COMMENTARY ON HERITAGE : Highland Gathering Stirs Longing for Culture, Country We Never Knew : Marvel at the ethnic spectacle of bagpipes, tartans and the strathspey this weekend at the O.C. Fairgrounds. They help remind us who we are.

Heritage is perhaps a little like a handlebar mustache or middle-aged spread, a thing one is born to, but which requires some accommodation and acceptance before a man can wear it with comfort.

Grandma told of Great-Grandmother Adam in America and the wearying life in Kansas that would make her disappear behind the barn. She’d be found facing in the direction Scotland lay, with its misty, homey, heathered hills.

Her hands would be clenched; silent tears flowing like a disappointed child’s. She knew this flat, rude, unapologetic land of dust, heat, vicious twisters, vile black snakes and broken, begging Indians was all she’d ever know again of home.

My grandmother said she heard the angels come for her ailing brother, one night in the 1880s. I heard none that night in 1950, when her life ended. So I sent my angels packing, to where Santa and the Easter Bunny go.

But every year--on Memorial Day Weekend--the child inside awakes again on the morning of the Annual Highland Gathering and Festival held at the Orange County Fairgrounds in Costa Mesa.

From blocks away, in the fog-damped morning, one can hear the crisp, brittle, rattle of snare drums, the boom of the bass, then the deep, humming whine of bagpipes warming up.

There will be martial music for battle, like “Scotland the Brave,” the slow awe of “Amazing Grace,” from 25 massed pipe bands; the merry reel and the graceful strathspey for dancing.

Last year, I took along a special woman friend, one of those Americans who knows in general her own roots are Irish, but little else. She loved it. She was enthralled to learn that a pipe major’s majestic dress uniform and regalia cost about the same as a good used Honda, from boots to tall ostrich hat. (The dirk, or knife, tucked into a high stocking, is some $125 alone.)

She was delighted as a child herself, at the magic of border collies herding geese and sheep, just as they were doing centuries ago, before explorers even discovered this upstart, California. She loved the splendor of the tartans and the spectacle of the day.

My then-girlfriend did not seem pleased that for The Games, I’d waxed and curled my handlebar mustache for the first time in our relationship.

“Well, do you like it?,” I asked.

“It’s not important whether I like it,” she said too politely. “The important thing is whether you like it.”

Women.

This year I’ll be at The Games alone, but not when the sweet shriek and whine of the pipes and thunder of the drums commence, causing a shiver under the hot spring sun. The hairs on my arms and neck stand up. The itch and sting starting at the corner of my eyes remind me again who I am.

There was an older man at last year’s games, with watery, bright blue eyes and an elegant snow-white mustache, waxed gracefully out a bit longer than mine. Our eyes met momentarily in the dense throng.

We smiled and nodded, two countrymen with proud pasts.

We didn’t even need to speak.