The fallen~Sparrow~hawk; The dance of the Flaming Arseholes

The dance of the Flaming Arseholes     April 19, 2002

Jeff returned, the Dagda, in long beard and poncho. He immediately surveyed his domain, the progress of tree growth, clearings, new planting and general condition of the place of which he was the founder. Jeff  had been driven back from Beneficio, a similar community in Spain, by Stewart. His arrival coincided with that of Tanya and Billy and Hazel. Jeff went off to be reunited with Damnait, a reunion that began to take on a comical air when they kept missing each other.

The evening found Tanya, Stewart, Billy, Alison and myself on the Bog Myrtle and spliffs. Once the talk had moved from plants to foxes to lambs, (tail-docking) talk of other communities, horses, workhorses and their ability to drag twenty feet logs to build the cabin, hares, hounds and the prices they fetch, chickens and especially Alison’s new five hens and one cock; willow and the suppleness of its branches for basket weaving, a conversation, in short, bursting with abundance, the toil of spring, for the abundance in summer.

After Tanya and Alison retired Stewart and Billy found a mutual love of sailing, Billy  having sailed on many fishing boats off the West Coast including the fated Solway Harvester, about which he said, “There were three decks and the sleeping cabins were right at the bottom, so before you knew you had rolled over, it was too late. The boys were found in their beds”. It was surmised that the boat could have been hit by a container.  “It, the Solway harvester, is lying in the Isle of Whithorn (or beyond) and you can see by the dent in its side, something barrel-like hit it, you ken”. Billy also said “A good seaman can’t swim, and a good skipper doesn’t swim. Doesn’t want to, will do anything not to get the lifeboats out and get his feet wet, you ken”. It turned out that Stewart and Billy had drunk on the same boat off the west of Mallaig and Elgin and seen the northern lights.

Stewart was overjoyed that he had finally met another man who had actually not only seen, but participated in the ‘Dance of the Flaming Arseholes’. A ritual which takes the form of a rolled up newspaper stuffed between the bum-cheeks with the other end set alight. These flaming cockatoos, drunk I may add, danced about on a wooden ship, (this caused me hilarity). The one to keep going to the last wins. Many have received severe burns playing the Dance of the Flaming Arseholes.

This story was told by Billy at the end of anecdotes about the initiation rites of young new recruits on boats. “One has his leg tied to a big rubber tire and is told to wear it in case he goes overboard; it will keep him afloat, as a good sailor can’t swim; the tire will drag him straight down, which is better. The new recruit drags a tire around for days, you ken”

Another initiation finds the new recruit attached to the bow of the ship to shout out obstacles through the mist, meanwhile the crew are below having a laugh surrounded by remote tracking radar; they speed the boat up to twenty knots until the poor soul is screaming his head off.

Billy talked of the Jollys. I told him I wanted to go drinking in Dunragit. He confirmed they were good boxers though rough. One pub in the middle of the high street was okay to go to while the other two were rough, “you ken”.

Stewart asked what my particular interest in the slave was. It is not the first time I’ve been asked. It is a question any reader will ask. Being mixed-race and being brought up, and having expressed mainly the white side, I am asking myself my feeling towards and about my black heritage and slavery.

Stewart was under the impression that I straightened my hair;  as it is the Jollys who, reputedly, shave or straighten their light-coloured frizz, or indeed, have taken to wearing wigs. I do not have light frizzy hair but loose curly hair, taking after my English maternal grandfather. My European features make me look Mediterranean, Brazilian or North African.

My interest? It has become a JOURNEY OF COLOUR. A journey of  a mixed race man back to part of his roots. The roots that is the racist killing of his, and racial subjugation, however subtle of his brothers and sisters. Moral; avoid the error of ever denying of one’s own origins. This is my story. It needs to be told, not in fiction but as it is unfolding. Are they, the descendants of Jolly, still in these times, ashamed of their black heritage? (I know that Irma, the jolie laide perniciously directed me towards the Jolly story.) It is a ‘stigma’ they have carried for an inordinate amount of time, over two centuries long; black people have not only been in Britain in our cities and in the countryside since the 1950s, they have been here for centuries, more than we know have a trace by now.

A part of me descends from slavery. It is a sad as it is but a part of me as much as my Irish heritage and its painful legacy. Can I really experience being black? Plastic paddy, bogus black; not black enough; olive skin, light brown, I am in between (I have been lynched by whites and mugged by blacks) and by knowing and owning my that part of my African history gives me a confidence that can transcends race to stand up against those who seek to denigrate those of African descent.

So, Jolly, a slave, who fell in love with a local girl, siring great-, great-, great-, great- grand children still living in the same community after over two hundred years.