Belonging
Belonging has been a fluid thing in my life. It has never quite stood still long enough for me to grasp it with certainty. At times it has felt unclear, almost like an emotional hunch rather than a fact — something moving beneath the surface, quietly tugging at me, without explaining itself.
When I was young, I had a music teacher who opened a door into another world. He played Grieg, Sibelius and other Scandinavian composers, and he did not simply play them; he unpacked them. He allowed the music to breathe. Through him, I heard landscapes I had never seen: northern light, forests, snow, water, distance. Something in that music stirred me deeply. It made me feel, strangely and powerfully, that I was Norwegian, or at least Scandinavian in some inward way. It was not an idea I had reasoned myself into. It was more like a feeling that had arrived before thought albeit, I visited Sweden often and I am grateful for the friendships I made there. I also lived for a short time in Stavanger in Norway.
Later, however, another longing took hold of me. I found myself drawn towards Gaelic — the language, the sound of it, the music, the people who carried it. I began to listen to the songs of the Hebrides and felt again that curious pull of recognition. I wanted to meet Gaels, to hear their voices, to understand something of their world. The islands seemed to call to me, not loudly, but with a kind of old persistence. I wondered what was happening in my life. Why did these places, these sounds, these cultures, seem to matter so much to me?
Because I was adopted, I knew little about my heritage. There were gaps where others might have had stories, names, places, old photographs or family sayings. I had questions, but not many answers. So, some time ago, I arranged for a DNA heritage test, hoping it might offer some clarity. When the findings came back, they brought surprises.
My mother’s line took me to Ireland. My father’s line led to the island of Islay, off Scotland’s west coast. There was something moving in that discovery. Islay is part of the Hebridean world, and in that sense one of my strong feelings had not been imagined. The pull towards Gaelic culture, towards the music and atmosphere of the islands, had found some kind of answering echo in the facts of ancestry.
And yet, in other respects, the result was disappointing. I had carried within me two strong feelings of heritage: Scandinavia and the Hebrides. One seemed to be confirmed; the other was left unexplained. I had hoped, perhaps, that the test would gather all my longings into one neat pattern. But life is rarely so tidy. A DNA result can tell us something about blood, migration and descent, but it cannot fully explain why certain music pierces us, why certain landscapes haunt us, or why the soul sometimes recognises a place it has never known.
Belonging is not only inherited, it is also awakened. My love of Scandinavian music may have come through my teacher, through sound, through beauty, through a young imagination receiving something with unusual force. My love of the Hebrides may have come through blood, or memory, or the deep mystery of family lines hidden from me for years. Both feelings were real, even if only one could be traced through a test.
One good outcome of the search was that I met second and third cousins on a few occasions. That mattered. It gave flesh and voice to what had previously been only a report on a page. There is something deeply human about meeting people who are connected to you by threads you did not know existed. Conversation becomes more than conversation. It becomes a small act of restoration.
Still, I am left with the sense that belonging is not a simple destination. It is not always a flag, a surname, a test result or a place on a map. Sometimes it is music. Sometimes it is language. Sometimes it is a coastline, an island, a family line, or a meeting with someone who carries part of your story.
For much of my life, belonging has been uncertain. But perhaps uncertainty does not make it false. Perhaps it only makes it deeper. I may never fully understand why Scandinavia and the Hebrides both spoke so strongly to me, but I know that they did. And in their different ways, they helped me listen — to music, to ancestry, to longing, and to the quiet search for home.