A significant date on the calendar

This is a special date in the calendar for Scot's the world over!

It is the date when we remember the birth of Robert Burns, poet, social commentator and customs officer. For the last week on the radio at 5.40 a.m. the Rev. Johnston McKay has started the day recounting something of the life of Burns, during the prayer for the day spot on radio 4. Most interesting and encouraging!

All over the world people will be raising a glass in memory of Burns, his writings and commentary make interesting reading. The further you are from the source it seems the clearer the picture he paints becomes. I remember an occasion in 1970 sitting in our flat in Johannesburg on the 25th January and reading a few lines from one of his poems. Written in Edinburgh, the opening line of which: 'Edina Scotia's darling seat,' in my mind - I could see him sitting on the side of the Salisbury Crags in Edinburgh overlooking the City, watching all the reeking lums (smoking chimneys) spewing out their grey clouds into the atmosphere, listening to the noise and the hustle and bustle of the town as people went about their daily tasks. Smelling the sweet odours of the breweries and the other stench of the City itself.

From our flat in Johannesburg I was transported to the side of the Salisbury Crags and I too could see and smell and almost touch the City of my birth and the place of my heritage. Edinburgh has always had that kind of fascination for me - regardless where I have lived. Even today I can go to a bedroom window and look out and see part of the City even though I live 15 miles from it. I like to think that although I am not a poet Edinburgh has the same influence over me that it had over Robert Burns.

It is not just that this is a significant date on the calendar because of the birthday of Robert Burns - there is more to it than that! In 1942 my brother James was born on this day, sadly he did not survive much more than infancy! By 1944 he was gone, a victim of a measles outbreak. I only know this because I remember my father telling me the story of how he found out about his passing. Note the date 1944 - nearing the end of the 2nd World War. My father was serving with the forces in Burma, miles behind enemy lines, a private soldier, attached to the Kings Own Royal Rifles, a Lancashire Regiment, operating as part of a mortar platoon. He told me he was returning from a patrol and as he travelled through the jungle back to his base he had a strange feeling that he would be hearing bad news! His worst fears were realised, James, a son he had only seen for the shortest of periods was gone. Knowing my dad as I did he must have been devastated and how he ever survived emotionally I will never know!

Ever since the day and I discovered the date of my brothers' birth I have always kept 25th January as a special day! I never knew him, there are no photos of him and very little record of him but he is my brother - he was and is special to me.

A few years ago along with Julie, my oldest daughter we went to visit our old nursery school in the Cowgate in Edinburgh. It was closing and the staff decided to invite all former attendees to visit the school and look at old pictures and records. Can you imagine my surpirse to look at the old register and see the names of both my brothers and the dates they enrolled in the nursery and the dates they left. I was thrilled and delighted. Then as we searched through the same register I looked for and found my own name being added and a little later my sister. Subsequently two of my older brothers' children were enrolled and my own two older girls had their names added.

In my mind it is true that one generation can speak to the next and so on. James Campbell, jnr is remembered - even though he lies in a simple grave in Piershill Cemetery alongside his grandmother - he has a real place in the affection of this brother who he never knew and who never knew him. This significant date on the calendar will always be James' Birthday - my brother!