A longing for belonging

Have you ever been somewhere that you can’t remember being before but that seems so familiar.?It’s not déjà vu but rather a recognition of comfort, that the place is somewhere that feels like home, that wraps it’s arms around you in a warm welcome as if to say pull up a pew, sit down relax, let’s yarn for a while.

I’ve been places like that, Connemara in the West of Galway, Ireland, and Murray River Country here in my home country of Australia.?

I wouldn’t say that I am a particularly spiritual man, at least not in the sense of belief in a God, particularly that sort of God defined by the Church of my childhood, or indeed any Church or any religion.?It seems to me that a connection to the spiritual need not be defined in dogma, nor set in the stone of tablets, or in the selection of some gospels to form a book when other gospels that may not fit the narrative were excluded by a Council of men.

But I have found that particular places do call to me.?On the plains of Connemara, west Galway, surrounded by the peaks of the 12 Bens in Joyce Country, I found that the spirits of my Ancestors did walk with me as I mused whether what I was feeling was simply a longing for belonging or a deep seated ancestral memory.??A memory passed down to me in my YDNA by generations of Joyce men who were born, lived and died buffeted by the winds of the Wild Atlantic Way.?Men who gathered with family in stone walled crofters’ cottages, who sat around fires telling the tales of bards and listening to the wisdom of druids, laughing, crying, living and dying.?Generations shaped by the land, by the spirits of place, reaching forward in time claiming the sons born in far away foreign lands, separated by years but not by spirit.

And so, I have the same feeling in Murray River country which shaped my mitochondrial DNA passed down through my mother line.??The wide sweep of the river, the tranquillity of the billabongs and the majesty of the river red gums, the cries of cockatoos and parrots and the lofty silhouettes of wedge tailed eagles.

I’ve come to believe that the feeling we have in those places comes in part from the fact that when we return, our Ancestors welcome us, we see things that may on the surface appear unfamiliar with eyes and a heart that were formed in large part by those landscapes, the smells of the plants and the movement of the birds and animals, the feeling of the winds on our skin, wild westerlies in Joyce Country and the hot dry northerlies of summer in Barapa Barapa and Yorta Yorta Country.

The music from both countries sings in my blood, the songs of Ireland and the dream time stories of my ancestors here both stem from that very human desire to yarn, to tell stories, to laugh and cry, to respect our elders and to cherish the promise of our children.??The Danish have a word that I think best describes that feeling of home.?Its “hygge” which is translated as comfort or cosiness, that feeling of “contented mood evoked by comfort and conviviality”.?So when you travel and you find a place that deep down you know you “know”, take the time to reflect on whether your ancestors are calling to you, reaching out and giving you a hug.

I find it interesting that the Joyces of Irelands Coat of Arms is a two headed red eagle and that there is synchronicity with the dreamtime eagle Bunjil, that brings together both halves of my DNA.?Maybe I am a little more spiritual than I give myself credit for.