I was recently contacted by a certain James Learmont. He lives in the UK, somewhere in Peterborough and had a few questions for me. I got an email asking for the names of my grandparents and where they came from. I replied immediately and within minutes he had sent me my great great great grandfather's death certificate and my great great grandfather's marriage certificate. I was amazed, astounded. James Learmont has been researching the Learmont line for a few years now and has put me in touch with Henry Learmont, a cobbler; my great great grandfather.
It was bizarre to talk to someone who knew the lineage of my family more intimately than anyone in my family, that I knew of. I know of old Bill Abbot who knows more than anyone else, there's Uncle Tommy who apparently knows a lot as well. The amazing thing about the Learmonts is that at some point our paths must cross, from Ayrshire, Kilmarnock, the Dumfries, we all have something in common; by blood and blood alone are we Learmonts
We identifiy, or I should say that I identify with my name, I feel to be a Learmont, I am interested in who I am and where I came from, if one wants to know one's self, you have to know your history, your ancestry, your blood line, your pride and heritage. I have written about Lermontov the scribe, Thomas the Rhymer, the true Thomas of Erceldoune for it is said that he could not tell a lie, the mythic Scottish prophet who was carried off to the Faerie land by the Queen, predicted the death of Alexander III of Scotland and apparently had powers to rival the great Merlin.
There are members of my family who I feel aren't interested, but I can't expect them to shift in the same direction as I do, we can't all carry the same weight, we aren't all alike and we can't all keep the candle of our identity burning. The few the proud. If you feel you need to extinguish what you are then so be it.
Two posts ago a comment was left by my ex-wife, one Petra Learmont. How strange it feels to see my name there, appended to someone else's name. I'll give you a little history. I was married for 6 months, happily so for two months, and bitterly for another two months, I then left and two months later I was divorced. That's a farcical peroid of time that I don't even remember, that has faded from memory, that has become meaningless and insignificant. But somehow this affiliation remains and I'm not sure I like it.
So I ask again. What's in a name?
My ex-wife has no interest in Tam Learmont's bakery, Henry Learmont's shoe shop, Thomas the Rhymer of Erceldoune, Mikael Lermontov the poet, James Learmont in Peterborough, my dead grandparents Granny Lady and Grampa Tom, my wonderful array of Aunts Isabel and Nacy and Uncle Tommy, my plethora of siblings, cousins, my neice and nephew. She can't possibly have any idea of what it might mean to be a Learmont, what it feels like to be a Learmont, she has no affiliation to the Learmonts, is not married to one, has no Learmont children, has no Learmont blood coursing through her veins, has none of the Learmont talents, in short, she is not and never will be a true Learmont.
So why would she continue to use it?
It can't possibly be because we were married for a significant period of time because we weren't, 6 months is 182 days is 26 weeks is 4368 hours, you get the idea. On top of that, it's been 6 years since we divorced. She has a life of her own, a child and a boyfriend and house they are building together. So why, after all this time does she need to continue to use the holy name of Learmont when it means as much to her as calculus to an apple?
Identity.
Some humans feel the need to reinvent themselves, in fact I think we all do that in many ways. But what we fail to realise is that a shift, change or growth occurs within one's self, that we are the masters of our own lives and identity, that we have ourselves to blame for who we are and that we have ourselves to praise for our accomplishments. Name theft is one way of cheating that process, it's much like buying a fake university degree online or a fake passport. The danger lies in when you begin to believe your new found identity, when you begin to make your own affiliation with it outside of its true domain, when you perform some bizarre strain of psychological home-kit alchemy and morph apples into oranges. It's simple logic, A = A, B = B, If A = B then A <> A. I am a Learmont because my heritage and blood tells me this, you are not a Learmont because you have no relation to my blood, you don't have my children and you don't know or care to further the Learmont lineage. You might as well pick any other random name. I wonder what her her boyfriend thinks, what her child asks her, 'Mummy, why do we all have different names?'
My sister's ex-husband, the lying, cheating, adulterous, philandering, stealing, murderous bastard took on our name. This is identity theft, name theft is for no other purpose than cheating either others or yourself out of the truth. Face the truth, face who you are, dump who you aren't.
Why is humanity so wonderfully interesting and so bizarrely flawed at the same time?