The Honking of the Geese
7 September

Pretty much on cue, September blew in and so did the geese.

For some reason, they seemed to by-pass this area in the spring. The usual V-trails in the sky were missing. However, they're back - raucous and honking across the sky.

We had a fairly cruddy Bank Holiday Weekend. It either rained or was grey and gloomy. We were very close to putting on the central heating at one point. We did manage more work on the back wall and we did get to see my parents and I did go to Quaker Meeting and organise a children's session. I'm really pleased that we are making progress with the wall. It seems to have taken an age but we are now very close to getting the shed bought and installed.

We also caught up with Angels and Demons on DVD. After the awful experience of The Da Vinci Code, I really wasn't expecting very much from this film at all. Maybe because of my low expectations, I was pleasantly surprised. It rattled along at a fair old pace without pausing to explain any of the absurdities of the plot. 120 minutes passed quite reasonably.

Come Tuesday, it was 1 September and the sun shone brightly thus allowing mothers across the land to bemoan the fact that the weather is always better once the kids have to go back to school. Thursday morning, however, was dreadful with almost monsoon conditions. It must have kept the young people well and truly indoors for, although it was the day for the schools to re-open, I didn't actually see a child in uniform until Friday on my way home from work.

Thursday night, Ross and I went to the private view of one of Ross's friends and colleagues, Donna. It was held at the Novas Contemporary Urban Centre which is the same space in which Robert performed with Barebones back in March and which Ross exhibited in during the Capital of Culture year. The exhibition included a range of beautifully crafted works of which this sculpture entitled Sankofa, made out of African Iroko, was the highlight for me.

It being a small world in Liverpool, we also bumped into teachers from the Primary School at which both Donna and Ross have done work and where I hope to do some voluntary work during this next year. We chatted and I now have a start date confirmed for Monday 21 September so that's one more hurdle surmounted. By Christmas, I should know whether or not I should be looking for a change in circumstances.

As the week rolled by, Ross and I also caught up with Wuthering Heights televised in a new adaptation by ITV. I was impressed. I don't like the book. I find the timescales tortuous. Because of the similar names over the generations, I find it hard to remember who is who and what is happening when. And I also think that it is completely over-wrought. This adaptation didn't, couldn't, shirk that aspect of the work. In every other way, for me, it was the clearest telling of the tale in its fullest that I have come across so far. It even made me want to go back and take another look at the novel, which is a mighty achievement.

Mostly this was down to the cast. Tom Hardy was superb as Heathcliff. I simply don't understand the urge to hate and destroy. It's not in my make-up. Hardy made me believe that a man could be so motivated even if I didn't understand it. Andrew Lincoln brought the milksop character of Edgar Linton to life as did Burn Gorman with the drunkard, Hindley. I was less happy with Charlotte Riley's Cathy which felt a bit lightweight and Sarah Lancashire's Nelly did not seem to age with the passing years as did the characters around her. Rosalind Halstead, however, turned in a fine performance as the wronged and deceived Isabella. Good stuff.

I'm aware that I don't always comment on world events as much as I might. Wars and famines quite often pass this Journal by whilst the vicissitudes of the weather and a well-turned buttock are often worth a mention.

However, there are a few things that I want to put on my record.

On 20 August, Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi was released from a Scottish jail on compassionate grounds. He is the only person who has ever been convicted of an offence in connection with the Lockerbie bombing which claimed 270 lives in 1988. Megrahi has terminal prostate cancer. The prognosis is that he will die shortly.

The decision was made by the Scottish government and by Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill in particular. He has made the following statement.

"Mr al-Megrahi did not show his victims any comfort or compassion. They were not allowed to return to the bosom of their families to see out their lives, let alone their dying days. No compassion was shown by him to them.

"But that alone is not a reason for us to deny compassion to him and his family in his final days. Our justice system demands that judgement be imposed but also that compassion be available.

"For these reasons and these reasons alone, it is my decision that Mr Mr Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al-Megrahi, convicted in 2001 for the Lockerbie bombing, now terminally ill with prostate cancer, be released on compassionate grounds and be allowed to return to Libya to die."

This is a decision which has not been been widely acclaimed on the international scene.

I think that it is the sanest political decision which has been made so far this decade and I applaud the Scottish executive for showing courage and compassion in the face of international opposition. If Western armies are in Afghanistan to fight for democracy (and I think that that is debatable) then it seems to me absurd to attempt to prevent a democratically elected government from doing something which is perfectly legal within its own judicial system simply because you don't like it.

Elsewhere, we saw events to mark the seventieth anniversary of the beginning of the Second World War. There were many things happening in Poland, for example, and, in Prague, a train left the main station bound for London. It commemorated the train which did not leave in August 1939. On board were elderly people who had left Prague on earlier trains that year when they were but children. Also on board were the sons and daughters of those who had travelled but not lived long enough to see this day. All were of Jewish heritage and had taken part in the system known as Kinder Transport.

In Prague, this was organised by a young British diplomat by the name of Nicholas Winton. He was 100 this year and was present in London to greet the train when it arrive at Victoria Station. As part of his birthday celebrations, he took a flight in a microlite. It was piloted by the daughter of one of the children he helped to save. He is an extraordinary man and a true hero. Compassionate, brave, mild and unassuming. The world is always in need of such people.