Courtroom Drama

Last Thursday – Friday Nigel was in court.  He and colleagues Sue and Phil had super-glued themselves to Barclays’ window to protest against the fact that Barclays is Europe’s largest funder of new fossil fuel extraction, a massive driver of the global rise in temperatures and sea levels.

These court cases are quite frustrating – the audio-visual equipment for viewing evidence usually doesn’t work and a lawyer has to show everybody on their little laptop.  On this occasion the judge’s microphone also didn’t work and the defendants hadn’t been sent all the necessary paperwork, again, quite usual.

To stave off the boredom, I took some embroidery.  Supporters of climate protesters get an extra thorough search on the way in, so I’d already had my embroidery scissors confiscated, but was still stitching away at the back when, during a lull, I caught the judge’s eye.

‘Somebody has brought a dangerous implement into the court!’  she announced.  I looked around me in surprise before realising she was referring to my embroidery needle.  As the court usher marched towards me, I zipped it into my bag and tried to look innocent. He let me keep it.

Nigel, Sue and Phil, however, were not so lucky - they were found guilty of criminal damage because the police’s de-bonding agent temporarily left some smeary marks on the glass when mixed with the super glue (now all nicely cleaned up).

The whole experience leads me to the question, who is more dangerous – a woman embroidering, three non-violent protesters glued to a window, or a vast multinational bent on profiteering from causing irreparable damage to the planet?

For much greener banks, try Nationwide or Triodos.

A Haven of Welcome

  
There is something very special about the house of friends – a haven where you know you are welcome.  Carolyn and David’s house in Gateshead has been that to us ever since we met when sharing the experience of new parenthood thirty years ago.

For twenty-four years however, we have been living in different regions, hundreds of miles apart.

Over that time, the generations have rolled over and the families have developed through different phases in their life cycle.

We have met the changes in our own family by moving from one house to another, whereas David and Carolyn have extended and adapted the same house in an inventive manner. This time when we visited, a room that I remember was a bathroom thirty years ago had become a bathroom once more, whereas the bathroom which long ago replaced it had morphed into the dining room.

I wished for a time lapse film that tracked the expansion of both family and house.

However, when we visited recently, the person who recalled most to us the first days of our friendship was somebody we had never met before - Lydia, one of their young grandchildren, busied herself with toys that once Hannah and Pascoe had played with and over her head we smiled at one another

Advent - a blessing

 

In the past, Advent was a time of fasting and contemplation, allowing people to prepare themselves spiritually for the Christmas celebration to follow, rather as Lent is a time to prepare for Easter.

Now, lights and baubles surround us even before Advent starts and many Christmas parties are over by the second week in December. 

In CS Lewis' much loved children's book, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Narnia was under a curse whereby it was always winter and never Christmas.

Nowadays we seem to be under a spell where it is always Christmas and never Advent.

No wonder that when Christmas Day arrives, we are often frazzled - instead of a sense of wonder, I have a sense of disappointment - somehow I have cheated myself of the 'true meaning of Christmas'.

This year, I'm going to try to take the bustle and preparations with a pinch of salt.  Whatever I manage to do, it will have to be good enough.  And actually, because my friends and family are kind and forgiving people, it WILL be good enough.

So in 2022, I am making a pre-New Year's resolution to find some space and stillness in Advent.

Photo shows Nigel & our friend Carolyn with a giant robin at Gibside.