“The Moonlit Meeting,” a short story

I wrote this short story around 2001 when I was living in Pictou, Nova Scotia. It was my first attempt at writing dialect, though this time it wasn’t Scots-English but Irish-English. I heard this dialect a lot as a youngster since my step-father, Bill Moorhead, was from Larne in Northern Ireland.

When picturing “Mary’s Mountain” I had Ben Guillion in mind, the mountain that I climbed many times just outside my hometown of Campbeltown on the Kintyre peninsula in Argyllshire, Scotland. On a clear day we could see the coast of Northern Ireland from Campbeltown.

I added the leprachaun character because I like the idea of leprachauns – even have a small one pinned up in my den and wear it in my pocket whenever I attend a St. Patrick’s Day party.

We Scots and the Irish are brother Celts and I like to try to dispel the false impression that we are enemies. I have no problem with the Irish – after all, the Scottish people originally came from Ireland (and St. Patrick was born a Scot). In fact, my great-grandfather Edward Morrens, son of Irish parents, Thomas Morrins and Rose Robertson, was born and died in Campbeltown (1832-1906), so I surmise his parents moved to Scotland sometime before his birth. As far as I can tell this was the beginning of the Morrans family in Scotland, at least my branch of it. You’ll note the variation in spelling of our family name. I can only conclude that the record keepers were careless spellers or some of my ancestors were illiterate.

In 2006, when my wife Gayle and I were living in Chapala, Mexico and attending the Lake Chapala Writer’s Group, I submitted this story to the local English-language magazine, El Ojo del Lago, where it was published. Here I’m including the story in its entirety for your enjoyment.

I like to think of “The Moonlit Meeting” as a fable and hope you can identify the moral lesson.

To read the story, click here: Moonlit Meeting – for Website

11 thoughts on ““The Moonlit Meeting,” a short story”

  1. Hey there would you mind letting me know which webhost you’re using? I’ve loaded your blog in 3 completely different internet browsers and I must say this blog loads a lot quicker then most. Can you recommend a good internet hosting provider at a fair price? Thanks, I appreciate it!|

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    • Thanks for your comments. I wish you could hear Ian read the story as, of course, he does the Scottish accent perfectly (after all it is his own) and he does the Irish accent very nicely indeed. He read it at our writers’ group meeting just before it was published and got rave reviews, especially for the accents. In fact, the editor of the magazine that published it remarked that Ian could read from the telephone book and make it sound charming! Your comment about “climb” was interesting. However, I don’t completely agree. To my mind “climb” does not imply “top”, but just that he did climb on the mountain. For instance, many people have climbed Everest, but not all have reached the top. By the way, what is “the L?”
      Thanks for keeping up with our blog as well. I’ve been in Norway visiting my daughter’s family and Ian has been in respite here, so we’ve been inactive for awhile. Watch for a new blog shortly. Thanks again.
      Gayle Moore-Morrans

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