Ginger AF

Red hair enters the room before you do.

It did when I was a boy. Before anyone knew whether I was funny, angry, gentle or afraid, they knew I was ginger.

Carrot top. Fire crotch. No soul.

Always delivered as banter. Always with the same escape hatch: if it hurt, I was the problem. I needed to toughen up. Learn to laugh. Prove I could take it.

So I did.

That is a performance bullied children learn. Laugh before anyone notices the joke landed. Become louder than the people trying to make you small.

Coming home to Scotland has reintroduced me to other old names.

Irish. Mick. Tim. Celtic.

Some are mine by history. Some by choice. Some are weapons in the mouths of people who think my belonging threatens theirs.

I bought a Celtic strip and the warnings began immediately. Be careful what you say. Remember what side your family followed. Wait until you discover what those people are really like.

I know what people are like.

No club, church or tribe is spotless. I have spent too much of my life inside institutions to confuse belonging with innocence. But I will not accept that someone else gets to assign me a side, explain my blood to me or decide where I may feel at home.

I was born in Glasgow and carried away before I could remember it. I came back forty-four years later with the accent changed, the roots intact and enough scars to recognise myself.

Teased. Bullied. Targeted.

Ginger. Celtic. Irish. Mick. Tim. No soul.

They were supposed to reduce me. Instead, they tell the story of a man who has spent a lifetime being named by other people and has finally learned to answer for himself.

I am all of them.

I am Ginger AF.