taibhse

“Taibhse” (pronounced, at least in my odd St. Paul Irish idiolect, “TEV-sheh”) is Irish for “ghost”. That wisp of white in the foreground is the young lady from the rince (”dance”–I’d pronounce it RINN-keh) picture in action; the low light and 100 speed Acros film turned her into a phantom. And the musical notes lurking in the background are from the traditional jig “The Mist in the Meadow”.

In verifying the spelling for “taibhse”, I ran across a nice little Irish idiom, “taibhse gan tairbhe”, which the Irish Dictionary On-Line renders as “white elephant”. But “gan tairbhe” is “without avail”, so a “taibhse gan tairbhe” is a “ghost to no avail”, a pointless phantom, rattling his chains in the corner while no one pays him any mind. Which reminds me of a story I wrote, published in the fall 2005 Duck & Herring Co. Pocket Field Guide, now sold out; so perhaps if I find a suitable “taibhse gan tairbhe” picture to pair it with, I’ll post the tale here for the few of you who don’t own their own copy of this wonderful little magazine. (And you should follow that link above and buy a copy or two of the field guides that are currently available–you won’t be disappointed, it’s a quirky little gem unlike any other, and it has a handy hole in the corner just right for hanging on the nail in your outhouse.)

So ends today’s lesson.

Five cullings for today:

• me and my dad from catherine buca photography
• Stranded from serial photographer
• under an umbrella at the park from twenty-five.net
• Ei Talvikunnossapitoa from luotokuva
• Bittersweet Nightshade from MAKING HAPPY