Not sure where this belongs so ...well....here it is.....

Gentlemen & Ladies,

This may sound a little strange but here it goes:

I’ve been trying to delve into my family history for some time now and I’ve actually been making a bit of progress with it. Some sources good, some rather questionable but I’m now at the point that I seem to be able to tell the difference.

That's not what I’m writing about.

In the quest for history I’ve been reading a LOT of Scottish, English and European history books. Plodding my way through tomes that I never new existed have awakened a new interest that I really never knew I had - the history of Great Britain, Europe and Royalty. I can’t seem to get enough. Now while it is very interesting to me which Duke of Serbia was assassinated to start the Great War and which dowager Tsarina had to move from Russia to live in relative poverty in England after the Russian Revolution the thing that has riveted me is the history of Scotland. Not England, not Great Britain, not Ireland (of which I have ancestors from all) but Scotland.

(Daz, I think I finally have enough info together to send you so you can (as you so kindly offered) ask your friends in Lancashire about a Scots family come to greatness so far south of the border.)

In all this reading I’ve been doing (and prowling used book shops as well as spending a fortune at Barnes & Noble) I’ve found one common denominator. That’s what I’m writing about.

This is a feeling I’ve never had before and only read about. The feeling when reading history books and looking at pictures of the old country and all of a sudden you feel the fire in your veins. That this is YOU and where you come from. Not just a connectedness but real FIRE in the veins and a longing for the country.

I can trace my family back to the 11th. century when the Normans showed up in Great Britain. Piecing the interim together is the challenge.

Does anyone else know what I’m talking about? Not the need exactly to know where you come from but the deep down gut feeling when seeing pictures and reading history and just knowing that this is RIGHT? I do not believe in reincarnation but I DO believe in racial or genetic memory. Perhaps that is what I’m experiencing. I’ve never been to Great Britain but it just feels like home. We’ll be going there next June (2007) and I cannot wait to sink my senses into it.

Ok, just my ranting but this is new and interesting in my life so I thought I’d ask the questions. Kilts fall right in there too. It just feels right.