Foreword for my Scottish Memoirs

from freedigitalphotos.net

From time to time I will post some of my memoirs - this is the Foreword

FOREWORD

            Let me prepare you for what is to come, dear reader.  This book has no pretensions as a serious history tome.  Instead it is a conversation. Or, perhaps, better say a series of conversations: memories written on a vine leaf that provide a glimpse of life for a young lass growing up in 1950s and ‘60s Scotland. 

If you haven’t met the term before, a vignette is a short descriptive sketch that depicts a single event, an observation, a setting or such. The origin of the word comes from “something that can be written on a vine leaf.” It is a free style of writing, some call it stream of consciousness writing, with each vignette standing on its own. For my purpose here, each is a wee slice of life from my memories of growing up in a small Scottish town called Kirriemuir.  I have changed the names used to protect the innocent, but each vignette is a truth as I saw it.  And if I ramble some, well that is okay, it is MY story.

Was it Churchill who said, “history is another country”?  They had the right of it. I sit here with my laptop on my knee and access to the world a click away, far removed from that 1950s girl. 

So, dear reader, pull up a stool, put your feet up, pour yourself a nice cup of tea and … enjoy! And if you need help with the odd Scots word, there is a glossary at the back.

Old Forfarshire from wiki commons

Kirriemuir lies in the heart of Angus, called Forfarshire in old times. It nests snugly under the Angus Glens and overlooks the fertile Valley of Strathmore. 

How to find Angus on a map of Scotland thanks to wiki commons