My DNA results have come in from Ancestry and tell me I'm more Welsh than Irish - 41% of me in fact. The 21% Irish is from Munster, a place of mass migration. Scottish 12%, 10% English with Sweden, Denmark and Germanic Europe making up the rest.
I had no idea about the Scottish but I guess this is a small island. I was reminded too of the Slovenian women at a poetry festival years ago who didn't believe I was English. Ancestry's map of the Germanic region that contributes to who I am stretches right down to that Slovenian border.
Is it all nonsense? A modern version of palm reading and fortune telling? Is it muslin mimicking ectoplasm and voices from within a soundbox?
I think of that great poem I've used in workshops, They Tell Me I am Lost, by the American Maurice Kenny. The clue's in the title.
How will Ancestry link this to the family tree? Thankfully the allotment is calling in the sun because screen time's stacking up and I don't know why I'm doing this other than as an antidote, a need to feel part of a bigger geographic community. I'm speculating. What is it feeding?
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