TWA year syne A wis rinnin drama warkshops in Glesga an wis warkin wi a talentit lass o aboot 14-year-auld. A let dab that A’d managed tae get tickets fir tae see ane o the first London perfomances o Hamilton: An American Musical. It wis jist me an this lassie in the kirk whaur we wis warkin an she skelloched. Alood. ‘Naw!’ she yowled. ‘Wha’s guan wi ye? Can A come in steid?’

She’d nivver seen a shaw in the West End but she’d heard the Oríginal Broadway Cast Recordin o Hamilton oan Spotify hunners o times. No hunners as in ‘loads’, hunners as in several hundert. As a young, black lassie that wantit tae be oan the stage, the multi-racial cast’s success in Hamilton occupeed a sacred place in her hairt. Seein it wis her dream – bein in it is her life ambítion.

Hamilton tells the story o ane o the Foondin Faithers o America, Alexander Hamilton. A’ve noo hearkened tae the soontrack eneuch that A cannae say thon name wioot yaisin the R ‘n’ B cadence o the scriever an central performer, Lin Manuel Miranda. Miranda is a New York-Puerto Rican musical theatre makar.

He cam across the historian Ron Chernow’s 900 page buik oan this little-kent gadgie frae America’s foondin myth, an decidit it wuid mak a gran musical. An historians dinnae get a sicht mair lucky nor Chernow, noo sharin in the $150,000 a week in richts that Miranda earns frae the Broadway shaw alane.

Miranda can mak the story o a deid white dude settin up federal finance that appealin tae a 14-year-auld Glaswegian that the thocht o seein it maks her skreech. No ainly is there a love-triangle wi Hamilton an twa sisters, a dalliance wi anither man’s wife an THREE DUELS, but Hamilton is a walkin American Dream. He hustles an strunts an ‘writes like he’s running out of time’ – he is a rapper, he is Miranda, he is America.

Whit dis it mean that America still sees itsel in a character that says, ‘I’m just like my country / I’m young, scrappy and hungry’? An whit does it mean fir us that its naitional hoaliday is a celebration o its independence frae us? An A’m no seyin frae England. Hamilton wis born in the Caribbean tae a Scottish faither an a local mither.

Scotland wis gettin a guid auld go at the spyles o colonisation bi the US Declaration o Independence in 1776. Indeed, ‘young’ countries aw ower the warld celebrate freedom frae Scotland, an the UK, nearhaun ilka week. Thir’s a handy list oan Wikipedia cried ‘List of countries that have gained independence from the UK’. Mibbe ye feel awkwart aboot the global superpooer o America spendin ower lang thinkin thirsels sair-colonised underdogs. Weil, hoo aboot ye celebrate alang wi Malawi an the Solomon Islands this weekend comin? Or mibbe the Bahamas an Kiribati neist week?

Addressin thon past is somethin we are frankly pants at. Frankly pants. The sooth-Lunnon actor that pleys Hamilton in the West End, Jamael Westman, recently spak wi the Observer aboot hoo the shaw affectit his politics. He pit it better nor I cuid.

Fir him oor colonial past ‘is like a mental health issue and it will get worse if Britain doesn’t come to terms with it.’ Whit else is the clusterbourach o Brexit nor a symptom o a delusional an ill kintra that cannae see the warld as it is, that cannae see that we’re nae weil?

As wi mental health, airt therapy can help. A’m aye recommendin the braw novel, Joseph Knight by James Robertson, aboot the fecht fer slaves’ richts agin thir Scottish maisters (an thir’s braw Scots in the dialogue). Talkin therapy can gie us a lift an aw, wi the likes o the David Hayman BBC documentary o lest year addin tae the conversation. At its core it’s acceptin that though we micht no think oorsels as racists, oor hale life is líved in the matrix o spyles frae the wark an land an cultures o ithers.

So as A cringe a bittie wunnerin hoo America, the biggest bangster in the pleygrun, can still see itsel as a scrappy upstert, A’ll turn thon cringe oan Scotland an aw. Gin we think oorsels the puir doontrodden colony o England, we’ll no can luik at the mental health issue festerin at the hairt o oor naitional story: the lads an lassies suppressed here gaed aw ower the warld an crushed oot, cleared aff, raped and murdert thir wey intae aw thon list o 61 ‘countries that have gained independence from the UK’.

Ane o the refrains o Hamilton is, ‘Who lives, who dies, who tells your story?’ We’ve been tellin oor ain story the wey we like it ower lang – the ‘45, Culloden, Bannockburn, the Clearances. Whit pairts are we ignorin? Whan will we cam tae a place whaur, in the wards o ain o oor ain musical scrievers, ‘Broken faimlies in lands we’ve herriet,/ Will curse Scotland the Brave nae mair, nae mair’? A year whaur we hid 61 deys o naitional murnin tae atone micht be a guid stert.