A Word of Ulster Scots 7

It wasn't necessary to be familiar with black American street slang to understand the import of the song "Hit the Road, Jack" by the late great Ray Charles. We all knew what he had to do.

Road has a range of meanings in Ulster Scots and I'd like to explore a few of them today. Before exploring this road, less travelled recently, it might be worth mentioning that there subtleties to the English meaning of road. A main road is inevitably referred to as a line (the Ballymena Line, the Rasharkin Line) but even a rough track across a bog (boag) would have been called "the moss road". I was reared (raired) on a road that rejoiced in the name "the sunk road", so christened due to its propensity to flooding in bad weather. (Yes there was the odd bit of rain in my youth, whiles).

A road man or surface man was a worker dedicated the upkeep of the Queens highway and its attendant ditches, gulleys, verges and drains.

Before crossing the road, it was and is always advisable to "aye luck baith roads before stepping oot") and on the road , it is essential to "keep her between the hedges".

There was the metaphoric road of life and the cri de couer of the veteran about its unfairness and fundamental inequality (the oul doag for the hard road and the pup for the pad) when the tough tasks are entrusted to someone with experience while the simple jobs are left to the novice.

It can mean distance (he's fit tay hit the ba a lang road, occasionally heard of a golfer) as well as admission charge (we had tay pi wur ain road in). A series of misdemeanours or incompetences in one's place of employment might result in the sack or "getting the road".

If a colleague or a competitor was unworthy of comparison with your own abilities or talents, you might be moved to comment that "you wudnay see them in yer road". You might well encourage such a person to "get oot o me road" as their very presence may be unhelpful, either practically or otherwise.

If a personal relationship had deteriorated to the point of indifference or even outright hostility, a person might "niver luck the road ye wur oan".

If a job were left incomplete, it might be said to be "half roads done" or done incompetently might be "done half roads".

A location could be handy  ("on yer road hame" "on yer road by") or it might not be handy ("oot o yer road" "I could niver live in a place as ooty ther road as thon"). The deviation could be metaphorical as well ("he wud go ooty his road tay day ye a guid turn" or "he wud go ooty his road tay day ye a bad turn" not so common, I think)

The price of a good, if within the bounds of normal commercial mores can be said to be "no ooty the road".

As always, I am indebted to poet and lexicographer James Fenton for his invaluable reference work "The Hamely Tongue" (Ulster Scots Academic Press).