When Is A Tiff Not A Tiff?

How about "when it looks like this"...?

For those of you living under an electrical blackout for the past 24 hours, the photos show Charles Saatchi involved in a row with his wife Nigella Lawson.  The images are incredibly upsetting.  At one point he has both hands around her throat and she clearly looks distressed - not surprisingly, given that her supposedly loving husband appears to be attempting to strangle her in public.  Today Saatchi spoke out about the incident, admitting that the images were "horrific" but going on to state they actually show nothing more than a "playful tiff"; the reason he had his hands round her throat was to "emphasise his point".

I don't about the rest of you, Blogverse, but I would be incredibly wary of a man who felt he had to "emphasise a point" by throttling me in public.  Don't get me wrong, I'm under no illusions of the ups and downs of relationships, and I'm always a teeny bit suspicious of any couple who insist that they never ever row or have even the teensiest disagreement about anything ever, but while I'm happy to have a good old-fashioned squabble about whose turn it is to put the rubbish out (hint - yours) I draw the line at strangulation. Call me strange, but it seems less like a "married couple row" and more like "domestic abuse" that way...

Now I don't profess to know the ins and outs of the Saatchi-Lawson marriage; for all I know the man is a total saint and this was a totally out-of-character, out-of-the-blue, one-time thing for them.  Looking at those photos though...well, lets just say my DV radar started bleeping in a BIG way.  Having a row in public is one thing; ranting at your wife until you reduce her to tears and then grabbing her throat is, actually, quite another.  That's bullying.  That's abuse.  That is not, in any way, shape or form, a "playful tiff".

I don't know what horrifies me more: the images themselves, Saatchi's attempt to "explain" himself, or the fact that not one single person - not a passerby, not another patron at the restaurant, not the tabloid hack taking the photos - stepped in to help.  I wouldn't necessarily intervene in any old argument, but seeing a man with his hands around the throat of a clearly-distressed woman...maybe my moral compass is broken but I'd like to think I would at least go and ask if she was ok.  And yet nobody did.  Not one person checked to see if Nigella Lawson needed help, or intervened to let Charles Saatchi know his behaviour was waaaaay inappropriate.  Not one.  And you know what the very worst thing is?  I'm actually not surprised.

Violence against women has become normalised in our society, to the point where something like this can happen and no one bats an eyelid.  How many prime-time TV shows show the brutal (mis)treatment of women?  I know I like a good crime story as much as the next person, but even I'm starting to frankly get a little bit nauseous at the sheer level of bloodthirsty violence meted out to my gender in the name of entertainment.  The opening of Ripper Street.  Vast swathes of The Fall.  That particularly hideous anal rape scene in The Politician's Husband.  And that's just off the top of my head, without even thinking about it.  (This from the woman who adores Criminal Minds and has a library of books about the psychology of serial killers...)  Seeing women as objects, treating them with violence both physical and sexual...this is normal now.  And these scenarios play themselves out every single day in this country, and it never changes.  2 women a week are still murdered by their partners or ex-partners.  No one knows the true statistics about rape and sexual assault, but I would stake my life on the fact that somewhere in Britain, as you're reading these words, a woman is being raped by her partner.  (And it IS rape, despite what certain sections of the media and Parliament would have you believe...)  Schools and colleges up and down the country still spend time offering rape alarms to their female students and cautioning them not to walk home alone by themselves after a night out; police forces spend time and money putting together campaigns warning women not to let their drinks out of sight for fear of them being drugged and date-raped, and yet no one bothers to say to the boys "hey fellas, here's a thought - keep it in your pants and don't rape anyone tonight, yeah?"  Violence towards women is normalised and it's women who constantly have to adapt their behaviour to deal with the consequences; a recent campaign DID attempt to point out to young men that forcing themselves on their girlfriend after she'd said she didn't want sex was - duh! - rape, but the norm seems to be to remind the girls to be careful.  The norm is not to tell the boys not to rape, not to belittle, not to hurt.

Charles Saatchi probably doesn't think of himself as an abuser, and why would he?  Someone with his money, with his power and influence...he wouldn't do something like that.  And besides, it's not like he hit her or anything.  It was just a row.  A tiff.  No big deal.

Except actually, Charles, it sort of is.  It's a very big deal.  It's a prime example of both the normalisation of violence and the way some men are so easily able to play down their actions.  Society lets them do so.  And it's disgusting.

I don't want to tar everyone with the same brush here.  I know not every man is an abuser and I know there are many who were horrified by the images released this weekend, and by Saatchi's pathetic "explanation".  But there are also a good percentage of males in this country who wouldn't think twice about it, who would nod and shrug and go "yeah, sounds about right".  And these young men are going to produce children who will be brought up to believe the same thing, and so on and so on ad infinitum.  For goodness sake, we're living in a world where schools are seriously having to consider teaching primary school children that porn isn't the same as sex - how in the name of good stuff did we reach THAT point?!!  How has this attitude become normal?!

I don't have the answers.  If I did, would I still be on my soapbox banging my anti-DV drum?  Unlikely - I'd be dancing through sprinklers or something.  But my point is that 'society' needs to sit up and pay attention, to realise that this is NOT ok.  In my idealised utopian vision of the world these pictures would make people realise this attitude and behaviour is unacceptable; people would start agitating for change and then maybe we could start making a dent in those statistics and stop these awful crimes, but with my 'realistic' head on I know it's not going to happen.  Something else will happen in the next few days and this will be old news very quickly, just like every time some awful act of violence is committed against women.  I don't want to be a pessimist, but sometimes I truly despair at the rest of the world.

I want to end this on an upbeat note but, somehow, I can't find the words and so I'll leave it at that...

Friends Forever...

So I'm going to start blogging again because this week I met up with two of my gorgeous and clever friends, Lorraine and Sarah, and was told in no uncertain terms that I need to carry on with it.  What can I say, I just do as I'm told...

Although actually, it seems quite apt to start this thing again with a bit of a paean to friendship because before I met with the girls on Wednesday I was at a memorial service for someone I loved very much, someone I would have walked barefoot over hot coals for...being at the service and talking about things with other people who also loved him made me realise several things and got me musing on the topic of friendship as a whole...that is perhaps for another day, however, because I want this blog entry to be about a very special human being...

So, the basics.  Two year ago my friend Jamie committed suicide.  I'd known him since we were at secondary school together and he was one of the sweetest, funniest, warmest people I've ever met.  If ever I was upset about something, Jamie was the one person guaranteed to bring me out of my funk by doing or saying something so completely ridiculous you couldn't help but laugh.  When we were 14, however, he began exhibiting some fairly odd behaviours; we didn't know it then, but this was the start of an ongoing 15 year battle with paranoid schizophrenia, the condition which would eventually and indirectly claim his life.  Schizophrenia turned my sweet, caring friend into a stranger; someone who was either drugged up to the eyeballs on every anti-psychotic drug going or who had stopped taking his meds and was either hospitalised or - to put it bluntly - raving.  Sometimes this was funny or endearing - he once rang me in a flurry of urgency to tell me Marilyn Monroe had stopped singing halfway through Diamonds Are A Girls Best Friend and told him to ring me at once to tell me I was beautiful - but sometimes his episodes made him nasty and, in the very worst cases, violent.  When he was taking his medication we were able to maintain some form of friendship but, as can often happen, after six months or a year he would believe the medication had cured him because he no longer heard voices or saw hallucinations - and he'd stop taking them.  This sent him into a downward spiral again and he'd end up back in a psychiatric hospital.  It was awful for all of us who knew him, especially his family, but what was also horrific was the number of times Jamie himself realised he'd said or done something to upset or hurt someone whilst in one of his 'episodes'.  It devastated him to think he could have physically or emotionally hurt the people he cared about, who cared about him; in the end, the battle with his schizophrenia became too much for him and he killed himself.  The funeral, two years ago, was a bit of a blur; all of us were, I think, relieved for him because he'd been so miserable and exhausted trying to fight it all the time.  If I'm honest, I think we were also a little relieved for ourselves, which is a horrible thing to admit.  The last two years or so of his life were particularly awful for his family especially, and so when the funeral happened it was all a bit raw and...well, it wasn't 'normal'.  That's why his parents wanted to do something to celebrate all the good things we remembered about him, rather than reflecting on all the trauma of his illness, and so we all got together and had a really lovely service followed by a damn good chat in the pub.  Jamie would have approved wholeheartedly, although I'm pretty sure he would have gone mad at some of the stories we were telling each other!

Every one of us at that memorial had our own very personal stories and memories about Jamie, but the one thing that really stood out for me was just how many people's lives he had touched in the stupidly-short time he was on this planet for.  We came from all backgrounds, from all walks of life and yet this one person had, in his own unique and very special way, imprinted himself on all our hearts.  It saddens me desperately to think of all the things Jamie never got to do and will never get to experience; it saddens me even more to think he'll never truly know how many people he meant something to or how much we all loved him.  I realised on Wednesday that I never told Jamie enough times how much I loved him; how much I valued his friendship; what he meant to me and how he made me a better person.  I miss him every single day.  

So I guess that's sort of the point of this blog entry.  I'm not good at telling people how I feel about them, not even my closest friends and family, but it doesn't mean I don't care.  I've been incredibly fortunate to get to know some truly amazing people over the years; astonishingly, some of them consider me friends in spite of my weirdness and my antisocial attitude and my general "not very good at this stuff" stuff.  Some of us have been through some really tough times together and come out the other side stronger than ever.  Some of us have done nothing but laugh until we're almost sick.  The main thing is I know I can count on each and every single one of you, and that is what Jamie taught me.  You're not on your own.  You're never on your own.  There is always someone, somewhere, who cares about you and who can be called on to come help you out when you need it, no matter how big or small the issue is.  I may never be the type of girl who has deep and meaningful conversations with you about things, but I want you all to know it doesn't mean I don't love you any less.  I may be terrible at taking my own advice (something Jamie pointed out to me so often I considered getting it tattooed at one point) but I like to think I'm good at listening.  And being a shoulder to cry on.  And dancing wildly in inappropriate places.  And laughing like a fool over something which no other person on the planet except you and me would find even remotely amusing.

Someone once said to have good friends you have to be a good friend, but sometimes I wonder if that shouldn't be the other way round.  I am a better friend, and a better person, because people are good friends to me.  That is a rare and precious gift and I honestly thank each and every single one of you for it.  I only hope I can return the favour one day...

Stop! Or My Toddler Will Look Better Than Your Toddler!

You know when you read something and can't quite believe you've read it, so you read it a couple more times just to make sure you aren't going completely insane?  Apparently, this past month saw the launch of the inaugural  Global Kids Fashion Week, complete with couture catwalk shows where Mini-Moss's strutted their stuff in front of the fashion pack.  I'll say that again.  Global Kids Fashion Week.  With catwalk shows.  And child models.  

Ok, so I know fashion is big business, and I'm not naive enough to think that there isn't money to be made in selling clothes to children (£6.5 billion pounds in the UK, apparently.  Most of that is probably spent on replacing the trousers of small boys who cannot get through a day without skidding on their knees at some point) but a FASHION WEEK?!!  Someone please tell me I'm not the only person who thinks there's something inherently wrong in this?

It's not just the ridiculous amounts of money people spend on their children's clothes (according to the Indy, one mum at the catwalk show took along her two year old - a two year old!  To a fashion show! - and the little darling was wearing, and I quote, "a leopard-print jacket from Gap, gold metallic jeans 'just from Baby K', and patent knee-high Leila Kella boots" and said she would happily spend more money on her daughter's clothes than her own).  PATENT KNEE HIGH BOOTS!!!  She's TWO!!!!!!!!!!!!!  And that is apparently completely normal because this two year old "loves shopping".  Oh really?  Well then can I have her, because every two year old I've ever seen in a shop has either been screaming its head off or asleep.  If you have one that doubles as both cute shopping buddy and offspring, then I'm all in.  You could make a fortune.  Seriously, you should go on Dragons Den with this, they'd love it...

Before I even go anywhere else with this argument/rant, I would like to point out two things, both of which I would hope are glaringly obvious to any of you with even half a braincell.  Firstly, two year olds have a habit of being both slightly unsteady on the feet (thereby falling over a lot and either getting dirty or ripping holes in their hitherto-untouched clothes).  Secondly, they have a truly irritating habit of growing at a rate of knots when you least expect it, ensuring that there is absolutely NOTHING in their wardrobe that fits them practically overnight.  And don't even get me started on their shoes.  Bearing this in mind, WHY would you spend a small fortune buying them couture this that and the other when it will either be outgrown or damaged beyond repair within a week?!!  I mean what?!!  Actually, while we're on the pointing-out-the-glaringly-obvious thing, I would like to add that no two year old should be wearing patent knee high boots.  No child should EVER wear patent knee high boots.  Jesus Christ, are you INSANE?!!  No wonder the sexualistion of children seems to be on the up if this is considered acceptable behaviour.

That brings me to my second "wtf?!" moment.  One of the other mums at this fright show is, and again I quote the dear old Indy, "a personal stylist for other people's children" (she already has one of her own).  A STYLIST FOR CHILDREN?!!!!  Dear GOD, no wonder the rates of adolescent eating disorders and body dysmorphia are on the rise if children now have to compete with each other in the fashionista stakes at pre-school!!!  Don't talk to Chamomile, darling, her Pull-Up Pants are sooooo last season!!!

I would dearly love to be able to chalk this up purely to the realms of the Yummy Mummies and their ridiculous "we have so much money and time we don't know what to do with it all" weirdness, but sadly I don't think I can.  For, while Global Kids Fashion Week (god, that brings me out in a rash just typing it) is probably at the extreme end of things, there's no doubt that the overt sexualisation of children through their clothes has already seeped down to the high street (remember the bras for six year old's, anyone?  And those "slogan" t-shirts which are basically asking paedophiles and perverts to stare at your offspring?)  And the whole sense of "competing" and "fitting in" has also started seeping down.  Five year old's get admitted to hospital for anorexia.  My friend's daughter, aged seven, told me she was too fat to wear a swimsuit last summer.  (I cried, afterwards).  I see children in shops having the screaming ab-dabs because Mummy can only afford Primark and they want Pucci like Saskia done the road.

This madness has to stop.  What is so wrong with letting children be children; with letting them run around and cause havoc and ruin their clothes, which you don't mind about because you got them from a charity shop or Tesco or something (and what's wrong with a few holes anyway?)  They grow up too damn fast as it is, and there's enough pressure on them to comply with the Beauty Myth - boys as well as girls - when they reach adolescence.  Is it too much to ask that you let your two year old run around in battered dungarees and have FUN...?

Crime and...Punishment?

At some point in the next 12 to 24 hours, 42 year old Steven Ray Thacker will walk from his cell in the execution block at the state penitentiary and make his final journey to the chamber where the state of Oklahoma has sentenced him to die.  In December 1999/January 2000 Thacker murdered three people; Laci Dawn Hill, Forrest Reed Boyd and Ray Patterson.  Three victims in three days across three states.  By any account - and to anyone with even a shred of humanity and conscience - this was a despicable act and the perpetrator should rightly be prosecuted and punished.  In Oklahoma, this means Steven Ray Thacker will die.

I have always been against the death penalty.  Don't get me wrong, I fully believe that anyone who commits a crime should be duly punished for what they've done; I also believe, however, that the person should then be educated and rehabilitated in order to try and turn them into a fully-functioning member of society.  Sadly this is isn't always possible; a lot of my studies into serial murder and violent crime have taught me that sometimes a person cannot be rehabilitated and released - as one of my heroes, former FBI 'profiler' John Douglas says, how can you rehabilitate a person when there's nothing to rehabilitate to?  The likes of Ted Bundy or Jeffery Dahmer, for example, or someone like Ian Brady in this country, don't have anything inside them that any mental health professional or legal establishment could work with to produce a functioning member of society; whether by nature, nurture, some other 'explanation' or a combination of all of the above, some people are never going to be able to walk around in public without wanting to hurt and kill as many other people as violently as they can.  So yes, if you commit as heinous a crime as Steven Ray Thacker did then I fully support your being prosecuted for it.  There will be no tears from me in the public gallery when you are brought to trial and held accountable for your actions, regardless of whether you personally believe yourself accountable or not.  And if the Court, in its infinite wisdom, decides to sentence you to spend the rest of your  natural life behind bars because you are too dangerous to ever be released and too 'other', too 'gone' to respond to any form of rehabilitative procedure then I for one will be congratulating the judiciary on its wise and learned response.  I might sigh a futile sigh at the nature of Man; may even feel a little regret that you cannot be helped, but I will certainly feel a heck of a lot safer that you are behind the iron bars and solid stone walls of Her Majesty's Prison.  I would shake my head, shrug my shoulders, applaud a sense of Justice Well Done, and go on my merry way.

What I could not do, however, is sleep as easily if I knew you were to be executed...

The contradiction in terms is stark, I know.  There are people, many people, who cannot be helped and can never be freed; people who cost us taxpayers a small fortune to keep them and people who, sometimes, seem to be better off in many ways than some well-behaved segments of society.  We've all tutted over the Daily Mail's revelations of prisoners having pool tables and Sky TV and lord alone knows what else (although having watched the excellent documentary series about life inside Aylesbury Young Offenders Institution I suddenly see why all these things are necessary - to prevent the prisoners going stark staring bonkers and killing themselves, each other, or the excellent men and women of the Prison Service.  Frankly, the use of a few pool tables is a small price to pay if you ask me...)  But no matter how 'evil' we think a person is, no matter how reprehensible their crime and how deep their total lack of empathy or remorse, I cannot condone the idea of so-called civilised nations carrying out what is, to all intents and purposes, state sponsored murder.  Its the judicial equivalent of me smacking you on the bare arse with my belt while yelling at you that it's terribly, awfully wrong of you to hit your little sister.

The comparison may be trite but the example makes its point.  How can we, as honest, decent, upright citizens who abide by the moral code of our society, honestly accept that it's perfectly all right for the Government whose laws we obey to break their own rules?  Taking someones life is considered morally and legally wrong by most of us, yet when it comes to taking the life of someone like Steven Thacker - monstrous though his crimes are - we sit by and allow it to happen?  I have never understood how a world which claims to prize life so highly (look at the number of anti-abortion movements in America, for example) can at the same time be so wilfully dismissive of that same prized entity; or is it just that we can be picky about which lives we care about - unborn foetuses yes, but those who have committed a crime, no chance?

I've read many arguments against the death penalty over the years, not least the stark statistics which show that, far from being the deterrent the Powers-That-Be claim it to be, there are more and more people being convicted of the most violent and despicable crimes in states which still have the death penalty.  Many of those who are convicted of these crimes are subsequently sent to Death Row.  Of these individuals, one person is released from prison after an average of ten years after new evidence proves them innocent for every ten who are executed.  That terrifies me.  How many of those ten who didn't go free were also innocent?  Maybe none of them, but how can we be certain?  It's a lot easier to let someone go free after ten years in a jail cell, institutionalised though they will almost certainly be, than is it to attempt to make amends with a corpse.  The morality argument, the statistical burden of proof, the number of unknowns...that's why I support Amnesty International's work to end the use of the death penalty; it's why I'm supporting the One For Ten project...I just can't see any justification for taking a life as punishment for life.  In the very crudest terms, how is it making you suffer for what you've done if I just snuff you out?

But the most eloquent argument for ending the use of the death penalty I have ever read comes from Charity Lee, founder of The ELLA Foundation.  The Foundation is named after her daughter, who was sexually assaulted, beaten and murdered when she was just four years old.  The perpetrator?  Charity's son and Ella's brother Paris, who was thirteen at the time.  How any mother could go through what Charity has and still be sane is beyond me; that she has gone on to use her experiences to become such a powerful and eloquent speaker is remarkable, but what is even more remarkable is the way she speaks about why she doesn't believe in the death penalty.  The full text of her argument moved me to tears and I strongly recommend that you read it (it's too long to add to this blog but the link is here), but this is the part which sums up her feelings and which I wholeheartedly agree with, and it seems the perfect way to end this blog post...

"One way we rise above our base instincts is to believe, wholeheartedly, that all killing is wrong. Period. No matter who does the killing. All human life is sacred and should be treated as such, especially in our darkest hours as a human being. There is no justice in killing another human being. None. All it brings is more pain, more violence, more murder, into the world. I for one am trying to lessen all of the above in mine.

The Good, the Bad and the What-WERE-You-Thinking?!!

So it's Oscars time again, when Hollywood falls over itself to pat itself on the back and tell the world how clever it is.  By the time you read this, the little bald men will have been handed out and the glitz and glamour put away for another year, but let's be honest, who really watches the Oscars for the details of who gave what award to whom?  There's only ever been one reason to watch the overblown fabulousness that is the Oscars - to bitch about the dresses!!

Ok, firstly a special mention to nine year old Quvenzhané Wallis.  Not only was she truly phenonmenal as Hushpuppy in "Beasts of the Southern Wild", but she looked amazing in Amrani Junior at the awards.  And that dog bag?  The girl is starting a fashion trend...

Next to one of my favourite actresses ever, the gorgeous and talented Amy Adams in Oscar de la Renta.  This dress appears to have been a real love it or hate it gown, but I love it.  It's old-school glam and she pulls it off like an absolute pro.

On the subject of old-school glamorous redheads, I have to mention Jessica Chastain in Armani Privé and Nicole Kidman looking super-sparkly in  L'Wren Scott (Mick Jagger's new squeeze).  Jessica really brings old-school Hollywood to life and Nicole is just...well, la Kidman never fails to knock it out of the park on the big occasions!

             
       


Helen Hunt decided that the endless hours of trying on posh frocks in designers studios was waaaaay too dull and so did what any self-respecting woman would do when a big event comes around - hit the high street!  Not only is she amazingly talented but she wears H&M to the biggest awards ceremony in the world.  And pulls it off.  Bitch.

Reese Witherspoon's Louis Vuitton gown made me go green with envy.  Even though the dress was blue.  Reese has come a long way since Legally Blonde; these days she rocks the red carpet like a siren.  The fact her daughter Ava helped pick this dress just makes it even cuter in my eyes!

Zoe Saldana first came to worldwide attention being given a blue spray-paint job in Avatar.  No wonder she doesn't want to see the colour ever again...instead she wore a gorgeous Alexis Mabille Couture gown and looked sensational.

The Sweetheart of Mumbles, Catherine Zeta Jones, looked a bit like an Oscar in her golden Zuhair Muran dress.  If anyone could pull it off though, it was Mrs Douglas...

Kelly Osbourne has transformed herself from the sort of wild child you'd dread turning up at a party in an (almost) elegant young lady!  Her Tony Ward Couture dress was absolutely stunning and the purple hair is awesome!!

Amanda Seyfried wore one of my favourite designers, Alexander McQueen, and looked incredible.

Charlize Theron could wear a binbag and still look incredible.  In Christian Dioe Haute Couture she looked beyond amazing.  She's also an amazing actress, an incredibly intelligent, warm and witty woman and if I didn't like her so much I'd hate her.  Fact.

My best-dressed of the night, however, goes to Jennifer Lawrence.  Not only did she **SPOILERS** walk away with the top prize on the night, but in Christian Dior she looked like a cross between a fairy-tale princess and Grace Kelly.  It might have tripped her up but who wants practicality?  You don't get many chances in life to play dress-up like this, so props to her for seizing the chance and running with it.

Now for the not-so-good.  Firstly, Anne Hathaway.  Just...no.  It does nothing for you, darling, even if it IS Prada.

Naomi Watts' dress is too shiny and too sci-fi.

Jennifer Aniston was swamped in Valentino.

Kristin Stewart and Jennifer Garner both look lovely from the front, but the backs of those dresses ruin the look for me.

           

 


Olivia Munn looked like she was wearing curtains rather than Marchesa.

And the what-the-hell-were-you-thinking dress?  Well, Helena Bonham Carter has been slated (as usual) by the fashionistas for her dress on the night, but I personally love it because it's oh-so Helena.  I wasn't loving Jane Fonda's yellow-peril look, either, but again she's not exactly known for her "conservative" tastes.  This year there was no equivalent of the "swan dress", which was a little disappointing.  Come on, ladies, let's go for broke next year, huh...?

Tangible Spirits...

Sometimes a person will come into your life and you will have absolutely no idea how or why they are there. Usually you will know them; they are the unexpected playground ally, the first person to break your heart, the colleague who shares your love of crocheted cushion covers...each of them enters the sphere of your existence and, for good or ill, makes an indelible impression upon you.  Whether they remain life-long friends or pass through your orbit for a short time, you remain profoundly changed by the experience of knowing them and will carry them in your heart and mind, affected by their memory until the end of your days.

The person who has affected me most recently is dead.

I didn't know him; in fact, until a couple of years ago, I had no idea he even existed.  But fate has a funny way of bringing people to your attention and, for whatever reason, I now find myself indelibly bound up in a story that stretches back before I was even born...

When I was a small child, there lived in the bungalow next-door-but-one to my maternal grandparents a kind old lady by the name of Mrs Wilgrove - "Aunt Jess".  She passed away when I was six so my memories of her are few, but the abiding image I have of her is a gentle, sweet old lady whom my grandparents were very fond of.  After Jess died I – in the way of small children – blithely went on with my own life, only occasionally remembering the woman who had briefly been part of my experiences thus far.

That is, until a few years ago.

I had heard, in the years since Jess’ death, that she had had no family to speak of and that she thought of my grandparents in particular as a sort of ‘surrogate’.  The thought made me sad; Jess was a lovely woman and to think of her being on her own, especially at the end of her long life, was terrible.  The only other story I remembered about her up to this point was my grandad once telling me that Jess’ dad was a coal delivery man and had once delivered coal to the infamous murderer Dr Crippen, with young Jess helping him.  Being intrigued by serial killers, you can imagine what impact the revelation had on me at the time!  But that was all I really knew, or remembered, and it wasn't until I was helping my grandmother clear some things from her garage that Mrs Wilgrove and her story came back into my life.  Amongst all my grandad's old tools and the various detritus people accumulate over the years, I found an ice-cream tub with various small jewellery boxes, photos and an envelope in.  Not recognising anyone in the photos (or indeed the jewellery  I asked my grandmother about it and she told me it had belonged to Jessie Wilgrove and that, after she died and my grandparents were clearing out the bungalow, they had taken these things as keepsakes.  Looking through the photos and other bits and pieces, I was struck by two typed letters from the War Office, dated from towards the end of the Second World War, and that is the moment Edward came into my life...

Edward A. Wilgrove was the only surviving child of Jessie and Edward Wilgrove.  Born in 1923, Edward had a twin brother, William, who tragically died well before his first birthday.  Edward senior had been gassed during the First World War and suffered with poor lungs for the rest of his life; he and Jessie never had any other children.  The three of them carried on, a nice self-contained little family unit, until the advent of the Second World War.  This is where the War Office letters came in...

Edward junior, my Edward, had joined the 9^th Battalion of the Durham Light Infantry.  I have a photo of him in his uniform which Jessie kept all those years; he looks, as so many of them looked, so terribly young.  The 9^th Battalion DLI saw service throughout the war in several ‘hotspots’: North Africa, El Alamein, Sicily and on into Northern Europe and the battlefields of Normandy.  This is where the inevitable happened.  On the 17^th July 1944, at just 21 years of age, Private 5837293 Edward A. Wilgrove was killed in the service of his country.  The first of the yellowed letters from the War Office bears the grim tidings to his parents that his body was laid to rest in a temporary grave in a makeshift cemetery, until such time as it could be buried properly.  The second letter, dated early 1946, informs the reader that Edward’s body has now been laid to rest with all due ceremony and formality in the British War Cemetery at Bayeux.  Unfortunately the news of his son’s final resting place came too late for Mr Wilgrove; never a well man, he had passed away in December 1945, leaving Jessie to cope on her own.

My grandmother told me my grandad had always wanted to take Jess to the cemetery, so she could see her son’s grave and know exactly where he was (for surely every mother wants to know exactly where her children are?)  Unfortunately the opportunity never arose; in the end, Jessie was too unwell to make the trip and she died without ever being able to go and lay flowers on her child’s grave.

By this point in the story I was in tears.  The thought of the kindly old lady I so vaguely recalled from my childhood having no family left in the world, never getting to visit her son’s final resting place in person…it was awful.  I come from a close family and, whatever else we may be, we are always there for each other; I couldn't and can’t imagine what it must be like to have nobody at all to support you through what must surely be the most harrowing of experiences.  Jessie had my grandparents in the end, and they were very close, but I was haunted by the thought of her dying without ever being able to say some form of final goodbye to her son.  I asked if I could take the letters and the photos; my grandmother gave me the jewellery as well, which I still treasure to this day, but it’s the letters and the photo which haunt me the most.

I don’t know why Edward and his story has become something I feel so strongly emotionally attached to.  I knew his mother, yes, but only a little; I never knew Edward himself or had any reason to until that day we were clearing the garage.  But he’s part of me now; he and Jessie and Edward senior and poor little William who died so soon…they are all part of my life and the fabric of my existence and I can’t forget them.

I made a promise to myself the day I learned their story: that I would honour the intentions of my dear grandad and go to Bayeux, to stand in that cemetery and lay flowers on Edward’s grave.  It’s been a couple of years since I heard the story and swore to go but this year, by hook or by crook, I will make that journey.  In memory of Jessie, in memory of my grandad and on behalf of those who live so well now thanks to the sacrifices made on those battlefields, I will lay my flowers on the grave and, after sixty-nine years, let Edward know he isn't forgotten...

Opinions Are Like Bellybuttons...

...everyone except Sheldon Cooper has them (Sheldon, of course, has Facts).  

So the shortlist for the BBC Sports Personality of the Year contest has been announced this week and unsurprisingly, given the fact that Britain was the Olympic and Paralympic host country this summer, the list is dominated by several of our Golden Guys and Gals from those blistering, breathtaking weeks.  Take a bow Jessica Ennis, Mo Farah, Nicola Adams, Ben Ainslie, Katherine Grainger, Ellie Simmonds, Sarah Storey, David Weir, Sir Chris Hoy, Bradley Wiggins, Andy Murray and Rory McIlroy.  Trying to choose a top three from this list is enough to send a person crazy; trying to choose one overall winner is surely impossible.  I honestly cannot make up my mind which one I would go for; every time I think I have my top 3 (out of the 8 I’m really rooting for), I remember something someone else did and end up confused and bewildered all over again.  Let’s face it, between the Tour de France, the Ryder Cup and the two summer Games, we’ve been slightly spoilt for choice this year; coming up with a shortlist of twelve (more than the usual) must have been an absolute nightmare.

Sadly, however, Joe Public’s response to the list has been frankly ludicrous, for the most.  While I fully agree with people who have mentioned several notable ‘omissions’ (where in the hell is my Hannah Cockcroft nomination, people?!!  And why is there no nomination for Alistair and/or Johnny Brownlee, who were immense in the triathlon?  And were those of you compiling the shortlist not watching Jonnie Peacock silencing an entire stadium of 80,000 people with one finger?  And what the hell happened to the nomination for Laura Trott, which is the one most people seem to keep picking up on?  Plus away from the Olympic/Paralympic hoopla – what happened to Dario Franchitti?!!  How many more times does the guy have to be awesome before he gets a nod?), there have been some comments made that really, really put my back up.  Brace yourselves, people.  This one might get a little ‘ranty’…

Firstly, all those people moaning about Andy Murray being included “because he has no personality”.  Oh for goodness sake.  Now I’m not exactly the world’s greatest Murray fan (not if he’s playing my beloved Djokovic, anyway!) but to be a) so predictable and b) so pathetic is, frankly, pitiful.  So he may not be Mr Life and Soul of the Party or whatever when he’s interviewed.  That’s because he is a professional tennis player!!!  Not a professional party animal or a professional comedian or anything – a tennis player.  His job is to go out there and try to win his matches, and then try to deal with some moronic reporter shoving a microphone under his nose and asking stupidly-trite questions without either crying or yelling or punching Sue Barker.  You try it sometime and see how you get on.  He is not there to make you laugh or entertain you in any way other than by producing some bloody great tennis.  He’s being professional.  Look it up in a dictionary, would you?  And while you’re at it, look up the definition of “personality”.  Astonishingly, it has more than one meaning.  Guess which one they’re going for in this particular instance…?

Secondly, the ‘vote for John Terry’ campaign.  Ha ha, very funny.  Stop, my aching sides.  No really, stop, would you?  Otherwise I might scream, and I can go supersonic…I won’t go into a rant about this one because I think anyone with half a brain cell can figure out why that waste of space shouldn’t even be mentioned in the same breath as any of the other nominees – even Frankel and he’s a bloody horse!!!  Moving on…

…to the thing which has really, really, really got my back up.  Right now my back is so up I resemble Quasimodo.  I cannot fathom the sheer level of utter plebbiness of the moronic pond life that pass for members of the human race.  It makes me weep for humanity.  And for my own soul…

There are some people who have been questioning the inclusion of the three Paralympic athletes in the shortlist.  I will say that again.  People have been questioning the inclusion of David Weir (four gold medals, in a wheelchair), Ellie Simmonds (two golds, a silver and a bronze, not to mention smashing two world records while she did so, born with achondroplasia) and Sarah Storey (four gold medals in cycling, missing her left hand).  The reason for this?  Because they compete in the Paralympics and therefore in a smaller ‘talent pool’ than the likes of, say, Usain Bolt or Michael Phelps.

Ok, I’ll admit it – there are more able-bodied people in the world than there are disabled/differently-abled.  This is a fact of life, a quirk of fate, whatever you want to call it.  There always has to be an ‘other’ to something and, in the case of humanity, it is disability.  You don’t have to be Einstein to suss this out (as I have just proved by mentioning it here in my blog).  But you know what?  FOUR GOLD MEDALS.  How many have you got, Mr Four-Fully-Functioning-Limbs?  FOUR GOLD MEDALS.  You must have more than that, right, Mrs-Two-Hands?  TWO SMASHED WORLD RECORDS.  What have you got, Mr-and-Mrs-Average?

That’s right.

Nothing.

Because sadly for you being a moron hasn’t yet been approved as a sport by the IOC.  (But don’t give up hope – as soon as it is, you’re a sure fire winner for the title).

Ugh.

Allow me to illustrate the pointlessness of the seething mass of humanity with a few choice comments from the article on the BBC News website announcing the shortlist.  (Inability to spell and brain-dead statements all the “intellectual” property of their appropriate authors…)

“The paralympians faced a minute talent pool to compete against and thus in comparison to other professional sportspeople, shouldn't be up there. We're not supposed to look at tem as disabled right? Well then, there are more deserving people due to their feats against stronger competition. We've moved on from tokenism surely, and will get us no further.” – Nick Ebrell

Well, Mr Ebrell, I refer you to my above statement.  But by all means, since you form part of the larger ‘talent pool’, give Usain Bolt and Yohan Blake a call and book yourself in for the 100m final at the next world championships.  After all, it will make their achievement so much more incredible that they were able to go out against the rest of the wo…oh, hang on a minute.  That’s right, I almost forgot.  Like all other professional sportsmen and women they only compete against a tiny pool of like-minded and similarly-able individuals.  I guess that renders your argument invalid.  Next!

“Agree with number one. As much as the media tried making out, the paralympics registered very little...” – Our friend Mr Ebrell again.

Presumably you were on Mars for the eleven days of the Paralympics then, Nick?  And for the build up of at least a year beforehand?  In that case, I entirely forgive you for making the above statement.  You weren’t?  Oh.  Fail.  Presumably the fact that the 2012 Paralympics was the first Games to have ever sold out and the fact Channel Four cleared their schedules after the first two days due to public demand escaped your notice.  What were you doing, harvesting belly-button fluff?  Moving on…

“The example of Zinardi winning endurance events at 46 years old, while it is an inspiring achievement, shows there simply isn't the level of competition you find in the olympics. To say there is - Is just patronising nonsense.” – Il Pirata

Ooh, this one is possibly one of my favourites!!  Firstly, Mr Pirata (not your real name, I suspect; at least our friend Nick has the courage to identify himself), it’s ZAnardi, not ZInardi.  Secondly, your level of stupid is sublime.  Alex Zanardi nearly died in an absolutely horrific motor racing accident.  He nearly DIED.  As a result he lost both his legs and is now a Paralympic handbiking champion (2 golds and a silver, actually).  To put that into context for you, this involves ‘pedalling’ with your hands.  For miles.  Let’s see you try it and then tell me it doesn’t have the same level of competition as any other cycling event.  The man is, quite simply, an outstanding athlete.  Clearly you didn’t see the events though.  Your loss, frankly…

“Three Para-Olympians just smacks of quotas and isn't representative of general opinion. They are inspirational as a group but not memorable as individuals”. – Chris

Quotas?  Quotas?!!  What is this, the battle for cod fishing rights in the North Atlantic?!!  I refer you again to four gold medals, four gold medals, two smashed world records and two gold medals with a silver and bronze thrown in for good measure…

“At least 5 of this year's nominees are tokenism either because they are women or representative of disability but you would never get to hear of them as proper sporting interest. Finding success at the Olympics and Paralympics while done little else does not make them a sporting personality.” – hizento

Well, well, so we’ve gone from quotas to tokenism.  It must be silly-season, right?  Even my cat knew who Jessica Ennis was before the Olympics; she was the ‘Face of the Games’, for gods sake!  Were you living under a rock?!!

“I'm sorry if people get upset but there are a hugely disproportionate number of disabled athletes in this list. Look at the number of able bodied athletes compared to disabled and I'd be surprised if the ratio is 0.1/% not the 25% in this list. Positive discrimination it may be but discrimination it is none the less and that does a huge diservice to all athletes who've competed this year.” - RememberScarborough

Ri-ight…guess what?  I’m upset.  If anything, I think there should be more Paralympians in there (Hannah Cockcroft!  Jonnie Peacock!!  Dudes, where were you, seriously?!!)  In fact this year was so extraordinary that I think they should have had a separate load of awards (besides the medals, obviously) just for Team GB and Paralympics GB because they were extraordinary!!

“Hideously PC list. Where is Alastair Brownlee? Where is Alastair Cook? Where is Laura Trott? I haven't even heard of Sarah Storey, and Grainger took 4 attempts to win gold? Wow she must be amazing. Perhaps if Brownlee had a withered hand he'd have got in? Token nominations to fit the PC bill. BBC hang your head in shame!” – Steve Bradley

I’ll give you Laura Trott and Al Brownlee.  But Cooke?!!  Ah hahahaaaaaa!!!  I’m sorry, what have the cricket team done this year, exactly?  Or him personally?  Do shut up.

“Eliie was swimming against people with arms and legs missing. Now call me the cynic (and I'm no swimming expert) but you can't tell me beating them at swimming is not that great an achievement; small bodied or not. :-(

Ellie - ridiculous choice. Ennis the same. She won 1 gold medal. So did many other's, but not all are implanted in to 'Lord' Coe's clique.” – Bazza the Bubble

Someone should have listened to LEXI, clearly…

There are other various delightful comments in similar veins, but it basically boils down to the fact that the Paralympians shouldn’t be there because there are less of them competing so it’s a smaller playing field therefore their achievements are less and they only got listed because of tokenism/the PC brigade.  *facepalms*  What complete and utter twaddle, says I.  I know everyone’s entitled top their opinion but actually some of this could be classed as quite offensive – I couldn’t post some of the more moronic posts because the dear old Beeb deleted them.  Just as well, really…

Anyway, to end this rant on a much more positive note, I think I finally decided who my choice is.  For his sheer tenacity, determination and astonishing sporting prowess, for his brilliant personality and ferocious competitive spirit, for four gold medals in less than two weeks, and for making me scream for 5000 meters and then burst into tears of joy after my tears of disappointment that Oscar Pistorius was robbed on the line – for making my evening at the Olympic Stadium so utterly astonishingly memorable and joyous – I will be voting for the Weirwolf himself.  Ahhhh-oooooooohhhhh!!