The There There Letter: Qualtagh, Quaff-tide, and Quince
Three things from DAH.
DAH is me, David Anthony Hance. I pen, promote, and make change (not the coin kind).
First up this week, Qualtagh …
The last native speaker of Manx Gaelic died in 1974. Manx survives as a heritage language on the Isle of Man, in the Irish Sea between England and Ireland. Apparently, the first person seen when you left home in the morning was a big deal on the Isle of Man. They had a word for that person: qualtagh, the first-foot … also the first person to come through your door on New Year's Day. My daily qualtagh is one of my neighbors across the street. Good for a wave, at least, if not for any especially good luck. As for New Year's Day threshold crossing, I can only hope that someone lovely does cross our threshold on 1 January 2021. It's been lonely times for our little family, so used to entertaining at home.
Manx Gaelic recording - Ned Maddrell (Last native Manx Speaker)
Second up this week, Quafftide …
Sometime towards 5:00 PM each day my quafftide (definition in the link below) arrives. It's usually when we sit down to read aloud to one another. A glass of wine at the end of the day, when we settle together with the three dogs (naturally awaiting their supper). Perhaps a little snack; perhaps a nibble of Manchego with a bit of membrillo (for us, not the dogs). Lovely. Just us, at home, until perhaps a New Year's qualtagh presages the return of visitors. In which case we'll need to do a quick scurryfunge to make things nice for potential firkytoodling to celebrate better days.
It's quafftide! Let's firkytoodle under the clinkabells
Third up this week, Quince …
Part of me (a quite tiny part of me) wishes we had a quince tree in our garden. It's this time of year when the quince ripens yellow, as we enter the holiday season. But growing quince seems somehow un-Californian, although I'm certain there are home garden quince trees here. It's just that citrus seems so much more sunny, and certainly simpler to enjoy. Quince is a confusing fruit, at once so appealing in its appley-pear appearance and so challenging in its dare-you-to-peel-and-prepare-me reality. Like some people in that way -- well, not literally that way. It's a metaphor.
It can't be eaten raw and it's the devil to peel
And a bit more … the character Peter Quince speaking a prologue to The most lamentable comedy, and
most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisby, performed in Act V of William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. The punctuation and line breaks are important since this was intended to be spoken aloud.
If we offend, it is with our good will.
That you should think, we come not to offend,
But with good will. To show our simple skill,
That is the true beginning of our end.
Consider then we come but in despite.
We do not come as minding to contest you,
Our true intent is. All for your delight
We are not here. That you should here repent you,
The actors are at hand and by their show
You shall know all that you are like to know.
That's all for this week.
From Mary Oliver's poem "Sometimes" …
DAH is me, David Anthony Hance. I pen, promote, and make change (not the coin kind).
First up this week, Qualtagh …
The last native speaker of Manx Gaelic died in 1974. Manx survives as a heritage language on the Isle of Man, in the Irish Sea between England and Ireland. Apparently, the first person seen when you left home in the morning was a big deal on the Isle of Man. They had a word for that person: qualtagh, the first-foot … also the first person to come through your door on New Year's Day. My daily qualtagh is one of my neighbors across the street. Good for a wave, at least, if not for any especially good luck. As for New Year's Day threshold crossing, I can only hope that someone lovely does cross our threshold on 1 January 2021. It's been lonely times for our little family, so used to entertaining at home.
Manx Gaelic recording - Ned Maddrell (Last native Manx Speaker)
Second up this week, Quafftide …
Sometime towards 5:00 PM each day my quafftide (definition in the link below) arrives. It's usually when we sit down to read aloud to one another. A glass of wine at the end of the day, when we settle together with the three dogs (naturally awaiting their supper). Perhaps a little snack; perhaps a nibble of Manchego with a bit of membrillo (for us, not the dogs). Lovely. Just us, at home, until perhaps a New Year's qualtagh presages the return of visitors. In which case we'll need to do a quick scurryfunge to make things nice for potential firkytoodling to celebrate better days.
It's quafftide! Let's firkytoodle under the clinkabells
Third up this week, Quince …
Part of me (a quite tiny part of me) wishes we had a quince tree in our garden. It's this time of year when the quince ripens yellow, as we enter the holiday season. But growing quince seems somehow un-Californian, although I'm certain there are home garden quince trees here. It's just that citrus seems so much more sunny, and certainly simpler to enjoy. Quince is a confusing fruit, at once so appealing in its appley-pear appearance and so challenging in its dare-you-to-peel-and-prepare-me reality. Like some people in that way -- well, not literally that way. It's a metaphor.
It can't be eaten raw and it's the devil to peel
And a bit more … the character Peter Quince speaking a prologue to The most lamentable comedy, and
most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisby, performed in Act V of William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. The punctuation and line breaks are important since this was intended to be spoken aloud.
If we offend, it is with our good will.
That you should think, we come not to offend,
But with good will. To show our simple skill,
That is the true beginning of our end.
Consider then we come but in despite.
We do not come as minding to contest you,
Our true intent is. All for your delight
We are not here. That you should here repent you,
The actors are at hand and by their show
You shall know all that you are like to know.
That's all for this week.
From Mary Oliver's poem "Sometimes" …
Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
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