day. (See one of my earliest blogposts here, Call me a schlemiel)

This time, instead of Moby-Dick, I’m devouring Kidnapped! by Robert Louis Stevenson. Until I downloaded this classic to my digital bookshelf, my knowledge of this author extended as far as the recurring crossword puzzle clue: Author of Treasure Island. Answer: RLS

To my amazement, the historical novel Kidnapped! covers the same era, and territory, I’m researching–the Scottish Highlands just after the Battle of Culloden. From the writing, I’ve picked up quite a few insights into the clothing, the foods, differences in social status, in languages and dialects, in political allegiances (woefully enmeshed with religious beliefs) and local customs. But sheesh, what to do with it all? Especially since, sadly, hardly any women show up in this book.

There are other classics I’m looking forward to reading. Poetry by Robert Burns, and the picaresque novels of Tobias Smollett. Granted, it’s a broad-stroke way to hone in on a particular story. A lot more work than hunkering down to a preconceived notion of what the book wants to be. Deductive reasoning, messy but often delightful and surprising. When I get impatient, that’s what I tell myself anyhow.